We're Not Who You Think We Are
Album: Mellon Collie and The Infinite Sadness
Year: 1995
. . .
Probably because they’d written and recorded nearly 60 songs for Mellon Collie and The Infinite Sadness, it was a much more organic recording process than when they made Siamese Dream, as James Iha and D’arcy Wretzky got to contribute their own guitar and bass parts, though Billy Corgan would still obsessively overdub a zillion guitars on every song.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2276: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Muzzle”
Album: Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
Year: 1995
. . .
And so Siamese Dream was a smashing success, making it to #10 on the U.S. charts and #4 in the U.K. charts, and Billy Corgan became the latest of that early-90s trend of reluctant rock stars, who railed against the success they were having. All I can say is thank the gods for Oasis, who blew that shit right out of the water, but in the years before that, it was a real trend: artists selling millions of records getting really pissed off at the people who bought their records, even as they were taking full advantage of the artistic freedom all of those sales brought them.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2275: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Tonight, Tonight”
Album: Siamese Dream
Year: 1993
. . .
It must mean something, but I don’t exactly know what, that Billy Corgan got two of Siamese Dream’s most affecting ballads out of his fucked-up childhood, and each one is completely different from the other.
“Disarm,” the one about his abusive parents. is an absolutely anthemic piece of music, building inexorably towards its climax. But the other, “Spaceboy,” stays etherial and quiet throughout.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2274: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Spaceboy”
Album: Siamese Dream
Year: 1993
. . .
As legend — not to mention a bunch of stories at the time — has it, the sessions for Siamese Dream were fraught, to say the least. In a lot of respects, it a miracle that they finished the record at all. Not only was Billy Corgan suffering from writer’s block and suicidal ideation, guitarist James Iha & bassist D’arcy Wretzky had recently broken up. Oh, and drummer Jimmy Chamberlain had become a heroin addict, often disappearing for days at time, which was a problem, since he was the only other member that the dictatorial perfectionist Corgan would let play on the record.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2273: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Mayonaise”
Album: Siamese Dream
Year: 1993
. . .
The third single from Siamese Dream, after “Cherub Rock” and “Today,” “Disarm” showed that Billy Corgan had more on his mind than finding new and interesting guitar tones.
And after five songs where The Smashing Pumpkins brought the crunch, the acoustic guitar plus strings “Disarm” was exactly the kind of curveball Siamese Dream needed en route to becoming a classic record, as it somehow was both lighter than air and bigger than mountains.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2272: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Disarm”
Album: Siamese Dream
Year: 1993
While Siamese Dream had a bunch of singles and radio songs, I also loved it because of some of the longer, artier cuts. Not all of them, of course: “Soma” is too somnambulant by half and I’ve always liked “Silverfuck,” it does shoots its wad a little bit early.
But “Hummer” is the shit: nearly 7 minutes of glorious noisy prog meandering, anchored by a riff thats splits the difference between “Today” and “Rocket,” only thicker and meatier than either.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2271: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Hummer”
Album: Siamese Dream
Year: 1993
. . .
We’ll always have Siamese Dream.
Given the near-30 years of craziness that followed it, nowadays Siamese Dream seems even more like a miracle, practically dropping out of nowhere during the summer of 1993 to join Last Splash and Exile in Guyville in dominating the back half of that year for me.
Of course, there were the haters, who said that it was too polished, too metal, too proggy, and you know what? They were right! It was too polished, too metal, too proggy. That that was the point! One of the key reasons Siamese Dream was so great is that it sounded so great: Billy Corgan and genius producer Butch Vig somehow layered a million guitar parts without it ever getting thick and muddy.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2270: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Today”
Album: Singles – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Year: 1992
. . .
With the exception of 1979’s That Summer!, no motion picture soundtrack ever affected me as much as the soundtrack for 1992’s Singles. And unlike That Summer!, Singles was a film that people actually saw, especially as it came during that period where filmmaker Cameron Crowe could do no wrong, though I certainly didn’t enjoy it nearly as much as Say Anything or Almost Famous.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2269: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Drown”
Album: Gish
Year: 1991
. . .
For reasons I don’t remember, the debut album by The Smashing Pumpkins, Gish, totally didn’t make my radar when it was initially released in 1991. I wasn’t alone: it barely grazed the Billboard top 200 albums charts, stalling at 195.
Instead, I picked it up in late 1992 or early 1993, having become Pumpkins-curious based their track on the Singles soundtrack, “Drown,” about more which tomorrow.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2268: The Smashing Pumpkins – “Rhinoceros”
Album: Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake
Year: 1968
. . .
In a little over two years, Small Faces had gone from your typical English R&B snobs to psychedelic minstrels whose consensus best album was named after Liverpudlian tobacco, was released in a circular sleeve, and featured a second side that was song suite about a guy named Happiness Stan who sets out to find the missing half of the moon.
That’s just how great the drugs were in late-60s London.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #2267: Small Faces – “Lazy Sunday”