Phoenix, AZ – Garbage, with special guest Starcrawler, played a sold-out show at the Van Buren in Phoenix on November 2, 2025, the penultimate stop of their “Happy Endings” tour, which marks their final North American run.
Starcrawler Heats Up the Stage
Starcrawler is a great opener for Garbage. Formed in 2015 in LA while still in high school, the group is next-generation punk/glam rock with a nod to its old-school roots. Front person Arrow de Wilde is anything but boring; her stage presence is marked by constant motion, demanding her audience’s rapt attention. The all-male band is politely dressed; the amps and microphones are painted in bright screaming pink. The visual message is everything and everyone is a backdrop to de Wilde, and it works.
What about the music, you ask? It’s hard. It’s fast. It’s a gut-punch barrage of guitar and drums and vocals. Starcrawler is not there to coddle you and slowly warm you up. No. They blast at you from the first second they are on stage. The opening song, “Good Time Girl,” is an excellent opening choice, and pardon the pun, sets the stage for who de Wilde is as a performer. Whether playing their original music or performing covers, Starcrawler is as fun to listen to as they are to watch. A friend of ours who saw the Denver show described de Wilde as Mick Jagger hyped up, and I think it’s a wonderfully accurate description.
De Wilde is so energized in her performance that she underestimates the limitations of her physical environment. Toward the end of their set, de Wilde climbed down from the stage and attempted to stand on the very top narrow rail of the barrier to get closer to the crowd, momentarily causing security to scramble as they ran to catch her and prop her up. The crowd loved it, and eventually, security carried her back to the stage. She never missed a single note during the entire time. There were moments of wild head tosses followed by rebelliously hawked loogies that would have made a young Johnny Rotten proud.
Starcrawler’s hard-hitting sound and rebellious energy promise a fresh take on punk and alternative rock, fitting for a Garbage opener.
Band members: Henri Cash (guitarist); Tim Franco (bass); Seth Carolina (drummer); Bill Cash (pedal steel/guitar); Arrow de Wilde (vocals)
Setlist:
Garbage Delivers a Bittersweet Performance
By the time Garbage took the stage, the crowd was completely amped up. Shirley Manson took the stage, appearing at first a tad formal in her body language as the last notes of “Laura Palmer’s Theme” played out. She kicked off with “There’s No Future in Optimism,” and seemed to calculate the crowd’s mood for the night. The crowd was ready; with the news that this was the last North American tour, everyone was extremely happy they bought tickets. Partway through the show, Manson noted it was the first show to sell out on the tour, and thanked everyone who turned out.
Manson is an iconoclast because of decades of surviving the trials and tribulations of the music industry and developing a tough exterior to weather the most abusive criticisms. She is not afraid to speak her peace. In addition to the 30-year legendary music catalog, this quality is what endears her so deeply to her fans. She will stop a show to get unruly fans under control, or to make sure children have proper hearing protection (both things happened during this show). She is the human embodiment of a honey badger. She does not give a shit, and fans love and respect her for that.
Manson took the crowd on a musical journey through the decades, leading up to the 2025 release, “Let All That We Imagine Be the Light.” She reminisced to the audience about their fourth album “Bleed Like Me,” sharing the frustration of struggles with their record company at the time, as demands were made to sell more copies, even though Garbage had already hit the million-record mark with previous releases. It is these little glimpses of their band life that clue you in to what has made Manson who she is today.
Speaking of “Bleed Like Me,” before Garbage played the title track from the 2005 release, Manson called out true Garbage fans get the song, and said, “We are all freaks in the freak show.”
Garbage did not disappoint. With the encore, the set was 19 songs long, not including restarting “Run Baby Run” after Manson addressed a crowd issue in her wonderfully blunt way.
As I sit and review interviews regarding the decision to end North America tours due to the “thievery of the record industry,” a part of me cannot help but speculate about the phrasing of “North America” in the announcement, rather than a reference to touring anywhere. Maybe it is me hoping Garbage will continue somehow, that somewhere there will still be Garbage concerts. My speculations are ironic and futile, but like the theme of the set-opening song, “There’s No Future in Optimism,” I am an eternal optimist and hope that we will see Garbage again. If this really is the end of Garbage tours, then I count myself lucky I have seen them twice and thank the band profusely for 30 years of amazing kickass music.
Band members: Duke Erikson (guitar/bass/keyboards); Butch Vig (drums); Steve Marker (guitar/keyboards); Shirley Manson (vocals)
Setlist:
Encore:
