Smashing Pumpkins - ADORE (1998) - their last masterpiece - the poll

you can thank D'arcy for convincing Billy to keep that one on the album, and to not change the lyrics of Appels + Oranjes. D'arcy doesn't get enough credit for her influence on Billy, she had much more sway than Iha in terms of what got on an album, what songs they would record, etc.

If that's the case, then D'arcy OTM.

I know Appels + Oranjes is the most divisive track on Adore, but I fucking love that song, and the (admittedly very dated) techno arrangement. the original demo - "What If?" - was one of the best surprises in the 2014 reissue, much more straightforward arrangement, similar to Pistol Pete:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4LIh9F9ZeE

It is!? I was always under the impression that 'Appels + Oranjes' was a well loved track amongst Pumpkins die-hards.

For me, one of the things that made the Pumpkins so great is that they combined a lot of things that I love. Hard rock? Check. New wave? Check. Shoegazing/goth rock? Check. Proggy epics? Check. And much more...

This is partly why I've always been down on Zeitgeist - Billy felt that he had to make a rock record, but the Pumpkins were more than a straight hard rock or alternative rock band.

otm, always loved Billy's description of the band as a wheel with all the different genres/influences/directions as spokes on that wheel. Zeitgeist is pretty one-note, but so is Gish- there's Crush, Daydream, and the dynamics in songs like Window Paine and Suffer, but there are equivalents on Zeitgeist like Bleeding the Orchid, That's the Way, the last two tracks. Issue obviously is the songs aren't as good.

I couldn't say that Gish was one note, I can still hear a combination of very different influences in there!

"what if" is interesting but i think the final arrangement of "appels" is basically perfect (it's "dated" i guess but it sounds about as good as anything on ray of light does today), the synthetic cymbal/snare rush give the song a kinda dazed wonder and rapid frame-rate that fits and enhances the lyric, it's sort of like the musical embodiment of billy corgan saying "whoa" at a time lapse film or something

I wouldn't change a thing about Adore. Unlike MCIS or Machina, I would never consider tinkering with it.

don't get me wrong brad, i love the way the album version of A+O sounds, but i understand why it's such a divisive track, ray of light comparison is otm and probably has a lot to do with that. netphoria is a miserable place.

FYI Adore probably wouldn't have tanked as hard as it did if Billy didn't pulled the Rick Rubin produced version of "Let Me Give the World to You" off the album at the last second. He wrote in the liner notes to that 2014 reissue that that song was going to be last on the album, and he was in a meeting with a bunch of executives that were visibly put-off, scared, and bored by the entire record except LMGTWTY, so he pulled it out of... spite? dumbass. that shit would've been a hit single.

having said that, I can't imagine Adore ending any other way than with "Blank Page."

i completely disagree that "let me give the world to you" would've been a hit but i guess we'll never know. i'm personally thrilled it's not on the record

yeah it would've been really jarring tacked on at the end of that record, he obviously made the right decision longterm - people love Adore now, I still think it's their last masterpiece - & LMGTWTY as a bland MOR single from this very dark, sad record might've worked and deceived people at the time, but by now it would be obvious to everyone what a cowardly & hedging move.

um appels + oranjes is the best song on adore in my opinion

the machina ii version of LMGTWTY is definitely better

i also find it weird that billy thinks it would've been "the hit" bc by the time adore came out pop had already shifted significantly

Billy in never really understanding the world through which he grumpily drags himself shocker.

i'm saying i could see it being an MOR / adult contemporary hit, at a time when bands like Matchbox 20 were doing very well making that kind of music. it's very much that type of song, you know? he tried to get into the NIN/Manson market with Ava Adore and it didn't work. maybe the same would've happened with LMGTWTY and MOR radio, who knows.

i absolutely LOVED "eye" when it came out, i was totally looking forward to the next album being all depeche modey

I have a theory that TEITBITE was the BOTE for SM commercially because billy looked so silly in the video clip.

But yeah I remember being vaguely disappointed there wasn’t more stuff like “Eye” on the album.

“ava adore” is such a weird song. so moody and glitchy and then there’s a double-tracked guitar solo that sounds imported from a cheap trick song

i first saw the "ava adore" video on trl when it wasn't live and was just called total request and it was just carson daily counting down videos on a couch in a dark studio iirc. think it came on before "as long as you love me." i was completely obsessed with mellon collie and i thought "ava adore" was potentially the best song i'd ever heard, so i immediately bought the record and found it extremely confusing. for months i only listened to the songs that coded as "heavy" (so... just "ava" and "tear"), though i would compulsively read the lyrics to the other songs and make up my own vocal melodies to them (??? literally have no idea why i did this). one night, when i was bored with whatever record i was listening to at the time (eve 6?) i put adore on and listened to it the whole way through and had such a powerful experience that it immediately became my favorite album of all time. i still get that feeling a little every time i listen to it

there are several weird cool digressions on this record, like the muffled piano bridge on "tear" or the "all you have to do is run away" part of "behold! the night mare" (that title is classic btw); the songwriting just feels very open in a way that carried over somewhat to machina and then the dude never really wrote that way again

i'm at the point where i think "perfect" was def the best sp single and is maybe the best sp song

ha brad I specifically cited that part as the justification for my B!tNM vote

also I'm finally listening to the b-sides/outtakes and boy this really is the album where Billy and co. just completely nailed the track selection and sequence

otm

i mean i love the b-sides for this record but i'm glad they're all not on the record (except maybe "blissed and gone" and "waiting")

of what made it on, it's absolutely *not* an intuitive set of songs to sequence, either. you could make a case for seven or eight possible openers!

"to sheila" was an inspired choice as an opener i think; it sets a muted, intimate, dreamy tone (even as "ava adore" comes crashing in after it) that the rest of the album lengthens and sustains

even when the album tries to get hard and edgy (verses of "pug") it inevitably slips into something more blurred and glowing (chorus of "pug")

the arising ‘99 version of Pug rules

The album premiered on a radio station here, two weeks or so before the actual release. I taped it obv. But for some reason, they aired it with the songs shuffled, not the album order. Bear in mind, it was two weeks before the physical release, so I played that tape to death. What they did was play Annie Dog which seamlessly went into Appels + Oranjes... I thought it was one song! And because I played that tape approx 1 million times those weeks, I cannot ever uncouple the two. Even made an mp3 pasting them together lol. It really works though!

lol did they play it in alphabetical order

ah yes, the famous "adeor" edit

Whoa you just blew my mind :D

Seriously though, when Corgan ends Annie Dog with 'fa-ace...' and then that A+O intro comes in... You had to be there prob but it works.

xp lol

lol @ simon

i'm sure it's been brought up already, but this album is really too damn long for one disc. i'm very much in favor of bands releasing long albums on two CDs even if they can fit on a single disc.. like the unwound double album...

"behold! the night mare" (that title is classic btw)

Brad gets it.

behold! the night mare is my favourite

the album is definitely too long but i'm not really sure what i'd cut except for annie-dog

Adore is overlong and shaggy in a way that reinforces its sense of loss and the feeling of actually being lost, and wandering in the dark. To Sheila is such a clear-eyed, relaxed, and optimistic opener, and from there it goes in a dozen different directions, and it ends all so unresolved with Blank Page.

D'arcy whining on the documentary about still being in the studio after ten months when the plan was to record the album in 6 weeks (4 days a week, 6 hour days) = classic.

and the recording process for MCIS had to have been even longer lol

actually the MCIS sessions only lasted ~6 months, early March to late August '95. the record was finished by the time they played Reading that year. pretty remarkable considering those sessions yielded the majority of TAFH as well.

but they were super concentrated & focused in 1995; Adore was much more of a session here, session there type of record, and one that started off as a Billy Corgan solo album (according to Brad Wood, who recorded To Sheila, Blank Page, Ava Adore, Tear, Daphne Descends, and Behold! the Night Mare). The 666 Tapes show the band at their best, one of my favorite performances of Porcelina is 27 minutes in:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_U7QGPz4xmA

I wonder how well rehearsed they were going in, and hoe much pre-production there was, though? I have a feeling some were rehearsed up prior to going in with others being worked out in the studio and others only featuring Billy (like 'Stumbleine') or Billy/Jimmy only. It's a lot of material!

*how

yeah of the 56 on MCIS & TAFH it breaks down like this:

written for Siamese Dream
Set the Ray to Jerry
Meladori Magpie

written during the Siamese Dream tour ( Gravity Demos )
Tonight, Tonight
Jellybelly
Zero
Here is No Why
To Forgive
Love
Galapagos
Mouths of Babes
Marquis in Spades
The Aeroplane Flies High
Pennies
Ugly

written fall '94 - early '95
pretty much everything else

written during the recording of MCIS
Where Boys Fear to Tread
Bodies
In the Arms of Sleep
1979
Thru the Eyes of Ruby
X.Y.U.
We Only Come Out at Night

Lots of stuff is just Billy at home: Stumbleine, Meladori Magpie, Rotten Apples, Blank... then they recorded the covers for TAFH right before Jimmy OD'd, and iirc they did a few more like Medellia and The Last Song that summer. But yeah most of those 56 songs were written and recorded in a very short period of time, pretty insane. there was a lot of pre-production and rehearsal in the fall of '94, and you can get a good sense of where they were at with the four Double Door shows in February '95, days before they went into the studio. Songs like Muzzle, Fuck You, Porcelina, Thirty-three, Zero, and on and on and on, were all fully formed by then.

a previously uncirculated gem was uploaded today. 2 hour adore-era show, ridiculous setlist & performance

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Yvk7X4wmhE

To Sheila
Behold! the Night Mare
Pug
Tear
Once Upon a Time
Crestfallen
Ava Adore
Appels + Oranjes
Daphne Descends
Annie-Dog
Perfect
Tonight, Tonight
The Tale of Dusty and Pistol Pete
Bullet with Butterfly Wings
Shame
For Martha
---
1979
Blank Page

Apathy Video continues to be a youtube hero. This just went up 15 minutes ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHDtCRHFsn4

aw 11:22

the interviewer does some annoying bits in the beginning but his description of Adore as "a wolf in lamb's clothing" is otfm