Spooner were one of those '70s/'80s American garage pop bands whose career was easy to dismiss. Based in Wisconsin, they played with many of the independent label bands that passed through Madison, but they didn't get out of town much themselves. Their three albums passed without much notice. Spooner probably would have remained a hardly-visible footnote to alternative rock history if their drummer, Butch Vig, hadn't turned into one of the current era's pre-eminent producers (Nirvana, Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins, etc.). Garbage is the band that evolved out of Spooner, who evolved into Firetown.

Three of Garbage's members, Vig, bassist Duke Erikson, and guitarist Steve Marker, hail from the ashes of Spooner. The fourth member is English vocalist Shirley Manson, whose pedigree stretches back through a series of British bands with excellent hairdo's. Garbage's sound welds Manson's surprisingly bluesy delivery with the American trio's avante-pop instrumental stylings, which might be best described as having a weird hard rock-cum-pomp edge. Alternately reminiscent of such disparate bands as late-period Tubes (""Only Happy When It Rains""), early Pretenders crossed with Big Beat-era Sparks (""Not My Idea""), and even Todd Rundgren with female vocals (""Supervixen""), Garbage's sound is all over the place. A lot of it even reminds me a bit of Spooner, although Shirley's voice certainly adds a whole new thing to these guys' sound, as does the way that they use tapeloops for rhythm tracks on several tracks.

There are a few ballads on Garbage's eponymous debut album, but most of the songs are driving rockers, seemingly designed to get young feet moving and young heads wagging. But I don't get the sense that the album is a coherent whole, so much as it's a collection of clever ""found"" ideas. Of course, recycling is central to the whole notion of garbage collection, so maybe the band's just making some sort of deep conceptual point here. I'm afraid, however, that Garbage's music lacks focus mostly because they're a ""studio band,"" rather than one that hones its material in front of an audience prior to recording. Perhaps before they cut their next album, Mr. Vig can get some time away from the studio so that the band can actually play some live dates. I'm certain that Garbage would sound sweeter if they did.