SAN FRANCISCO -- Garbage guitarist/keyboardist Duke Erikson may have been overly modest after the band's first gig promoting its new album, Version 2.0, on Wednesday night. "We're a little tentative," Erikson said of the intense hour-and-a-half show at the Warfield Theater. "We could feel it."

But if the 19-song set from the techno-pop quartet -- singer/lyricist Shirley Manson, guitarists/keyboardists Steve Marker and Erikson and drummer Butch Vig -- was at all tentative, it didn't seem that way to those in the audience. Garbage came through with a loud, electronic-tinged set of hook-driven pop songs such as "Queer" (RealAudio excerpt) and "Stupid Girl" that had the sold-out crowd raising its fists, pogoing up and down and singing along.

There also was nothing tentative about the way the group kicked off the show, walking onto the darkened stage to the strains of some Esquivelesque lounge music and ripping straight into the first single from the new album, "Push It" (RealAudio excerpt). Manson, dressed in her customary black micro-mini-dress that left little to the imagination, quickly established the mood for the night by hissing out the chorus of the song and working the stage in her caged-tiger prowl.

Abetted during the set by touring bass player Daniel Shulman, the other three members of the band -- dressed all in black -- exuded a calm, cool demeanor as they worked their way through much of the new album. The musicians imbued their highly polished studio concoctions with a noisier, dirtier sound that relied heavily on the effects-laden guitars of Marker and Erikson.

Manson hit her stride early in the set as she crooned the lyrics to "Special" with her spot-on vocal homage to Pretenders leader Chrissie Hynde. Later, she bounced around the stage like a boxer, punching out a throaty vocal rendition of "Fix Me Now."

A minute prior to beginning "Stupid Girl" (RealAudio excerpt), Manson apologized for the first technical problem of the tour. Other than that, the show went off without a hitch, building in intensity as the band delivered one hit or hit-sounding song after another.

In addition to the generous helping of songs from both albums, Garbage offered up cool reditions of "#1 Crush" (their mesmerizing contribution to the "Romeo & Juliet" soundtrack album) and "Push It" b-side "Thirteen."

"I thought they were incredibly tight for the first show of the tour," said fan Lois Langevin, 30, after the show. Langevin, who said she had not yet heard the new album, praised the fresh tracks for exploring new territory and said she liked "all the other stuff going on."

The "other stuff" Langevin referred to was the wall of noise, drum loops and electronic sounds that Vig and the guitarists triggered throughout the show. Those effects made songs such as "Queer" sound like they were being remixed live with odd doses of spacey wah-wah guitar or off-kilter, mid-song organ solos.

Yet, at times, the band could be extremely visceral. For an ensemble known primarily as a studio group that shuns the conventions of rock, Garbage's guitar-heavy renditions of the "Queer" B-side "Trip My Wire" and the pseudo-industrial "I Think I'm Paranoid" sounded raw and immediate.

And, despite his feelings that the show was a bit timid, Erikson said after the show that Garbage are ready to tour for the next year-and-a-half, as long as fans keep coming out to see them. If that does happen, it can only lead to an even tighter show, Vig said. The band played at least 200 shows during the course of its first tour, and by the time it was done, "we really felt like a band," Vig explained.

Garbage aren't the only ones willing to work at promoting Version 2.0 until its sales match or exceed the four-times platinum status of their debut album. Almo Sounds co-founder and legendary record man Jerry Moss (who started A&M Records with Herb Albert in a garage and turned it into one of the most successful indie labels of all time) proclaimed that Almo was willing to release singles and promote the new Garbage album well into next year. "They make great pop records," Moss said.

Hanging out backstage after the show, Vig said Garbage would jet off that night to Los Angeles for a promotional appearance on L. A. modern rock giant KROQ the next morning. After a video shoot for "I Think I'm Paranoid" in L.A. on Friday (May 22), they'll be off to Toronto for another gig. "As needed during this tour, they'll be entering recording studios to cut B-sides," said Almo Sounds general manager Paul Kremen, noting that new songs and remixes would likely appear on all singles released off Version 2.0. "Generally, they write and record B-sides really fast."

A few weeks earlier, Marker said he expected to have "about 20 minutes" of free time over the next year. But he took a few minutes after the Warfield show to sit down and chat with fans backstage. There, he recounted Garbage's recent record-release party in their hometown of Madison, Wis. "We had Neil Diamond and Abba impersonators for entertainment," Marker said, laughing. "I don't really remember much about that night."

SonicNet Editor-in-Chief Michael Goldberg contributed to this report.