Rating: 4/5

FOLLOWING an "indefinite" hiatus in 2005 after becoming disenchanted with music industry politics, Garbage - Shirley Manson, Duke Erikson, Steve Marker and Butch Vig - reformed last year.

They are back with an album that is fresh yet keeps to the band’s individual sound, straddling alternative rock and electronica.

Opening track Automatic Systematic Habit kicks in with a driving beat and demands to be turned up loud. New single Battle In Me has a chorus that rattles like machine gunfire and Control’s guitars and harmonica invoke a hot and dusty trek across the desert with Scottish singer Manson at her most menacing. A triumphant, bold and ballsy return.

Lisa Allen