2021Released
4:27

Did You Know?

Interesting facts and trivia about The Men Who Rule the World. By Songfacts®.

Garbage lead singer Shirley Manson isn't subtle on this one, coming in hot with the opening lines: The men who rule the world Have made a f--king mess Months after Garbage released their album Strange Little Birds in the summer of 2016, Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, winning the vote in the demographics of men, whites, and those older than 50, while losing in most other demos. His agenda included big tax breaks - especially for corporations and the rich - and a drawdown of environmental regulations. In this song, Manson shouts out her frustrations at him and other leaders motivated by money and self-preservation.

"The Men Who Rule the World" was released in March 2021 as the first single from Garbage's seventh album, No Gods No Masters, which they had nearly finished when the pandemic forced a lockdown in March 2020. They had to complete the album by file sharing, which was onerous and delayed the release, but they were thrilled with the results. "It was our way of trying to make sense of how f--king nuts the world is and the astounding chaos we find ourselves in," Shirley Manson said. "It's the record we felt that we had to make at this time." Remarkably, Garbage still had the same lineup from when they released their first album in 1995: Manson, Butch Vig, Steve Marker, and Duke Erikson. All of them play various instruments, with Vig doing most of the percussion.

The dense industrial sound is typical of Garbage, which will layer loops, keyboards, and guitars to create their backing tracks. Butch Vig has brought these sounds to his productions for Smashing Pumpkins and Sonic Youth.

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Song Analysis

Key, BPM (tempo) and time signature of The Men Who Rule the World.
G♯Key
MajorMode
4/4Time Signature
127BPM

Album

The album The Men Who Rule the World is released on.

Released By

The record label that has released The Men Who Rule the World.
Infectious Music
© 2021 Garbage Unlimited, LLC d/b/a STUNVOLUME under exclusive license to Infectious Music, a division of BMG Rights Management (UK) Limited
℗ 2021 Garbage Unlimited, LLC d/b/a STUNVOLUME under exclusive license to Infectious Music, a division of BMG Rights Management (UK) Limited

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5.8MArtists
73.5MSongs
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