Garbage (3.5 stars)
Bleed Like Me
After a four-year hiatus and near-breakup, alt-rockers Garbage return with their fourth album to a musical climate not particularly hospitable to their brand of slick, electronic-influenced pop-rock. Perhaps sensing the shift in tastes, the band has markedly scaled back the electronic elements, enlisting studio drummer Matt Walker and Foo Fighter Dave Grohl to play live on various tracks, and pushing the synthesizers and loops into the background on most songs.
Although this probably won't fool people into thinking they're garage rockers, it does serve to highlight the fact that, even largely stripped of the rocktronica sound that was groundbreaking on their 1995 debut, Garbage's songwriting is top-notch. Songs like "Run Baby Run" and "Boys Wanna Fight" are instantly memorable pop nuggets, and singer Shirley Manson is still one of rock's finer chroniclers of darkness and angst.
When the electronic elements come back to the forefront on songs like "Metal Heart" and "Why Don't You Come Over," they never overpower the music and are a reminder of the interesting sound the band crafted on earlier releases. It may be too late for Garbage to regain the spotlight they enjoyed in their '90s heyday, but Bleed Like Me proves they are still capable of turning in the same perfectly crafted music.
Lisa Marie Presley (2 stars)
Now What
After her first album got more attention from Larry King than the public, Lisa Marie Presley returns with the answer to the question few asked: Now What.
Do you ever wonder what Anne Sexton would sound like with the aid of a rock band and Pro-Tools? Of course not. But the King's daughter can make any record she wants, even if it is confessional poetry molested into the shape of slick pop. And that wasn't a joke about a certain ex-husband.
OK, so her tabloid life means her navel-gazing is of greater general interest than your regular, mediocre singer-songwriter or even messed up celebrity kid. In fact, you can ignore the music altogether and the liner notes are still a hoot: barely literate and packed with exclamation points and emoticons like this reminiscing about bonding with Pink: "I believe it was around 4 a.m. one night, drunk on the floor barking at each other lol :)" Ah, friendship!
But Presley may one day learn that writing songs about your drama isn't the same thing as making honest music. The sole highlight is an unlisted bonus track: the Ramones' "Here Today Gone Tomorrow." Odd, that on this simple rock cover, Presley sounds more engaged and musically sincere than her performance on the rest of her disc. But besides that cut, Now What is all generic music and forgettable tunes featuring Presley's American Idol vocal histrionics matched to her irrepressible potty mouth.