Garbage : Shut Your Mouth

This is not what we were promised. When Garbage first pitched up in the mid-'90s, they were primed to be a futurist techno-grunge steamroller, sleekly flattening everything in its path with unyieldingly marshall beats and purring guitars. No matter that her cohorts looked like ageing chemistry teachers: Shirley Manson was so much of a carrot-topped cybervixen that she was practically pixelated. And now this. Displaying a shocking lack of awareness of the finer points of social etiquette, 'Shut Your Mouth' is lacklustre autopilot Garbage, combining clubfooted beats with lascivious wah-wah and - woah, steady there! - scratching. Garbage are not a band sounding dated and irrelevent suits particularly well.

Pat Long