The Smashing Pumpkins
“*LONG NASAL WHINE*” – Billy Corgan
“BYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY-LEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE”
–
“I could have written 90% of these songs in my sleep. And in the morning, when I awoke, I would have said to myself, ‘Man, what a bunch of subpar songs I wrote last night!’” – Mark Prindle
Albums Reviewed:
Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness
Machina II: The Friends And Enemies Of Modern Music
The
Smashing Pumpkins are one of the most reviled bands in the Web Reviewing
Community, and, as keeper and maintainer of a site that approximately seven
people visit on a regular basis, I’m taking it upon myself to stand up for
Billy and the other three people who don’t really do anything. Prindle HATES them (giving Siamese Dream a
4! I mean, seriously, a 4!!!!!!!!),
and Adrian Denning gave Gish a 2!
And
ofcourse, I’m kidding. The two I’m
speaking of are (obviously) Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie And The
Infinite Sadness, both of which rule all sorts of engorged foreskin and
hold their rightful places among my favorite albums of all time. If you took them out of the band’s
discography, what you’d have is a just a pretty good (not great) band whose
best album is an outtakes collection, the best song on which is a Fleetwood Mac
cover. Now, it’s a REALLY GOOD Fleetwood
Mac cover, but, nevertheless, a Fleetwood Mac cover just the same. Those two albums, though? B-B-B-BITCHIN’! As a matter of fact, a little while ago, Rolling
Stone (which blows) conducted a reader (or, in my case, casual website
viewer) survey of the top 100 albums of all time. I entered in my top 10 for the survey, and
BOTH of these here Pumpkins albums made my personal cut! Led Zeppelin had two in there too, but no one
else. That’s exclusive company! I’m not gonna give away my list to y’all, but
I CAN say that nine of my top ten made the overall top 100. Which one didn’t, you ask? Fragile!!!! GODDAMN YOU
Oh! Silly me, I haven’t gotten to the lineup yet. Well, from left to right in your picture, we’ve got lead singer/guitarist/songwriter/control freak Billy Corgan, guitarist/occasional singer/occasional songwriter James Iha, Homer Simpson (who’s not actually in the band), token hot female bassist D’arcy Wretzky (or just “D’arcy,” like “Madonna” or “Fartman”), and SUPERB drummer/SUPERB smack addict Jimmy Chamberlin. Billy has kind of a nasal voice, but if you get past that, we’ve got one great band! Until Billy completely lost touch with the definitions of “good” and “shit” and started sticking as much music as was able fit on a CD even though not even CLOSE to all of it was “good” rather than “shit.” And he’s got a goofy-looking shaved head, but not in this picture. He’s also normally not an animated cartoon character.
Since I’ve got nowhere else to put this little bit of information, now I’m gonna mock my sister Marion for a bit. A while ago, around the time Adore came out, Marion proclaimed herself “the biggest Smashing Pumpkins fan on the planet” and walked around the center of Wellesley with a friend while both of them had taped large pieces of paper to their chest and back saying “I love Billy Corgan” and “I support The Smashing Pumpkins!” Actually, I have no clue what the things actually said, but they DID do this and it WAS Pumpkins-related. And yet she STILL hasn’t listened ONCE to Siamese Dream all the way through! CUCKOO! CUCKOO! NUTJOB!
And, since I’m getting bored, onto the reviews!
Oleg
Sobolev (dima@aspol.ru) writes:
You're wrong. Smashing
Pumpkins SUCK. They suck mighty, bar Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie.
Great reviews anyway.
Scott Floman
(scottfloman@hotmail.com) writes:
"Mayonnaise" (right spelling?) is my favorite
Pumpkins song too, and "Tales
of Scorched Earth" is the only Mellon Collie song I don't like as well!
Great minds! Seriously, I don't see the filler on Mellon Collie everybody
else does, either. Will check out "Piscies" again - I fear I may have
underrated it, while perhaps overrating "Adore" and
"Machina" a bit (oh
well). Will have to get the live album as well (thanks a lot! - another
album I can't afford). In short, enjoyed the reviews - curious to see what
you'll have to say about the Zwan album.
Shannon Carey (kissing_daylight@hotmail.com) writes:
Hey Brad,
I just wanted to comment on your excellent Smashing Pumpkins reviews.
It's
unfortunate that they get the shaft on so many WRC websites (*cough*
were your reviews funny, they were actually insightful about the music. I
appreciated that you were fair (you understand that the Pumpkins rule but
that they did record some really godawful stuff too). Oh and, yes,
"Mayonaise" fucking rocks my socks. Keep up the amazing work.
You always
mention how you have about 17 loyal fans, and I'm one of them. You happen
to be my personal favorite reviewer in the WRC. And I'm not just saying
that because you love Led Zeppelin III. :-)
Pedro Andino (pedroandino@msn.com) writes:
you wrc guys are the biggest
cocksuckers I have ever heard in my entire life! man do I hate you for dissing
them! speaking of that, I will defend these guys! don't ya' know they are from
Pedro Andino (pedroandino@msn.com) writes:
and I will tell you again!
SMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
(Brad responds:
Don’t I make it abundantly clear that I like the Smashing Pumpkins and agree with you
that they do, indeed, rock?)
Gish (1991)
Rating: 8
Best Song: “Rhinoceros”
I quite like this record, the debut from Whining Nasal Boy and The Exploding Large Orange Melons. I mean, it’s not nearly as good as the “big two,” as I refer to them, but it’s pretty darn good nonetheless. It IS a little samey, though. Whereas for Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie I more or less have the whole frickin’ album memorized (yes, ALL TWO HOURS of Mellon Collie), I can’t say the same thing for this record, and, trust me, I’ve listened to it LOTSA times. I look at the track listing and think “Hmm…what does “Snail” sound like again?” Then I click on the song and go “Oh yeah! I like that song! It’s cool.” It’d be nice to be able to do that WITHOUT having to move my house over to the Winamp box, but eh. I guess I’m just a big, fat, lazy piece of poo. With a great big cock.
Anyway, though it’s not as memorable as their best work, Gish is a solid, well-crafted piece of “alternative” rock, and that ain’t no jive, Clive. The first half is better than the second for three reasons. First, I don’t have that “I can’t remember what half the songs sound like” problem with it. Second, D’arcy doesn’t fucking sing anything (which is good). Third, it has fucking “RHINOCEROS” on it! Easily one of my personal favorite Pumpkins songs of all time! Sweet, man. Go ahead, just TRY to get the vocal hook in the chorus out of your head. You are simply UNABLE to do it, aren’t you? I’m gonna make a controversial claim: The “And she knows…she knows…she knows…” chorus of “Rhinoceros” is the hardest one line to get out of your head, once it’s in there, in ALL OF POPULAR MUSIC AS WE KNOW IT. OK, that’s probably wrong, but it is that way for me. You know, once, no matter what I listened to, I walked around singing “she knows…she knows…” for A MONTH. Usually, when something gets stuck in your head, you live with it for a few days, get sick of it, and plop something else up there. Nope, not this time. ONE SOLID MONTH. “She knows…she knows…she knows…she knows…she knows…” And, the thing is, I NEVER got tired of humming that one little line! It’s so fucking awesome! “She knows…she knows…she knows…she knows…she knows…she knows…sh-“
OK, I’ve gotta move on and talk about the rest of the record. We could be here all DAY with that “she knows…” crap! “I Am One,” via a drum intro, and “Bury Me,” via a bass intro, present another reason (besides having the most addictive chorus of all time) that the first half remains etched on my brain more easily than the second. It’s got more energy! It’s not like the Pumpkins are kicking ass like Black Sabbath here, but they manage to move along at a nice, rocking pace, driven SUPERBLY by Jimmy Chamberlin. His drumming is really a key part of the Pumpkins sound, that steady, tricky, neat backbeat, like a standard 4/4 thing with about 15 hits on the skins per beat. I digs it, I do. “Siva” is another example of the exact same fucking thing as “I Am One” and “Bury Me,” except for the slow part in the middle I can’t even hear half the goddamn time.
The second half of the record now, starting with track 5, “Crush,” tends to blend into a sort of slow, murky, pseudo-psychedelic haze that creates the “what the fuck song is this again?” problem I was speaking of. Normally, that type of problem would be a HUGE strike against a band, except that these are, just, GOOD songs! That, and they create such a cool little vibe. I don’t remember how all of ‘em go all the time because I’m in this layed-back fuzzy haze when they’re playing. Oh, that and the titles of the songs are NEVER in the frickin’ lyrics. Why is “Crush” called “Crush?” I dunno. Good tunes, though. I especially enjoy “Snail.” It might be my second favorite song on the album. I just never know it’s actually fucking CALLED “Snail” because Billy, as I’ve mentioned, does not sing “snail” at any point in it. So, yeah, good tunes. “Daydream” is a little stupid, though, and a doofy choice to end the record. Why let D’arcy sing? And especially something so dippy? And especially have Billy come in later after a period of silence to sing “I have gone crazy, I’m motherfucking crazy?” Blerf. That’s purty dumb, if you axe me. The rest of the album? A-O.K. by me, if less spectacular (outside of “Rhinoceros!”) than their best (two) releases.
And Billy sure looks silly with that shoulder-length hair, even stupider than with the shaved head!
Siamese Dream (1993)
Rating: 10
Best Song: “Mayonaise”
I know that in another section of Brad’s Big Cool Site Of Big Cool Awesomeness I talked about how Nevermind was my favorite album of the nineties, since it was my personal soundtrack for like five years and under no circumstances could I EVER speak about it rationally. Well, it’s not without competition, and here is that competition. This record is completely fucking BRILLIANT, and I didn’t even get my hands on it until a few years ago. I used to HATE this band, when I was like thirteen or whatever. “God, that fucker has such an AWFUL voice,” I would say, sort of like I say now about Geddy Lee (and he does, by the way, it fucking sucks). The ridiculously bombastic mega-splurge that is Mellon Collie converted me, though, and then fast-forward to my senior year in high school, where my good buddy John (Thaaaaaaaaaaaaa wisdom) decided, because he’s such a darn good guy (and he is!) to burn me a copy of this sumbitch, and DUDE!
You can tell right away, in the first few seconds of the record, what a drastic step up this album is from Gish, creatively, artistically, whatever-ly (and Gish is a damn good little record itself, remember). See, it’s all in the drum intros. “I Am One” starts Gish off with a nice little vintage Jimmy groove that sounds pretty darn good, and then continues into the body of the song. Cool stuff, but nothing super-spectacular, right? Now, look at the drum intro to “Cherub Rock.” It’s a COMPLETELY pretentious little snare roll, and it functions like an announcement to the listening audience that THIS record here is by NO circumstances your ordinary, run of the mill little grunge (I fucking hate this term, by the way) record. Then, ofcourse, the song builds and builds, adding a bass, then a few multi-tracked guitars, and pretty much completely never stops being fucking AWESOME, especially that “whooooooooo wants hoooooooooooooney?” line.
And the album pretty much never stops ruling from there (except for “Sweet Sweet,” but that’s, what, like one minute long? Who cares!). If you don’t like the eeeeelectric guitar, though, you probably won’t dig this one. There’s lots of guitars. LOTS AND LOTS of guitars. I once read somewhere that some parts of this record have THIRTY-TWO overdubbed guitar parts. Now, I highly doubt that, but the wall of guitar noise on stuff like “Hummer” (Tee hee! That means blowjob! Tee-hee!) and “Quiet” surely comes from more than one. I mean, Billy didn’t even know how to play piano yet (the piano track on “Soma” gets layed down by R.E.M.’s Mike Mills), so what else was he gonna do? This stuff is all just gold, though. GOLD, JERRY! GOLD! “Today” is one of the best and fucking catchiest singles of the decade. “Disarm” is one of the most goddamn beautiful things I’ve ever heard (rocking the socks off of “Dust In The Wind,” AHEM, Mr. Prindle), and the closing “Luna” isn’t that far behind (“I’m in love with you…I’m in love with you…and you and you…”). “Geek U.S.A.” and “SilverFUCK” both have about 6,000 parts and rock harder than just about anything the Melons have ever done (except “Heavy Metal Machine,” ofcourse…NOT! That song is fucking RANCID!). Goody goody gumdrops. I’m in HEAVEN when I’m listening to this thing.
But I
haven’t even gotten to the best stuff yet!
“Hummer” and “Soma” are two examples of a style I shall call
“progressive arena-grunge,” and they’re both absolutely CAPTIVATING. “Hummer” rocks decently (and pretty purtily)
for its first three minutes, before turning down the guitars and becoming
absolutely GORGEOUS for its last three.
“Soma” does the complete opposite, starting off soft and beautiful,
before Billy sings “one last kiss goodnight…” and B-BOOM, the massive wall of Siamese
Dream guitar smacks up your bitch.
Then, ofcourse, there’s the little hidden gem of the record and MY
FAVORITE PUMPKINS SONG OF ALL TIME, tucked mid-way through the album’s second
half, after “Geek
I can’t say I adore EVERY song here, though, ofcourse. I mentioned the short and inconsequential “Sweet Sweet,” and I’ve never been the biggest fan of “Rocket,” though the guitar buildup thingy at the end is SUPERB. Whatever, MINOR quibbles. This album is absolutely 100% orgasmic. And it’s funny, you know, how the best Pumpkins album ever can’t really in good conscience be CALLED a “Pumpkins album,” seeing as how Billy layed down ALL the guitar and bass parts himself. James and D’arcy had just broken up (they had been FUCKING EACH OTHER EVERY NIGHT) during the Gish tour, so they couldn’t be in the same room together or some shit. James gets co-writing credits on a few songs (“Soma,” “Mayonaise”) but it’s not like he did anything in the studio. So, Siamese Dream, by Billy Corgan, featuring Jimmy “Smack Addict Man” Chamberlin on drums. Album #1a of the nineties and one of favorites of all time. Smashing!
Candice
Cho writes:
siamese dream totally deserves that 10. although i
will have to respectfully
disagree and say that disarm totally kicks mayo's ass six ways from
sunday.
hey, wasn't 'today' on siamese dream? bc that song rocks too. and
how can you
not love james iha flying off a speeding ice cream truck while wearing a
dress? (but i will agree w/ you on james iha's song writing
abilities. dear
james, please shut the fuck up. thanks and love from the free
world. ps. i do
think that his songs w/ nina gordon are faboo--i love 'said sadly'
and 'dreaming'.)
Nick Collings (altrockreview@hotmail.com) writes:
Yeah, totally agree that Siamese Dreams deserves a
"10". It's still one of
my favourite records of the '90s, despite 'old Corgan losing his creativity
and surge towards the Pumpkins' end. I will forever play that album, you'll
probably hear me shouting down the retirement home in 50 years time - "Put
on Mayonaise, put it on!" As for Adore - if that was half it's bloated
length, it would easily be a classic album, as it stands it's too patchy for
greatness - so close!
nikus80@hotmail.com writes:
I never quite got this record, and I would give it a
seven.
But Mayonaise is one of the best songs ever. Really.
Pisces Iscariot (1994)
Rating: 9
Best Song: “Landslide”
You may be wondering why I’m giving a 9 here to a goddamn outtakes/b-sides collection. Well, the Pumpkins have about a gazillion random songs lying around, and they couldn’t get them all officially released if they were to put out like ten more outtakes collections. Their singles have like five other songs on them besides, you know, the ACTUAL SINGLE. Therefore, it stands to reason that a collection of the cream of the crop of this stuff from the Siamese Dream era might be pretty darn good…and it is! Their best album outside of the “big two!” Huzzah!
Now, there are a fair amount of good rockers here (“Pissant,” “Hello Kitty Kat,” and I especially love “Frail And Bedazzled”), but that’s not where the rating comes from. The rating is all up in 9’s shit because of all the soft, pretty, soothing stuff on here. Instead of opening with a drum intro like their last two records, Billy sticks the almost TOO quiet acoustic plucking of “Soothe” (Compare that to the end of the last sentence! Revel in my clever play on words! I am cool!) at the start of this one, thus setting the tone for the rest of the record, like the drum intros did for the previous two. “Whir” and “Obscured” define the terms “light” and “airy,” and they both fucking RULE (you know what I just realized? I use that term a lot…and you know why I do? Because “rule” RULES!). And hey! James Iha’s got a song on here! God, he can’t write a lyric for SHIT, can he? “Love love love love love” BLECH. Whatever. He’s not much of a singer, either, and all his songs sound like the same goddamn thing. “Light,” “airy,” country-twangy-poppy, but the few tunes Billy lets him plop on their albums are usually pretty good, and I like this one! “And if you love her, you know it will come true…” God, those lyrics SUCK ARMADILLO ASS, don’t they? Good song, though. Oh, it’s called “Blew Away.” I guess I should mention that, huh?
Now, while almost everything on this record is very good, to me, there are three CLEAR standouts. First, we’ve got the best “light, airy” track. Smear my dipstick with expensive Belgian motor oil, “La Dolly Vita” is a cool song. I like this bouncy-twangy shit Billy’s got going here. “La dolly vita…cool…as…ice…cream.” Neat! You know what’s even neater, though? Why, ofcourse, it’s a Fleetwood Mac cover! I feel a little guilty about giving an album a 9 and then saying its best song is a goddamn cover, but what can I do? “Landslide” is AWESOME! I picture Billy suddenly morphed into this hot, sorta kinky blond chick wearing a veil over her face. Ofcourse, she doesn’t have Stevie Nicks’ cool scratchy voice. She has Billy Corgan’s faux-feminine nasal whine. Poop! I actually like the Billy version more than the original, even though the original is a frickin’ GREAT song (and, ofcourse, more than the new Dixie Chicks cover. Yes, add drums and overdubs and turn it into a stale generic pop song. That’s exactly what you should do. NOT.). Billy stays VERY true to the original, only changing it much by replacing its muted electric solo with a pretty acoustic one. After “Landslide,” then, we have the third standout track, the ludicrous “Starla,” which has about four lines of lyrics and five chords throughout its insane eleven-minute length, but might be the best goddamn extended piece the Pumpkins ever did. The soft bongo section in the middle? How can you not love that shit? And after that it’s basically six minutes of guitar freakout solos over the same four or five chords played over and over again, but it COOKS! It’s very, VERY hypnotic. It just SUCKS YOU IN, it does!
Like the last review, I’m gonna use this ending paragraph to poo-poo the few things I don’t much like here. Funnily enough, the album’s other cover, a version of The Animals’ “Girl Named Sandoz,” is probably my least favorite track on here. Ugly guitar tone! And SPEAKING of ugly guitar tone, what did Billy use to record “Plume?” A food processor? It sounds like SHIT! The song is pretty cool, outside of the hideously ugly guitar tone, however. I like both of these tunes to some degree, but they’re what smart critic-type people call “weak links” in an otherwise sweet album of Smashing Pumpkins goodness. VERY good, VERY solid album, though. Excellent, even!
You know what? I wrote this entire review in the time it took “Starla” to play! “Starla” is long!
Earphoria (2002)
Rating: 8
Best Song: “Mayonaise”
Unless you’re a hardcore Pumpkins fan, I bet you might be wondering what this is, huh? Well, in 1994, Billy and the boys (and that one weird chick) released a VHS hodgepodge o’ live performances intercut with fun studio footage and odd skits called Vieuphoria (wow…what a great pun…), and the audio of the performances on this sumbitch got bootlegged all OVER the place. Fast-forward to late 2002, and the VHS gets rereleased on DVD, along with an official release of the already-bootlegged-by-everyone Earphoria! All rejoice! Huzzah! Poo on my scrimpsh!
Actually, I had no clue any of this crap ever existed until they officially released the CD in 2002. If you wanna call me “not a real Pumpkins fan, dude,” then that’s fine. Just remember that I wasn’t a fan back in 1994 and don’t give a flying rat’s fucking ass about bootlegs, because I have BETTER things to do than search for bootlegs. Like consult the oracle! EVERY FUCKING DAY! The fact remains that I ran out to my local Newbury Comics like a good little Pumpkins fanboy and purchased the CD just a few days after it came out, listened to it, and immediately went “what the fuck are all those little dippy synth-segway things?” Yup, just like how the original VHS contains live footage interspersed with weird skits and things (pictures of which are on the Earphoria packaging…Billy is playing guitar in a psychedelic freakout wonderland, D’arcy is having a party with stuffed animals, James is having his leg bent into an awkward position, and Jimmy is, um, playing drums), strange little segway things plop themselves in between the actual live tracks on this here CD too. I’ve got no problem with them, though, even if they’re stupid. I actually enjoy “Sinfony” as the album opener, and the next three are all really short (“Bugg Superstar” actually makes me chuckle at how ridiculously inane it is). They also stick a completely useless fifteen minute long thing called “Why Am I So Tired” at the end of the CD that I think is just the result of jamming in the studio. Picture “Starla,” only four minutes longer, devoid any lyrics at all or a cool middle part, and about 1/20 as interesting. Yeah, “Why Am I So Tired” of LISTENING TO IT!!!??? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
OK, moving onto the actual live tracks here, they’re taken from all sorts of random sources (no full live concert this be, no sir), and range from splurgetastically sublime to ludicrously mediocre. Some of my favorite moments here consist of alternate versions of ol’ Siamese Dream favorites. “Disarm” is given the full-on Pumpkins-RRRRRROCK treatment, and comes out none the worse for wear! And “Cherub Rock” and “Mayonaise” are both done acoustically! And ORGASMICALLY! Dude, an acoustic version of “Mayonaise!!!” And halfway through Billy starts cracking up and laughing as he tries to sing the lyrics!!! There’s no *squeak* noise, since there’s no feedback…but the moment of silence that replaces it is just as cool! And the percussion is just bongos and tambourine!!! I ask you…HOW FUCKING COOL IS THIS SHIT!
Elsewhere, the band runs through all sorts of old favorites in relatively normal fashion (as well as “Slunk,” which isn’t that good). The highlights are, ofcourse, the best songs, but most everything kicks loads of ferocious beaver tail. The crowd sings half the lyrics to “Today,” which sounds neat, and they also (though it’s a different crowd, at a different concert, on a different CONTINENT) help Billy out by singing the “one last kiss goodnight…” line of “Soma” before the wall-of-guitar section comes in and everyone has little wall-of-guitar love babies. “Quiet” sounds exactly like the studio version. “SilverFUCK” is thirteen minutes long, has an extended coda that isn’t on the album, and Billy breaks off halfway through to sing a line from “Over The Rainbow” for NO REASON WHATSOEVER, other than that it sounds stupid, but it’s goofy, so it works, sorta, kinda. Truthfully, I can’t find any real problems here, except for one, which is the absolutely horrendous piece of trash performance they give of “I Am One.” Sure, the drum intro kicks twice as much ass as the album version, but the performance is REALLY muddy (I can’t hear Billy’s voice at all…though I guess for some people that’d be a good thing), and in the middle Billy goes off on the most ludicrous vocal break I’ve heard in my life. “What you want is what you’ll get and that’s NOTHIN’!” “And what you cannot have is what you DESIRE!” “All I ever wanted was everythiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing and all I got was SHIT!” It’s things like this that make me go “hey, maybe all those people that call Billy a pretentious cocksucking twat may be onto something.” Really, why? It’s awful.
The rest of the material here is good stuff, though, especially those acoustic versions! Luv that “Mayonaise!” Best…song…EVER! A good, solid document of the Melons at their arena-rock peak, before Billy shaved his head and they got all weird. And there’s useless little synth-segways in between the songs for no reason, so that’s pretty cool too.
Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (1995)
Rating: 10
Best Song: “1979”
Well, hmm, what do you say about this one? When Siamese Dream became a huge success, whiny bald man puffed out his chest with braggadocio and claimed he’d follow it up with a double album that would be The Wall for Generation X. Well, he missed on two counts. First, this ain’t no concept album, which The Wall most DEFINITELY was (sometimes at the expense of the actual music). Fine, the songs loosely mimic the passing of a 24-hour day. Blow me. I don’t care. Second, it’s FORTY MINUTES LONGER THAN THE WALL. Seriously, who has the patience to sit down for TWO FUCKING HOURS and listen to this album all the way through, huh? HUH?
Answer…I DO!!! This album is BRILLIANT, chocked, stuffed and crammed full of massive amounts of well-written, memorable cock and big, sloppy tumescent songs! Blizzle dizzle! Once again, like the Pumpkins’ previous studio albums, it’s all in the intro, my friend. No more drum intros here, as instead we’ve got a PIANO INSTRUMENTAL! Oh, how pretentious! The three-odd minutes of the title track right there tell you this is gonna be the MOTHER of all alternative rock albums. Many people claim this bitch is stuffed full of filler more than anything, but I just don’t see it! I can honestly say I enjoy TWENTY-SEVEN of the twenty-eight songs here to some degree. And even if you DO think a lot of it blows, you HAVE to admire the cojones it took for Billy to release something this mammoth in the mid-nineties.
OK, moving onto the twenty-seven tracks that have lyrics, though I can’t say I enjoy the record quite as much as Siamese Dream, I can say that it’s more diverse. There’s plenty of good-old-fashioned Pumpkins rockers (“Jellybelly,” “Zero,” etc.), purty little ballads (two James Iha tunes, “Stumbleine,” “To Forgive,” etc.), one of the best singles of the nineties that most definitely does NOT rip off Husker Du’s “What’s Going On” (“1979,” AHEM, Mr. Prindle), heavenly-floaty-airy things (“Thirty-Three,” “Galapogos,” “Cupid de Locke,” etc.), a entire song that was purposely enveloped in ugly feedback and RULES (“Love”), a doobly novelty tune that RULES (“We Only Come Out At Night”), and, yikes, even PROG-ROCK. Yup, Billy’s crew had their progressive leanings, which you can see in “Hummer” and “Soma” and “Starla” and what have you, but “Porcelina Of The Vast Oceans” and “Thru The Eyes Of Ruby” are both full-fledged, Yes-inflected, balls-out PRRRRRRRROG ROCK! And they’re two of best damn songs on the album! The Almighty Riff in “Porcelina” is the SHIT, and that acoustic outro to “Thru The Eyes Of Ruby” is sooooooooooooooooooooo gorgeous! Shibby!
Amidst all this, there IS one song that sucks, “Tales Of A Scorched Earth,” which is just unlistenably ugly crap, and to make matters worse comes right in between “1979” and “Thru The Eyes Of Ruby,” which might be my two favorite tunes on the record. I usually don’t skip it when I listen to this baby all the way through (which I do more than you’d think, even if it is TWO HOURS LONG), though, since the ugliness is a neat contrast to the “heavenly” sounding stuff in the preceding and following pieces of smack. Fuck that shit, though. Why dwell on it when there’s nearly two hours of good material? I dunno! Maybe you’re a BUTTFUCKER!
Anyhoo, to me, the first and second disc present a nice contrast. The first one is more IMMEDIATELY pleasing (hell, three of the first six tracks were singles), while the second takes repeated listens to open up its box of goodies. I think I enjoy them both more or less equally, though if someone put me at gunpoint and made me choose (which most likely won’t happen, but never know), I’d probably choose the second. The first is more immediate because it sounds more like Siamese-era Pumpkins, with short, catchy rockers and such (including “RAT IN A CAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE”), but the second presents more of a departure. Sure, it starts off with the heavy “Where Boys Fear To Tread” and “Bodies” (Not to be confused with “LET THE BODIES HIT THE FLO’!” Different song altogether), and it has fucking “Tales Of A Scorched Earth,” the progger “Ruby” and “X.Y.U.,” possibly the heaviest tune on the album, but that leaves WELL more than half that’s taken up by light, mellow stuff. The two singles on this disc were “Thirty-Three” and “1979,” so that gives you some idea. The last five songs present quite possibly the most mellow twenty minutes ever layed down on a Pumpkins record (including all of Adore), and, to me, are really the hidden treasure of this album. The cute “We Only Come Out At Night,” followed by three soft, pretty love ballads (“Beautiful,” “Lily (My One And Only),” “By Starlight”), and then the closing Iha-penned “Farewell And Goodnight,” sung alternately by James, Billy, and D’arcy, with soothing ocean sounds, acoustic guitar, and nice lyrics to fall asleep to (“Goodnight, may your dreams be so happy and your head light, with wishes of a sandman and a night light”). Where did all this mellow shit come from? Who knows, but it’s as if the first disc of Mellon Collie is the Pumpkins looking back on what they (more accurately, Billy) have done, and the second is the Pumpkins looking ahead to what they (more accurately, Billy) will do on, hmm, let’s say…ADORE!!!!! Hell, “In The Arms Of Sleep” sounds EXACTLY like one song from Adore. Fo’ shizzle my nizzle!
In any case, while Siamese Dream is the Pumpkins’ best album, this is their defining artistic statement. A two-hour schmorgasbord (stupid fucking word I can’t spell, fuck spelling) of all that was good about ‘90’s alternative rock. Enjoy!
Candice
Cho writes:
mellon collie! *gurgles* so many great songs,
so little time. still, i think
half of it is really unlistenable. but to smack my bitch up, all of it is
beautifully written. billy corgan is the best lyricist ever. love
galapagos--
i think that's the one with "she comes to me like an angel out of time as
i
play the part of a saint on my knees". *swoons* dude, i'd SO
sleep with
baldie if he whispered shit like this in my ear. and HOW could you not
mention
tonight tonight? i know it's the radio friendly release, but it's so
gorgeous
and has the best beginning ever w/ the lush orchestral accompanyment.
nikus80@hotmail.com writes:
I also used to hate "Tales Of A Scorched
Earth", but is kinda
fun. The only song I don't really like is "Take Me Down" - I HATE
James Iha
voice. He sucks. A 9 for me, even if it took me A LOT of time to get the
fucking record. Listen to both discs separately if you have the same problem
as me. It has a lot of filler, but also A LOT of great songs and the filler
is fine.
Adore (1998)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “Ava Adore”
Now, you can take the cynical approach and say the Pumpkins changed their sound to become a quiet electronica-tinged art-rock band because they kicked Jimmy out for being a rampant smack addict all you want. God knows I actually haven’t heard anyone ever take that opinion, but it’s sure a neat little theory, isn’t it? Anyway, I don’t buy the theory I just made up. Billy said he was gonna make the change anyway, and the second half of Mellon Collie seems like a precursor to a lot of this stuff. It’s just a happy coincidence Jimmy’s gone, because could you picture him playing on some of these songs? FUNNY! But forgetting that, the fact is that this record is a GINORMOUS step down from Mellon Collie, and is really the end of Billy being all that musically relevant.
Now, I do NOT say this because “like, I only like rock and loud guitars, dude!” Radiohead went all weird-electronic and I gave Kid A a 10! I don’t like this album as much as its predecessors (though it’s pretty darn good, still) because Billy has no fucking idea how to edit a fucking album anymore. I mean, did this thing REALLY need to be 73 minutes? Now, you might be saying “But Brad, didn’t Billy already have this problem? Wasn’t Mellon Collie TWO HOURS LONG?” The answer, ofcourse, is NO, because Mellon Collie, to me, justified its length, goddammit. He had two hours of good material! And have you heard some of the stuff that DIDN’T get on the album? “The Aeroplane Flies High?” “Marquis In Spades?” DUDE! Those are some SWEET tunes. No, Billy still had his mojo working full-throttle in 1995, but fast-forward three years, and he’s starting to lose it. This album does not justify its length at ALL.
It starts out pretty well, though. “To Sheila” is an unassuming acoustic ballad that, just like with every other Pumpkins studio album, REALLY sets the tone for what the record’s gonna be like. The two singles that come next, “Ava Adore” and “Perfect,” both rule ASS, with “Ava Adore” ruling a good bit more. “Ava Adore” is actually in my handful of favorite Pumpkins songs ever, strangely enough, along with “1979” and “Rhinoceros” and “Mayonaise” and like half of the rest of Siamese Dream because that album is 100% FUCKING INCREDIBLE. “Weeeeeee muuuuuuust never be apaaaaaaaaaart!” That’s good stuff.
Here is where the album starts to get a little spotty, though, and that’s pretty fucking early, since there’s still an hour left in it. All of the next six or seven or whatever songs are decent-good in their own right, but do we really need ALL of them? Let’s see what we can do. OK, I THOROUGHLY enjoy “Pug,” so we’ll keep that. “Once Upon A Time” is that “In The Arms Of Sleep” rewrite I was talking about, but it’s purty and actually doesn’t have any electronics on it, so we’ll keep that. Let’s keep “Tear” too, since it’s INTERESTING. Now, “Daphne Descends” just sounds like a mediocre rewrite of half the songs here, so SCHEEYA. “Crestfallen” has no real reason to exist either, so SCHEEYA. I don’t really see any reason to have both “Appels + Oranjes” and “The Tale Of Dusty And Pistol Pete” on the same album, so I’m gonna SCHEEYA “Appels + Oranjes,” because “The Tale Of Dusty And Pistol Pete” is just so darn CUTE!
Look what we’ve done! We’ve lopped off twelve minutes! Now we’re at 61! Let’s keep going. The piano ballad “Annie-Dog” is unique, yes, but it also blows, so SCHEEYA to that one. “Shame” is the worst song the Pumpkins had by this point put to officially-released plastic (though they’d go worse later a WHOLE bunch of times). It’s awful. Six and a half minutes of absolutely nothing to keep me interested. SCHEEYA. 51 and counting. Phew. OK, “Behold! The Nightmare” stays. I dig that song, even if it’s got a dumb title. “For Martha” DEFINITELY stays, though I’m gonna lop off the final two minutes, since the song basically ends after six, yet continues to meander for a total of eight. Man, is this a beautiful song. And Billy wrote it for his dead mother! HEARTFELT! The guitar solo in there is positively CATHARTIC and gives me chills. I’d say this is my second-favorite tune on the record, after “Ava Adore,” except the last two minutes, ofcourse. Since “For Martha” would be a PERFECT way to end the album, “Blank Page” has no reason to exist WHATSOEVER, and is very, very, very boring to boot. The soft little middle part (“Take a day, plant some trees, may they shade you from me”) is actually very beautiful, but thirty seconds do not save a five minute song. So SCHEEYA, and SCHEEYA as well to the seventeen seconds of piano notes that make up “17,” obviously. Christ, what a dumb, pretentious way to end an album. And what’s with like half the songs on here being piano based? What the fuck does Billy think he’s doing? Remember, five years ago (Siamese Dream), he DIDN’T EVEN KNOW HOW TO PLAY PIANO. Now he’s using it as his primary musical backing? Dipshit. Oh, nice bald head. It looks like a horse’s ass mated with a cue ball.
But, aside from that, look at what
we’ve done! After “17,” “Blank Page,”
and the last two minutes of “For Martha” get surgically removed, we have…*drum
roll*…a FORTY-FOUR MINUTE ALBUM!
Hey! THAT’S A
Oh, and dude, look at the liner
notes. D’arcy’s got a see-thru shirt
on! LOOK-LOOK-LOOK AT THEM TITTIES!!!!!!!
Candice
Cho writes:
so adore is the one pumpkins album i actually own
(because my brother owns
every album ever plus all the b-sides since i bought him that aeroplane flies
high boxed set, except he doesn't own adore) and i really like the first half
of it. 'perfect' and 'once upon a time' are beautiful. yeah, you
can cut some
shit off the end. and build a bridge and get over the titties.
nikus80@hotmail.com writes:
I disagree with you. It's a flawed record, no doubt about
that, but
it's my second favourite Pumpks album. The only song I don't really like at
all is the opener "To Sheila". The rest of the songs are all fine,
but damn,
some are overlong. "Tear" is pretty good, but I don't want to listen
to
Billy singing nearly acapella in some parts. Shame is DAMN overlong, but
"Shshshshhsame" is one of the best corgan choruses ever. Is almost as
good
as "She knows she knows". Really. And the song is really atmospheric.
I don't know what were you smoking when you said "I don’t really see any
reason to have both “Appels + Oranjes” and “The Tale Of Dusty And Pistol
Pete” on the same album"... WHAT THE FUCK?? Those songs are NOTHING alike!
Appels +
"The Tale" is one of the most folk influenced ones. Plus they're both
some
of my favourite songs from the record. So is "Crestfallen". I think
you're
being unfair to this record, it is a bit samey for a 73 minute long record,
so it takes a lot of time to absorb, and some of the songs could be looped
off since they're, well, samey, but other than that it is a perfectly fine
record. Plus I dig this mix of technofolk. I give it a solid eight.
MACHINA/The Machines Of God (2000)
Rating: 6
Best Song: “Stand Inside Your Love”
OK, so Adore didn’t sell so hot. Naturally, Billy assumed this was because it was all soft and mellow and un-rocking instead of the real reason, which is that he lost his songwriting mojo. Well, he couldn’t rock without Jimmy, and (what a coincidence!) Jimmy’s out of rehab and cleaned up! So Jimmy’s back. But D’arcy’s out, even though she played most of the bass parts on the album BEFORE she got the boot, and replaced by Melissa Auf der Maur (gotta have the hot chick bassist, you know), who had been in Hole, who only got famous because Courtney Love shot Kurt Cobain and made it look like a suicide and because Billy wrote like every fucking song on one of their albums. Phew.
Oh, the album’s not that great, by the way, because, as I mentioned, Billy’s songwriting mojo is not in full force anymore. That’s not to say the album’s BAD. It has a bunch of darn good tunes, and a few great ones, but (again) WHY IS IT 73 MINUTES LONG!!?? Adore would have been ideal at about 45 minutes, as we found out in the previous review, and I’d wager this one would be ideal at about half an hour, maybe. The rest? You can toss it, even though not all of it’s bad. It’s just that so many of these songs sound like the SAME GODDAMN SONG. “Raindrops + Sunshowers,” “I Of The Mourning,” “Try, Try, Try,” “This Time,” “Wound,” and “With Every Light” have no reason to all coexist on the same album. I’d say keep two (MAYBE three) of these decent, unspectactular pop songs and you’re all set. Which two? I don’t know. I don’t much care, either. They’re all about the same. Kinda neat, but that’s all, DUDE.
This record DOES have a handful of VERY good tunes, though. My favorite (and the only to achieve no-brainer top-level Pumpkins classic status) would have to be “Stand Inside Your Love.” It sounds like it could be on frickin’ Siamese Dream!!!!!! What a beautiful song, with great lyrics (which is an upset, because a lot of the lyrics on this record are awful…not that I much care, ofcourse, I listen to Yes!). Another real solid tune would be “The Sacred And Profane,” which might have the best chorus on here (better than “Stand Inside Your Love!”). “You’re all a part of me now, and if I fall…” Good, good black tar heroine cocaine crack smack. And, for reasons beyond me, I’m also a big fan of “The Imploding Voice,” even if the production on it is horrible. Love that descending riff! And then there’s the closer “Age Of Innocence,” which, if you manage to get through all the awful sludge that resides on the second half of this thing (not an easy task, mind you), presents us with the only song that can rival “Stand Inside Your Love” in my book. Great song! And the band recorded it after everything else and slapped it on the end as an afterthought! Too bad you’ll probably stop this album in disgust somewhere during “The Crying Tree Of Mercury,” which is a FUCKING PIECE OF HORSESHIT.
There’s really a good bit of that on this record, you know. HORSESHIT, that is. The opener “The Everlasting Gaze” is the first offender, though not the worst. What a fucking blatant “Zero” re-write (complete with a-cappella part in the middle). It blows. Awful. And it shows again how the beginning always sets the tone for Pumpkins records, only this time the tone is “trying desperately to recapture past glories, yet failing.” “Heavy Metal Machine” blows even more. It was supposed to be like the “crushing centerpiece,” I think, like “SilverFUCK” or whatever, except it’s overproduced to the point that it completely loses any ass-kicking power it might have had, not that it would have had any to begin with. That and it’s terrible. Geez, and does “Glass And The Ghost Children” really need to be TEN MINUTES LONG? TWO is too many. “The Crying Tree Of Mercury” is the worst thing on the album, and possibly of the Pumpkins career, and if anyone actually likes it I’d be SHOCKED, and “Blue Skies Bring Tears” is more or less just as bad. YEESH. What IS all this shit?
And the production? AWFUL! Everything on this album is just SO OVERPRODUCED. Everything, even the really good songs, has this wall-of-sound thing going on, but not a good wall-of-sound like Phil “Murderer” Spector or the Siamese Dream wall of guitar. THIS wall is created by these fucking awful synth washes and guitar feedback noises that make the songs overbearing and dense without making them interesting. Everything in the background just sort of blends together into a big fuzzy high-pitched wash that just saps any energy the songs might have had otherwise. Ofcourse, more than half of these songs range from good to very good, but they could have been better had Billy just LAYED OFF all this overproduction shit.
So I guess his songwriting hasn’t gone COMPLETELY to shit (“Stand Inside Your Love” really does rule your mom’s camel toe), but you can EASILY tell it’s taken a few really big steps down here by the extended/artsy tracks. I mean, the generic MACHINA track (“Raindrops + Sunshowers” or something) is fine, good, solid. Hell, I might like it more than the generic Adore track (like, maybe, “Daphne Descends”). It’s when he tries to break out from the genericism that Billy just completely falls on his face. “Blue Skies Bring Tears?” “Heavy Metal Machine?” “Glass And The Ghost Children?” These songs are just unholy chunks of dung. What happened to “Soma?” Or “Starla?” Or “Porcelina?” Even Adore had “For Martha” on it. I guess Billy realized this too, though, since this WAS their last studio album. He’s one smart dude, that William Corgan. With a funny head.
Machina II: The Friends And
Enemies Of Modern Music (2000)
Rating: 4
Best Song: “If There Is A God (Piano/Vox)”
For those of you who have no fucking clue what this album is, let me briefly explain: IT’S TWENTY-FIVE FUCKING MACHINA B-SIDES AND ALTERNATE TAKES. Whoop-de-damn-do. The story of the record is pretty interesting, even if the music on it blows. Billy didn’t like his record company anymore, and wanted to release this hour and a half of music no one really needed to hear, so the Pumpkins conducted a limited pressing of 25 copies of the album, putting it on one LP and three EP’s, then distributed them among the fans with explicit instructions to distribute the album over the internet. Within a few days, mp3’s of the record popped up, and the band released the artwork over the ‘net too. A complete release of an album over the internet! A cool idea in theory. However, one would need access to a fast modem to download the damn thing, and CD burning software to get themselves a hard copy. This costs more than a CD (even a double album) costs in record stores. But the record company ain’t getting their hands on any money, so it’s GOOD! Right?
Anyway, what I did in getting this thing for myself is put the LP (about 50 minutes) on one CD-R and the three EP’s (totaling about 42 minutes) on another. I’m gonna refer to the LP as “disc one” and the EP’s as “disc two” for the rest of this review, too, by the way. Got it? Good. Now I can tell you to not bother going through the effort to get this, because it SUCKS. HARD. About half of the songs just sounds like mediocre rewrites of The Generic MACHINA Song, with even WORSE production, if you can believe it, though some of it may just be the mp3’s I have. Stuff like “Real Love” and “Let Me Give The World To You” and “Home” makes me YEARN for the days of “Wound” and whatnot from MACHINA. Actually, to me, the best overproduced mediocre pop song was penned by Mr. James Iha! That’d be “Go,” mainly because, since James wrote the thing and sings the lyrics, it sounds NOTHING like The Generic MACHINA Song. I actually dig it quite a bit. It’d fit right in next to “I Of The Mourning” as a kinda decent song on MACHINA. Good for James!
There’s a lot of like pseudo-industrial shit on this thing, too, and, jesus, it is HORRIBLE. Remember I said “The Crying Tree Of Mercury” was the worst song the Pumpkins ever did? Well, fuck that, “White Spyder” is the worst thing they ever did. I’ve only been able to get through the whole thing without skipping it ONCE. Usually, when I call something “unlistenable,” that just means it’s very bad. “White Spyder” is literally UNLISTENABLE. I can’t physically listen to it.
A lot of the other pseudo-industrial shit comes in the form of alternate versions or double versions of stuff, so that’s ANOTHER complaint (among many) right there. Do we REALLY need a “heavy” version of “Blue Skies Bring Tears?” And, believe it or not, the alternate version of “Heavy Metal Machine” makes the original sound like the fucking BEATLES. It’s THAT FUCKING BAD. VERY VERY VERY FUCKING BAD. REALLY BAD. A few of the songs on disc one get repeated in different versions on disc two, as well. “Glass’ Theme” reoccurs as “Glass’ Theme (Spacey Version),” and they both suck. The two versions of “Cash Car Star” are more or less identical outside of Jimmy’s drum work, and both are actually decent, since it’s one of the better tunes on the album. Both times. “If There Is A God” occurs in an AWFUL overproduced “full band” version as well as a SUPERB and pretty “piano/vox” version, which is just Billy and a piano. Hey! It’s a song on this record I really like!
The best song here is actually an alternate take of “Try Try Try” which is better than the MACHINA version, but I refuse to give my coveted “best song” honors to a re-recording of an existing half-decent tune, so it goes to that “piano/vox” thing. Blerbidoopdiddlydoop. There’s a few more good songs around here somewhere. The hard part is picking them out. I quite enjoy “Speed Kills.” It sounds JUST like an early Pumpkins sludge rocker! NO FUCKING BACKGROUND SYNTH WASHES EITHER! Nice. “Here’s To The Atom Bomb” is a nice little tune that sounds like one of the better songs on Adore. See? There ARE some darn good songs! I think I’ve counted like five or six! Cool. Ofcourse, they’re all surrounded by shit like “Saturnine” or “Soul Power” (a JAMES BROWN cover…Billy, you’re EXTREMELY white…no James Brown for you), and a useless synth instrumental appropriately called “Le Deux Machina (Synth).” Fuck THAT shit. *SIGH* Harrumpphhhhh.
Now you see why Billy ended the band. They weren’t any good any more.
Alexandre Grebennik writes:
Hi!
Though 4 for MachinaII is completely wrong. The Speed Kills is one of
their best songs, and Lucky 13, Glass' Theme, Dross, Cash Car Star, White
Spider - these are their "Glass And The Ghost Children" image songs,
they
are very good, so come on.
Aleksandr.
Judas O (2001)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “The Aeroplane Flies High”
Great. Just great. Now I’ve gotta spend a second consecutive (and third on this page) review explaining what the fuck it is I’m reviewing. Well, when the Pumpkins greatest hits collection came out, some copies were sold as a double album, with the second disc being a hodgepodge of b-sides and outtakes and whatnot from the Mellon Collie days through to the Machina albums, basically serving as the sequel to Pisces Iscariot. So THAT’S what this is. No, you can’t buy it by itself. Yes, that probably makes this review useless. Yes, I’m gonna write it anyway. Dig? You can download the thing if you want it for yourself…and if you can download stuff. And though I’m not gonna review the greatest hits album (I don’t have it, but I’ve heard all the songs), I WOULD like to question its song selection. Of the twenty tracks, EIGHT are post-Mellon Collie. What the fuck is that? And WHERE IN GOD’S NAME IS MAYONAISE??????????? I know it wasn’t a single…but it’s so GOOD! And why is “The Everlasting Gaze” on there? That song BLOWS! COCK! And “Real Love?” WHY DOES MACHINA II GET REPRESENTED!!! If it were up to ME, I’d have thrown the two singles from Adore on there (which they did), then “Stand Inside Your Love” from MACHINA, and used the rest of the album for, you know, when they were GOOD. But what do I know?
OK, back to the record at hand. As I said, it’s more or less the sequel to Pisces Iscariot, and so it has outtakes and b-sides from the Mellon Collie era (awesome), the Adore era (an interesting mixed bag), and the Machina era (for the most part, shit). Interestingly, four of the sixteen tracks here were on Machina II. “Lucky 13” and “Slow Dawn” managed to define the term “mediocrity” on that piece of shit, and (being the EXACT SAME VERSIONS) continue to do so here. “Here’s To The Atom Bomb” and “Saturnine” get all spiffed up for official release, though. “Saturnine” turns from a terrifically terrible pile of crap into a neat song that sounds like something from Adore, and “Here’s To The Atom Bomb” turns from a neat song that sounds like something from Adore into a VERY neat song that sounds like it could be on Mellon Collie. Sensing a pattern here?
If not, it’s that the Machina albums are not very good, Adore is good, and Mellon Collie is very, very, VERY good. To support this, one need only look at the four tracks here from the Aeroplane Flies High boxset with all the Mellon Collie singles on it (which I don’t have because it costs like $30, and I won’t download it because the whole point is the cool mini pseudo-suitcase packaging). “The Aeroplane Flies High” is one of the BEST fucking songs the Pumpkins ever did, and should have been on the actual Mellon Collie album. It’s like the spiritual descendant of “Starla,” only COOLER. “Marquis In Spades” is a solid “Jellybelly”-esque Mellon Collie rocker, “Set The Ray To Jerry” is a gorgeous little bass-driven ditty, and “Believe” is a James Iha song, so it’s, um…yeah, a James Iha song. They all sound the same.
The rest of
the stuff here is a VERY mixed bag, with some really good material (I DIG the
acoustic-techno Adore outtake “Waiting” that sounds exactly like “The
Tale Of Dusty And Pistol Pete”) and some HORRENDOUS stuff as well (“Soot And
Stars”…ugh…SEVEN MINUTES…ugh). And, hey,
you wanna know a song that can rival “The Crying Tree Of Mercury” and “White
Spyder” for AWFULNESS? Well, we’ve got
“Rock On” for ya! It’s a cover, and, like
the James Brown cover on Machina II, it’s just silly that Billy thought
he could pull it off and not have it suck.
“Hey, kids, rock and roll! Rock
on! Oooooh, my soul!” Billy…um…what the fuck are you doing? Outside of me, you’re the whitest man in
Whatever, no one cares about this album. Especially because it was never actually released by itself as an album It’s pretty good, though “The Aeroplane Flies High” is really an orgasmic song. Eh. Now I think I’m gonna go look at my new SI Swimsuit Issue, which I just picked up today. BOOYEAH! Brad’s prediction for Breakout SI Swimsuit Star in 2004: Ana Beatriz Barros. This is following two consecutive successful predictions of Petra Nemcova (this year) and Yamila Diaz (2002). Not that any of these women would ever look at me or anything.
Zeitgeist (2007)
Rating: 6
Best Song: “Tarantula”
Before I actually review this album, I’d like to share a little anecdote from my retarded little life. I recently confronted The Mythical Al on his tendency to never, ever be surprised by movies. What I mean by this is that, whatever his thoughts on how a movie will turn out before entering the theater, whether they be full of excitement or dread (And don’t ask why he’d see movies he assumes will be terrible; he’s a movie buff who’s lived in LA since he was 18 and wants to work “in the business.” He figures it’s his, like, “duty.” And the funny thing is I go see all those movies he expects to suck with him, too.). This is funny because, when we disagree on movies, it’s usually because we both expected it to suck but I surprisingly loved it, or vice versa (a recent example is Transformers, which he thought was silly and absolutely retarded, but I thoroughly enjoyed precisely because it was so silly and retarded). So I asked him why he’s never “surprised” by movies and his answer was that, being such a movie buff, he’s more familiar with the work of non-uber-famous screenwriters/directors/etc. than, say, me (a valid point), and that, in addition to this, being “in the business,” he follows how movies “track” and what the opinion of the movie generally seems to be, you know, “in the business.” The “buzz,” if you will. Combining these two things, he can usually accurately predict whether he will like a movie or not (and how much) before he sees it. I asked him if this takes the fun out of seeing movies, and he replied “of course not!” I didn’t understand. I love being surprised by movies!
But then I thought of myself and music and realized I was the same way with albums. Not the “in the business” part (it’s not like I follow what’s going on in studios or whatever), but I know enough and I know artists’ tendencies enough that I’ve gotten to the point where I can predict what ratings I’ll be giving certain albums, and I’m more often than not only a point or so off from what I eventually do give it, and very rarely more than two points off. It’s not often that I’m completely shocked one way or another, and when I am it’s usually because I’m trying out a genre of music I don’t have much experience with (like when I first listened to Public Enemy, for instance; I had no idea I’d like them that much, since I’d been so conditioned to dislike rap until then).
The point is I’m rarely wrong, and that brings me this album. My prediction was that this would be absolutely gawd-awful, like 2-level awful. Just horrendous. Billy hadn’t tried to write any straight-ahead rock since Mellon Collie, and he hadn’t tried an album of just that since Siamese Dream back 15 damn years ago. He had just released that terrible (though redeemed by a few good songs, thankfully) solo album of his, and then reacted to its tanking and his suddenly being irrelevant by “re-forming” the Pumpkins without telling James or D’Arcy, who wanted no part of the project anyway. When I heard he’d be “returning to his hard rock roots” and calling the album fucking Zeitgeist (Seriously, can you think of a more wannabe-serious/pretentious album title than Zeitgeist? What the hell!), the whole thing started smacking of desperation to get back into the mainstream consciousness at any cost, even if that meant dragging Jimmy Chamberlin’s drug-addicted ass into a studio to re-record the drum tracks from Siamese Dream over a bunch of 40-tracked guitar blasts that Billy shitted out as quickly as possible and used because they kinda sounded like Siamese Dream but sucked and also sounded kinda like nu-metal or something. This was what I was expecting. Then I saw the horrible album cover and became more firm in my pre-album bias. Then I saw Transformers and heard the despicably bad “Doomsday Clock” play during the closing credits (Really, a de-tuned riff that sounds like a half-assed “Quiet” ripoff with an extra-whiny Billy mumbling a non-existent melody that’s so bad it distracts the listener with how much it’s completely off the beat and atrocious? That’s your opener, the song you licensed to the closing credits of one of the biggest movies of the summer? You thought this pile of excrement was worth exposing that much?) and I became even more firm in my pre-album bias. My guess for the rating was in the 2/3 range, even though I absolutely hated that because I love what Billy and his sidekicks did in the mid-nineties when they were awesome. But sometimes people need to just slowly fade into the distance so they don’t tarnish their legacy. Billy actually passed that point years ago, but I figured this would be the last nail in the coffin.
Thankfully, and to my complete surprise, the album is not bad. It’s decidedly decent and listenable and OK. “Doomsday Clock” may be a colossal failure, but Billy only hits those depths of badness one other time on the album (“For God and Country,” which sounds like an outtake from his solo album…and no, not one of the two good songs). In one sense, though, it’s precisely what I expected, in that Billy gave the people exactly what he figured they wanted from the Pumpkins, i.e. big, loud, massively overdubbed, arena-ready guitars with Jimmy Chamberlin pounding away like Jimmy Chamberlin in the background, and nothing else. There is very little “light” material on this album, which is a shame because some of the best moments on Gish and Siamese Dream (“Rhinoceros,” “Mayonnaise,” “Today,” etc.) were not Billy yelling and screaming indiscriminately, and even when he did, he wrote a ton of good melodies, especially on the epoch-defining Siamese Dream (I still think it’s one of the best albums of the decade). Billy figured “Smashing Pumpkins” in the public’s mind equaled “Bullet with Butterfly Wings,” and while that may be correct, that’s not why they were such a great band.
So yeah, this record is one big, loud, huge Pumpkins rocker after another, and it seems Billy paid so much attention to getting the guitars to sound as loud as possible he forgot to write any good melodies. This is what I figured would happen, and this is why I figured the album would be an eyesore. However, I didn’t count on two things. First, the guitars sound really, really fucking good (except on “Doomsday Clock,” which is still a joke). Billy didn’t forget how to do that. Second, to make up for the lack of top-notch melodies, the other thing (besides the huge awesome guitars) Billy does is overdub like 10 copies of his voice on itself, and while the thought of multiple nasal Billys frequently dominating the mix might send you off a cliff, this, shockingly, often sounds very good. “Bleeding the Orchid,” for instance, is one of the record’s highlights, but I’m not sure how much of a song it’d be without the vocal tricks and overdubs. With them, though, it’s not bad at all. And he didn’t completely skimp on the melodies, either. The lead single “Tarantula,” for instance, unlike fucking “Doomsday Clock,” actually shows Billy might know what he’s doing when picking songs for public consumption. The main chorus is actually, truly, catchy (and yes, it’s helped by superbly used vocal overdubs again), and the main riff is even pretty interesting, even if it’s really an amalgamation of the one from “Bodies” (the rapid-fire nature), the one from “Zero” (the squeak thing), and the one from (again) “Quiet” (the chord sequence). Jimmy’s fills are excellent, too. Really, the production on this song is just top-notch all-around. Let me also toss some praise behind the token 10-minute ego exercise “United States” (not amazing, but certainly acceptable; no worse than, say, “X.Y.U.”) and “Bring the Light,” which has absolutely no melody whatsoever but amazing drumwork, production, and vocal overdubs, plus a vintage Mellon Collie-era “Zero”-esque (again) guitar solo. Billy’s shamelessly ripping himself off here. That’s fine. I expected that. At least it sounds pretty good.
This album is decent because of the guitar sound, vocal work (I can’t believe I’m saying that about a Pumpkins album, but there you go), and overall production. Not because Billy’s writing great songs again. It’s a triumph (sort of…I wouldn’t normally call a 6 a “triumph,” but I’ll do so this time because it’s not embarrassing, even if it’s only about as good as the first Machina album) of professionalism and production skill, nothing else. It also has no variety whatsoever. The only song that doesn’t sound like Siamese Dream/Mellon Collie on crack is the delicate and “light” (only song on the album I’d describe in this way) “Neverlost,” which might be my 2nd-favorite tune here after “Tarantula.” This album won’t resurrect Billy’s career, but it also won’t kill it, and, that, I think (kind of sadly), is something for Billy to be proud of.