Biography for
Shirley Manson More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

26 August 1966, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK

Birth Name

Shirley Anne Manson

Nickname

Shirl
Queen Helen

Height

5' 7" (1.70 m)

Spouse

Eddie Farrell

(7 September 1996 - 2003) (divorced)

Trade Mark

Her deep singing voice

Dark red hair

Trivia

Singer for the band Garbage

Is asthmatic.

Her father was a biology teacher, her mother a singer.

Has two sisters

She dropped out of high school at 16. Since then, she has been in bands such as Autumn 1904, Wild Indians, Goodbye Mr Mckenzie and Angelfish.

She was the lead singer of Angelfish by the time she was discovered by Butch Vig and Steve Marker.

She is the author of the handwriting in Garbage's debut album.

Her former husband is a sculptor.

Lead singer, lyricist, guitarist, and co-producer on Garbage's three albums - the 1995 debut release 'Garbage', 1998s follow up 'Version 2.0' and 2001s 'beautifulgarbage'. These albums have sold over 10 million copies to date.

She quit smoking after her husband's nephew died of cancer at age seven

Her favorite singer is Frank Sinatra

She has an orange Fender Strocaster wich she named "Rita"

She had piano lessons as a child.

Butch, Duke and Steve wore kilts to her wedding.

She was in the theater group when she was in high school

Was a model for Calvin Klein

Ranked #47 in Stuff magazine's "102 Sexiest Women in the World" (2002).

She had a cyst removed from her vocal chords during the Beautiful Garbage period.

Her divorce from sculptor husband Eddie Farrell became final in 2005. They had been separated since 2003.

In 2005, she revealed that she has the condition body dysmorphia, which may be the root of the depression which she has mentioned previously.

Her band Garbage, went on an extended hiatus in late 2005, although have worked together infrequently since.

Has reported that she used to cut herself as a teenager, even keeping a Swiss Army Knife in her boots, and has since used her celebrity status to bring awareness to the dangers of self-mutilation.

Personal Quotes

"I love looking at naked bodies, male or female, whenever possible. I think nudity is always tasteful."

'The truth is, I've always been wracked with self-loathing and terrible, paralysing depression" (Talking about her childhood years and the terrible self-image she had as a child)

"Young girls now correlate the word 'sexy' with nakedness. It's practically, 'Show us your labia'. If you play that game of allowing yourself to be judged by your physicality, it will not sustain you through a long career. There's always going to be someone younger, more beautiful, more desirable. It's a temple of dust." (About the music industry)

"Speech is my absolute lifeline and I felt like I'd lost my personality, been stripped completely of me; I felt invisible." (About having a cyst removed from her vocal chords)

"Here am I. I'm 38. My career's probably never been better. And I've made a decision which may or may not impact on it - I refuse to hide my experience and my age, as if it's something I should be ashamed of. I'm alive. I know lots of people who've never been lucky enough to get to this stage in their life. And I'm not gonna hide it for anybody." (about being almost 40)

"I'm afraid of happy people. They're chemically unbalanced."

"Until, I think, everyone in that school thought I was less than human. I felt ugly, weak, overwhelmed - I couldn't imagine being capable of doing anything. I certainly never thought I could be in a band. This was a dream it didn't even occur to me to dream about." (1998, Select Magazine)

"I look at today's charts, at the women who are selling the most records, getting the most column inches, and I'm terrified by how they are all controlled by a male corporate idea of what women and rebels should be. When Christina Aguilera is taken seriously as a rebellious figure, we have a huge problem."

A lot of celebrities just want money, fame, power, fancy cars, houses all over the world and have people bow down to them. To me, that's frightful behaviour.

A lot of people these days are not music lovers - they just want to be famous which is a very different thing to what I grew up believing in.

I am not a sexy woman, I'm not beautiful, I'm not a sex kitten, I don't flirt with people, yet I've been tagged more of sex symbol than women who truly are and I that's solely because I don't reveal too much: people are curious.

I couldn't feel good about myself hanging out in Armani clothes when my girlfriend can't even pay her heating bill. I'd feel foul and I'd be embarrassed.

Where Are They Now

(April 2005) Promoting her new album "Bleed like me" (Available in music stores since April 11, 2005) all around Europe.

(April 2006) Recording solo works with producer David Arnold while on break from Garbage.

(2008) Joined the cast of "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" as a regular cast member.

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