Concert Review - Garbage - Auckland - 3rd December 2025
Presented by Frontier Touring
Garbage Live in Auckland - Photo Credit Megan Moss
Review By: Faith Hamblyn
Artist/Band: Garbage
Venue/City: Auckland Town Hall, Auckland, New Zealand
Date of Event: 3rd December 2025
Lips opened for Garbage’s Auckland Town Hall gig, which was in a lull in the torrential rain. Their quirky garage indie-pop fit well in a venue full of vintage and brand-new alternative-rock fans; mums and their Smashing Pumpkins-shirted kids. Lips fans boogied in the strobe lights. Their second track, Empty Hours, was contemplative, a lonely reflection on uncertain love. Swirling patterns were projected on the wall behind the stage, and a big pair of red lips sat in the stands. They matched the ones on the drum kit – the band’s name made flesh.
The music turned retro rock and roll, with the guitarists on backing vocals. As the lips were spotlit in red against purple, they turned out to be a mannequin with a mouth as its head. All in the vein of indie-weird for Heave Ho!, a kitschy, Cootie Cuties-style banger. Your Deodorant Doesn’t Work was cute, catchy and funny, asking, ‘What would Cher do?’ My guess is a deadpan kooky quip, if the mood is right.
Lips was punky neurotic fun, but it was time for some other cherry lips. With velvety blue light, Laura Palmer’s Theme played, and Garbage launched into There’s No Future In Optimism from their latest album, Let All We Imagine Be The Light. Wearing a bias-cut chain-link space-marine-type outfit, Shirley Manson looked like a kick-ass queen.
Version 2.0’s I Think I’m Paranoid had the audience singing along. This was followed by Vow, from the self-titled debut. Shirley Manson sounds better now, more assured, and she has earned swagger that at the time she could only hint at.
Run Baby Run from Bleed Like Me had chicks high in the stands grooving, people waving signs and a Scottish flag in the audience and a stylish, steady funk bassline from Nicole Fiorentino. She added in backing vocals where the studio versions would feature overdubbed Shirley vocals.
Via Manson’s Dr Who TARDIS, Garbage took us back to 1995 for Not My Idea. Steve Marker, now sporting a wizard’s beard, attacked Butch Vig on drums with, fittingly, a grunge-style guitar. Shirley added in a couple of lines of New Order’s Temptation, which was electro-cool.
She introduced Hammering In My Head from Version 2.0 by saying they pushed out that second baby quick – ‘No wonder my vagina’s sore; sorry,’ which earned her a rimshot. So far, so fun, but it was from here that the gig captured my heart – #1 Crush, a study of Romeo + Juliet-level obsession with red and deep-pink lights; easily the best thing from Baz Luhrman’s film. The crowd whistled and cheered, and it gave me chills.
Bleed Like Me followed, a self-described song for the weird and tortured, a Lou Reed-style celebration of outsiderdom. And then it was back to the self-titled debut era for a song not for J K Rowling – Manson explained, ‘The LGBT community will always have our support and love, and fuck everybody else!’ – the glorious Queer. The crowd sang along with the bassline, and it remains one of their strongest songs, along with Androgeny and Cherry Lips from what must be their ally trilogy.
Chinese Fire Horse was a feminist anthem, and the bassline, appropriately from Nicole, slaps. Push It from Version 2.0 is a postmodern interpolation of The Beach Boys’ Don’t Worry Baby, with maximum strobe lights and rapturous applause.
For the encore, Shirley was presented with a disco-ball necklace for Stupid Girl, followed by I’m Only Happy When It Rains, both from their self-titled debut. The audience were on their feet, the torrential Auckland rain forgotten.
Garbage Setlist
There’s No Future in Optimism
Hold
I Think I'm Paranoid
Vow
Run Baby Run
The Trick Is to Keep Breathing
Not My Idea
Hammering In My Head
Wolves
#1 Crush
Bleed Like Me
Queer
Chinese Fire Horse
When I Grow Up
Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go!)
Push It
The Day That I Met God
Encore
Stupid Girl
Only Happy When It Rains
