Smashing Pumpkins: Fresh Fruit or Rotten Veg?

Hang on, this interview is done by the same guy who did that NME piece on Morrissey, isn't it?

Well, they're playing live on the BBC red button now. The rhythm section is Brad Wilk from Rage Against The Machine on drums and Mark Stoermer from The Killers on bass. Yeah.

Having heard the latest album, I don't think it's good as Oceania.

Another day, another interview, another "dude, no" moment:

Q. Sure, but at least some portion of the audience is going to be there to hear the records they liked 15 or 20 years ago. How do you feel about that?

A. I don't care. That's a nostalgia-sentimentality-based business that I am not a part of. It's like saying because one movie company makes cartoons and another company makes movies, I'm in the cartoon business. I feel like people lump me into the cartoon business, and I don't want to be in the cartoon business. It's very simple: You've got two great artists, two great histories, still making great music. We are going to go out and kick ass as good or better than somebody in their twenties or thirties or whatever. Either believe it or don't – but if you don't, then you will miss something that you rarely see, which in this case will be three hours of really powerful music. I mean, there is a point where you can't apologize for that, or you can't really explain it to someone who's got their head up their ass with a selfie stick.

Q. That's quite an image.

A. Thank you. I am a published poet. (Laughs)

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/billy-corgan-on-touring-with-marilyn-manson-and-battling-nostalgia-20150605

The man hasn't aged well and his obsession with wrestling just weirds me out. SP was my favourite band from the age of 12 to 19 (when they broke up), but since then it has become really hard. Odd becomes some of his new music I really like. "The Chimera" from Oceania, for example, is a really good song. Somehow it would be easier to put up with him if the band got back together, but I really doubt that'll ever happen. What a shame.

(Funny how he says he's not part of a "nostalgia-sentimentality-based business" when he just re-issued all of his 20-year-old albums.)

He's really the definition of middlebrow. He'd be more interesting if he was, you know, more interesting. Stop writing songs, start making soundscapes. Stop trying to make hits, start trying to make music that challenges. Stop singing, start ... I dunno, just stop singing, Stop singing, stop talking, stop being a poet, stop everything and start over again, for real. Stop the Smashing Pumpkins and do something else.

I would buy an album from this guy if it was 40 minutes of the most atmospheric/ambient parts from 90s SP with no recycled riffs or singing

I would buy an album from this guy if I lived in a totalitarian state where the leader was really into Smashing Pumpkins and there was a general expectation that you would buy at least one album from this guy or face some real-life consequences

I've already bought several albums from this guy!

Somehow it would be easier to put up with him if the band got back together, but I really doubt that'll ever happen. What a shame.

D'Arcy is seriously mentally ill/burnt out on drugs. Not sure why he can't work with Iha & Chamberlin anymore though.

Because neither of them seem to want to is the answer to that one!

I would buy an album from this guy if it was 40 minutes of the most atmospheric/ambient parts from 90s SP with no recycled riffs or singing

that would actually be p awesome. smashing pumpkins never bettered Drown.

there was some moment in the 90s when one of the station IDs on the alt-rock station played like a tiny blurt of some song, still unknown to me, which i suspect had to be sonic youth or MBV, but which i, with my limited knowledge, could only guess was smashing pumpkins. in hindsight, the better fanbase-shedding, career-shedding move, cred-wise would have been to totally swing in this direction, worry less about hooks, choruses, singing, and just really go in for the wash of guitars: soaring, crashing, murmuring, trembling. the endlessly overdubbed guitars on siamese dream are so expressive and suggestive, much moreso than billy's lyrics (especially post-adore) which tended so much towards the obvious and melodramatic that it got hard to feel anything listening to the records.

By the way, the band will no doubt get voted into the Rock and Roll HOF next year. I assume we can expect Billy will want to play with the current line-up (whatever it is at the time) and freeze out the original members. Let's not forget he has recently dubbed James a "piece of s---" and Jimmy a "f---ing liar." Charming.

However, it would be awesome to see the four of them get along and play a couple old tunes.

ooh, good point. Chamberlain in particular is such a crucial component of their success, it'd be a bummer if Billy freezes him out like that.

Wow, I had no idea how messed up D'Arcy had gotten over the years. Sad.

Billy and Jimmy have long since made peace. Lots of rumors that he's drumming on the new SP record. I think Matt Walker is more likely, but if SP is inducted next year, Billy will go with Jimmy or alone. James hurt Billy deeply in his heart by not saying goodbye after the last Metro show in 2000. Billy will do everything he can to keep James out of it, as if James has any interest. Billy would take the stage with D'arcy if she was capable. Mellon Colle and the Infinite Sadness indeed!

James hurt Billy deeply in his heart

still funny

I saw some scary photos recently, but where have y'all gotten your D'arcy news?

i'm friends with her on facebook

Say what you will, but she spun a nasty Twister wheel back in the day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPMdvnC6ldc

(I love how Kurt volunteers at around 1:10.)

Chamberlain rejoining the band (even if he's not yet committed beyond their current dates) has seriously reinvigorated my interest in the band over the last couple of weeks.

Sounding great.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpDHl1BlpBs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zch5JVN1uFg

show in camden was great. JC is joining the house band on Seth Meyers' show tonight, dunno for how long. he tweeted that there might be a "pumpkin gem" in the set. i think he means Ruby

https://scontent.fman1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xap1/v/t1.0-9/12108956_10153620687506397_5401487902949253546_n.jpg?oh=b6069b84c461a6a2b01c29cd12aa5810&oe=56C491DD

There was the same headline in a free recipe book with my veggie box delivery last week.

http://www.avclub.com/article/mellon-collie-foretold-both-glory-and-doom-smashin-226274

"Porcelina" is a high point of the record, if you ask me, but oh well. And the cover of the album....I guess it's an iconic image at this point twenty years on, but man it is gorgeous.

i didnt notice the angel was masturbating until a couple years ago

LOL at anyone who considers fucking Bullet the "high point" of MCIS, and thinks Porcelina is an energy sapper....NEXT!

"the unabashedly rockist 'Muzzle'".... yeah, it's a fucking rock song! christ

idek what rockist means in that context

to single out "porcelina" and "ruby" as slogs is to fundamentally misunderstand this record i think?

absolutely! they're the high-watermarks of SP1!

I don’t want this album viewed as an artistic failure publicly. And the way that it will be viewed as an artistic failure publicly is if it doesn’t sell.

billy otm, statement borne out by the "failure" of adore. actually kind of surprised at the lack of petulance in that quote, given most every other corgan interview i've skimmed

'Porcelina of the Vast Oceans' and 'Thru the Eyes of Ruby' are two of my personal highlights of this record and I don't find them slogs at all. I think Brad is totally OTM. I've also never understood the huge fuss over 'Bullet with Butterfly Wings' and '1979' either - I like both plenty, but I consider neither to be highlights. I'd go as far as saying '1979' is one of the most overrated Pumpkins tracks ever, actually.

i believe it to be their very best, but i guess it's overrated if you say so

idk i have a hard time seeing mellon collie as anything other than the peak of 90s alt rock. and i'm not even a big smashing pumpkins fan.

"Porcelina" sounds as big as its full title implies, and I love it for that reason.

the thing about it being the peak of '90s rock is i consider the last five tracks to be a deliberate troll of '90s rock

yeah I don't really think there's any precedent for a RAWK album that ends with five basically guitar-free ballads, nor anyone who's been foolish enough to try that since

Anyone else excited for the second leg of the IN PLAINSONG tour? With a 7-8 suite of Siamese Dream songs in the middle! Check out this setlist from one of the shows last year, with the Adore suite in the middle:

Tonight, Tonight
99 Floors
Today
My Poor Troubled Heart (traditional)
Dorian
For Your Love
Drum + Fife
A Stitch in Time
Mayonaise
Prairie Song
Jersey Shore
Sparrow
Perfect
To Sheila
Behold! the Night Mare
For Martha
Blissed and Gone
Ava Adore
Now (And Then)
The Crying Tree of Mercury
1979
Run2Me
Pinwheels
Stand Inside Your Love
Landslide (Nicks)
A New Poetry
---
Spaceboy
El-A-Noy
---
Cardinal Rule

Sparrow
Perfect
To Sheila
Behold! the Night Mare
For Martha
Blissed and Gone
Ava Adore

fuck

right?? and there are far fewer SD-era songs that work acoustically, so that pretty much guarantees we'll get Luna and Spaceboy along with Disarm and Today. We could get the first performances of Sweet Sweet since 1994! I made a list of all the possible SD-era songs they could do in this format:

Soothe
Luna
Sweet Sweet
Disarm
Today
Rocket
Spaceboy
Obscured
Whir
Glynis
Blissed
Smiley
Apathy's Last Kiss
Soma? (they did it in 96)
Hummer? (did it in 93)
Moleasskiss? (kind of a stretch but i could see him working it out, such a killer song, a lost classic, could've been a single)

Mayonaise could work acoustically, but I never need to hear that song again. Hoping Bill digs deep like he did last year with the Adore material (Sparrow???!!)

please please please let "obscured" happen

obscured is the best song

Always loved "Whir." In 1994 I was 12 and I thought that songs like that were what college kids listened to. It's got that college-y, angsty, Gen-X-y feel that we've all come to know and love. "Obscured" is so great, though.

gonna keep this streak alive and give a nice big shout out to my jam "obscured"

I never cared for "Apathy's Last Kiss," but this rough mix without all the flanger/chorus/phaser is really good

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8sue6FKHBM

Cardinal Rule
Stumbleine
Tonight, Tonight
World's Fair
Space Oddity [David Bowie cover]
Thirty-three
Jesus, I / Mary Star of the Sea
Mayonaise
Soma
Rocket
Spaceboy
Today
Whir [live premiere]
Disarm
Sorrows (In Blue)
Eye
Saturnine [live premiere]
Identify
1979
Stand Inside Your Love
Pinwheels
Lily (My One and Only)
Malibu [Hole cover]
Spaniards [live premiere]
---
Angie [The Rolling Stones cover]
Amarinthine [live premiere]

IDENTIFY??!??!????!!???!?

wacky

God, imagine Corgan doing the vowel-mangling bit on Angie. *shudder*