Garbage’s Shirley Manson has said the reason their current North American tour will be their last is due to “the thievery of the record industry”.
They kicked off their ‘Happy Endings’ tour in Orlando earlier this month and have indicated that they are “unlikely to play many of the cities” in the run “ever again”.
During a show at The Anthem in Washington DC on Wednesday (September 17), the frontwoman took a moment to explain their decision not to continue with major headline tours in the future.
“We have as a band decided that, due to basically the economics of the music industry, that we have to curtail our headline touring business,” she told the crowd. “It has, thanks to the thievery of the record industry, made touring very, very difficult.”
“We’re not complaining, we’ve had a fucking great run. I bring this up only because my concern is of course for young musicians who go out there and tour, they’re holding down jobs, they take two weeks off their work and they go around the country. Sometimes they’re sleeping in their van, sometimes they’re staying in really, really dodgy so-called motels and it’s dangerous and it’s really unacceptable and it really has to stop. Whatever’s going on, it really has to stop. It’s unsafe and it’s unacceptable.”
Garbage Shirley Manson explains why they are done touring9/17/25The Anthem Washington, DC#fblifestyle #garbage #shirleymanson
Posted by Rock N Roll Experience on Wednesday, September 17, 2025
Recommended
“So we have just decided that the economics have become untenable, so this is kind of the last time that we’ve decided we’re going to get on a bus and just tour all over North America. It’s a fantastic privilege and it’s so beautiful and exciting and amazing. And all the more so because I doubt that we’ll do a tour this size ever again.
She continued: “We all feel that we’ve been so immensely privileged and we’ve enjoyed unbelievable support from our fans, from you. At times in the music industry, they’ve told us we’re old, we’re over, nobody’s interested, nobody gives a fuck, nobody wants to play us on radio, nobody wants to interview us. And then you lot came along. You were like, ‘get behind us, Satan’. And we won’t forget it.”
As the members of the band raised their drinks to the Washington crown, Manson added: “We want to drink to your amazing collective health, we don’t know if we’ll ever see you again, maybe we will, maybe we won’t. But we all want you to be healthy and happy. Stay kind, stay adventurous, stay curious, ask lots and lots of questions, surround yourself with beautiful animals and natural and really, really good people. And if they’re shitty people, get rid of them. If they’re great people, here’s to you.”
Speaking to NME last year, Manson opened up about the crushing and “abusive” financial strains of the music industry.
“Now what you have are musicians who are independently wealthy – maybe they come from a wealthy family – and they can start to carve out a career for themselves in the music industry,” the NME Icon Award winner told us. “You have the old guard who made records before 1995; they themselves can survive. Then the artists who enjoy phenomenal success also survive.
“What you lose are the baby starter bands coming from working class beginnings and any middle class of musicians. They’re not the ones who are making really accessible, mainstream-sounding music – but the ones who take risks. Perhaps they’re making music that’s perhaps super heavy, that’s esoteric and strange.
Manson added: “You can hear that capitalist and economic strain in today’s music. It’s nonsense and it’s a heartbreak. Everyone is losing out. What’s happening to young musicians – and I underline the word young – is a fucking outrage. Somebody in government needs to go and help them out, because this is not right. It’s abusive.
In a recent post on Instagram, the band wrote: “We haven’t played an extensive headline tour like this one in the States for almost a decade. If the truth be told, it is unlikely we will play many of the cities on this tour ever again.”
They continued, saying: “We are going out in style and we hope you will join us. That’s life my friends. Nothing stays the same forever. Everything must change. All beautiful things come to an end.”
Visit here to find a list of remaining dates and more details, check out the full setlist from the Orlando opening show here, and go here for tickets.
Garbage released their new album ‘Let All That We Imagine Be The Light’ in May. In a five-star review, NME wrote: “While the world can often feel like a dark place, there is a sense of empowerment that can be reached by letting in the light.”
Speaking to NME about the theme of love that runs through the album, Manson recently told us: “I’ve never really written about love very much. I always think it’s been written about by people a thousand more talented than me. I’m just not a romantic person, really.”