Smashing Pumpkins: Fresh Fruit or Rotten Veg?

was it flappy bird who informed me that it's mixed kind of flat bc of all its crazy dynamics? it's the thing that keeps me at a distance from it these days

this is maybe just a me problem but i have no idea how to tell the difference between the original masters and remasters of sp stuff unless it's really dramatic, iirc there's a weird edit on "crestfallen" (or "pug"?) on the adore remaster

yeah they're maybe a titch louder but in general the remasters have been pretty subtle, which is one reason the revamped Machina reissue concept was interesting

tbh that is the only sp news i'm interested in

Mmm the vocals on cyr are mixed too loud. It makes sense since Corgan’s tone is the least generic sound in here but the whole thing sounds cheap somehow.

Simon & Brad: MCIS was intentionally mixed slightly muddy and it's quiet presumably to retain dynamic range--a rarity for a 1995 CD. I also think that Corgan & Flood basically ran out of time: they were still recording songs in August 1995 (there's an internal Virgin promo with some alternate song titles; "Bodies" was "The Rattler"), and by the end of that month they were already off playing Reading and other Euro festivals. They shot the BWBW video at the end of September, so they had roughly ONE MONTH to mix MCIS (and a good chunk of B-sides). Whereas I think Corgan & Vig took 6-8 weeks to mix SD. So I don't think they fucked it up, and they basically got what they wanted (a low-mid focus), but if they had even just another couple weeks, it'd probably sound better.

nice deets. I think it sounds good, I’m here for the low-mid focus.

Been listening to MCIS and AFH all day. I love these songs unreservedly for ever. They’ve been with me so long, makes me feel safe and home more than most else

But even disregarding all that (positive) emotional baggage, they still sound so fucking good.

thanks for the info fb, that all makes a lot of sense. despite my mild misgivings I don't know if I'd be comfortable with changing the sound of MCIS at all

Yeah I agree Brim+Simon, I like the way it sounds a lot, you just need to turn it up relative to most other music. And yeah I don't know what I would change either. You can hear hints of what a modern/more time intensive mix might've come up with if you listen to the bonus stuff on the MCIS/TAFH reissues. the albums themselves don't really sound different, but something like Inside the Dark Globe or the full Pastichio Medley tracks have more teeth to them, more cut. They're also brickwalled iirc, don't remember but they definitely don't have the dynamic range of the primary albums (thank god he didn't change any of that--remember how "Plume" has a scratch vocal take on the reissue because he didn't realize it was wrong? lol)

Oh yeah and "XYU" was called "Spum" until the last minute...you can hear him introduce it at Reading '95 in a sort of jokey high voice... really glad he changed that title....

Ha I always wondered what the hell he was saying in my bootleg of that show.

My “Mellon Collie”:

Jellybelly
Here Is no Why
Cupid De Locke
Muzzle
Porcelina
Where Boys
Bodies
Thirty-Three
1979
Beautiful
By Starlight

(bonus track: We Only Come Out at Night)

no ruby no cred

accurate

i really love the way mcis sounds, one of the best sounding rock albums ever imo. has a lovely warmth to it

I’m getting into an album that I ignored for 25 years, cut me some slack!

I luv how they continued with / expanded on that downtuned modern-rock sound of “Hummer” and “Mayonaise” with tracks like “Jellybelly.”

tbh all of the pre-machina sp records sound great

as i've prob admitted on this thread multiple times i even love the way machina sounds even though it sounds bad

hah, same!!

the mix is so muddy but that overdriven guitar sound where it sounds simultaneously like a synth and a laser... fuckin incredible

(“Ruby” is ok, but kinda plodding?, and in a Pumpkins mode that I don’t dig so much. My least favorite mode is when they get aggro, à la “Geek USA” & “Silverf*ck” — or, on this album, “Ode to No One” & “XYU”)

(but I was a teenage Gish-head who was kinda confused by SD, and stopped buying their albums altogether after Pisces)

'Ruby' is pretty much a prog epic...

Serious q—should I try making it thru the 64 bonus tracks on the Deluxe Edition; or just start with this "Pastichio Medley" I’ve read so much about (today) (on Wikipedia)?

The instrumental gravity demos are tite

you mean the mellon collie deluxe bonus tracks? ehhhh. i would just listen to aeroplane?

brimstead is right that the gravity demos are tight but that's like superfan shit

aw guess those are on the aeroplane flies high deluxe ed

Cool, thanks, I’ll check out Aeroplane

the best mcis b-sides are as follows: "mouths of babes," "set the ray to jerry," "cherry," "aeroplane flies high," "the boy," the entire tonight tonight ep minus "blank"

i sometimes feel like i'm the only person who loves "transformer" but "transformer"

oh and "pennies" and "marquis in spades," zero ep is where it's at really

I'm trying to discern if "Transformer" and "The Bells" have any Lou Reed going on, or if the titles are just a coincidence

yeah, "The Boy" and "Pennies" make you go... "he can write songs like that?"

“the boy” was written by james iha tbf

no ruby no cred

― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Friday, September 4, 2020 9:35 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

I had the CD version of MCIS growing up but i think I prefer the track order on the vinyl version

Set the Ray to Jerry and Pennies are perhaps two of my favorite Smashing Pumpkins songs and I didn’t get to hear them long after my teenage MCIS obsession had passed. I always wonder if my opinion on them would be the same if they had been included in the album.

I'm trying to discern if "Transformer" and "The Bells" have any Lou Reed going on

"transformer" is def a glam rock move

“the boy” was written by james iha tbf

Ahhh

“medillia of the gray skies” is a killer bside too

Ah, on the tonite tonite EP as brad mentioned

OK, I'm adding "Ruby" into my MCIS playlist (I can haz cred now?)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fW7qkjCiKXo

Lol so he ditched the "Shiny and Oh So Bright" continuing volume conceit already, even though he's keeping the similar artwork?

that would be extremely in character of him, cf. oceania being a part of "teargarden by kaleidyscope"; the day for night project

oh yeah, this is one artist that needs to stop announcing grand plans

The one thing Gerard Way is always going to have over Billy: when the former comes up with ideas for grand schemes he actually DOES make comic books and TV series out of them.

Who are some other artists who reached dazzling, dizzying artistic heights with a singular, indelible sound for a 3-4 year period... and then fell way, way, way, all the way down but kept on trucking (and somehow garnering attention) for literal decades, like Billy Corgan? (Bonus points if they, too, also became reactionary lunatics in the process, too.)

Van Morrison?