Circa 1990s, being dark and grungy, was considered cool. The band Garbage was the epitome of all this and its front-woman, Shirley Manson was edgy full of angst delivering lines from their tracks like “Stupid Girl”, “Supervixen” and “Only Happy When It Rains”.

I’m a huge fan of their first album and all albums that comes after. I even have a huge Garbage poster plastered on a wall in my room during my high school days. Just ask anybody who were unfortunate enough to have stepped into my room that time.

Therefore, obviously I was very excited to hear that they have a new album out. The band went on an indefinite hiatus back in 2005, and now are back with their first studio album in seven years.

Everything essentially ’90s alt-rock is present here in “Not Your Kind Of People”. The dark fuzzy guitars and grungy sounds and powerful female lead vocal were all spot on. I should be happy, contend and pleased, but I was not.

The album “Not Your Kind Of People” feels like they were a band trying too hard to be the ’90s legendary band, Garbage. This album feels like a really good imitation of ’90s dark alt-rock band I know and love. It feels like they are imitating themselves, if that were even possible..

I’ve to admit that this album sounded dull and outdated to me. I hate to have to write this down, because I love them.

What happen? Garbage is not a run of the mill wannabe band. They are legends to some. The band itself has a fine pedigree of kick-ass musicians. Drummer Butch Vig had worked with Nirvana, Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins, Blink182 and Green Day.

My guess is that they had followed every expect of the formula that had made them big during the ’90s to the most microscopic notes, and they forgot to innovate. What was edgy in the ’90s is not ‘edgy’ now.

Listening to the whole album sounds like just another mediocre band, releasing an album just for the sake of releasing an album. To me the album feel soulless and there isn’t much heart in it. It kills me to have to write that.

Then again, I might be wrong. Maybe the result is exactly what the band wants and it’s exactly what their fans wanted from them. “You are awesome, don’t ever change.” check your high school yearbook, most probably you had someone sign it and that was what he/she wrote. Maybe I’m just ‘not the kind of people’ for this album.

For those who thinks that “Not Your Kind Of People” is the best thing that had ever happen, then most probably they never did get over the ’90s. Don’t get me wrong, the ’90s isn’t a bad era to get stuck in.

Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t say that the album was bad. Technically it’s a perfect Garbage album. Maybe that’s the problem, that it’s too perfect of a Garbage album.

Listening to this album made me miss them more. I ended up digging my CD collection looking for their 1995 debut self title album, ‘Garbage’.