Smashing Pumpkins: Fresh Fruit or Rotten Veg?

Casual fan at the very best, but I can't think of a single memorable SP bass part. Michael Anthony has more standout moments.

"Rhinoceros" is a bass-driven song. Arguably the massive riffs of "Quiet" are mostly bass (unless that's an octaver). "Hummer", "Soma", "Bullet WBW", "Ava Adore" have pretty great bass parts. The goth roots of the Pumpkins sound depend on big bass riffs, they even remastered Gish very early on to boost the bottom end.

Holy crap I dialed up Mellon Collie in writing that post, listening for the first time in years. "Here Is No Why" my god what a CRUSHING track.

yeah like I said above, you can count the number of notable bass lines and bass driven songs in SP's catalogue on 1 hand more or less: Rhinoceros, Bury Me, Hummer, Glass and the Ghost Children, I of the Mourning. what you're hearing on Quiet is Octaver / pitch shifted guitar, yeah.

Here is No Why has my favorite written guitar solo Billy's ever played

FB I get where you're coming from but I guess my loss of interest in SP's music coincides with D'Arcy's departure - they became less goth-rock and more hard-rock after Adore, and that thick bottom end was displaced by a midrange snarl which doesn't do much for me.

^wholly agree with this

Definitely Rhinoceros and Crush have great bass moments at least

I half-suspect, just with all the different moving parts in those SP songs, that Billy might actually be fleshing out a lot of the structures on the fly in the studio--at least from SD on--so I don't doubt that it would be easier for Billy just to record all the guitar and bass parts himself and then just to teach them to James & D'arcy during rehearsals, in their finalized forms

making D'arcy play roots and fifths all the time seems a more glaring example of Billy's egotism tbrr

Casual fan at the very best, but I can't think of a single memorable SP bass part.

I disagree - Gish is awash with good basslines. Bass plays the lead melody on Bury Me.

Well, musically speaking, when I think of the Smashing Pumpkins, I think first of Billy Corgan's voice/songwriting/guitar playing and then think of Jimmy Chamberlin's drumming. Those are the defining components of the band for me. I don't give anywhere as much thought to the contributions of Iha and D'arcy.

I stand by my Van Halen comparison. Yes there are bass parts, but damned if any of significance come to mind, and even if they did, Michael Anthony's playing is the last reason anyone is listening to those records.

they would be way worse records without his bass playing though. locking down "running with the devil" the way he does is EXACTLY the right decision. stable bedrock for the two wild off-the-chain performers. song would be a mess without that. i mean the way y'all are talking just describes what most rhythm sections do in rock music, right? like very few people would name the bass and rhythm guitar as the key aspect of most rock bands, but they do all kinds of work making the songs move and set a mood and become earworms that it's easy to attribute solely to the lead guitar riff or the vocal part when you're playing it back in your head.

So many of those early VH classic tunes are without multitracking on Eddie's part (guitar overdubs for solos only?) so Anthony frequently straying from the root would have been a mess

No, I get that, bass is important, that's why most bands have bass players. But they can also contribute so much more than "locking down." I think of Iron Maiden or Metallica with Cliff, or the Who/Beatles. And so on. It would be one thing if I said the bass playing in SP (or Van Halen) was *bad*. That would take you out of the song. It's just not notable or noteworthy or essential to the music. Like, I can't think of any memorable bass parts in Slayer songs, either.

Set the ray to jerry is driven by a bass riff and awesome drums.

Trying to think of good Def Leppard or Boston bass lines ...

I can't tell the full extent of the bass part on "Glynis":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsvtXg7fMY4

like there's definitely a bass playing the root, but i can't tell if the bass part is also following along with the riff on another string

making D'arcy play roots and fifths all the time seems a more glaring example of Billy's egotism tbrr

lmao

i mean of all the infinite examples of Billy being an asshole... this is wild

p4k reporting on that new interview with "BlastEcho" with "D'arcy"... the first and only time i've ever encountered this site is when they're talking to "D'arcy"

every great band is allowed to have one member who mostly coasts. in most bands it's the singer.

Seriously. I've seen lots of bands where the singer has just left or stood there and done nothing for a stretch. GNR, Tool, Oasis, Morrissey, the Who ...

again though, look at or listen to any Pumpkins show and the myth of D'arcy being a bad bassist will evaporate... this is just one example, & I'm posting it bc it wasn't circulating until v recently (only acoustic performance of Ruby ever)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75aYiJnEU2I

No one said bad. I don't think? the shows I saw her with were no good but it was not her fault.

which shows did you go to? any of the Rosemont Horizon gigs in October 1996?

I honestly can't remember! One was Lollapalooza '94, another ... was a club date?

Expanding on a previous statement D’arcy made to BlastEcho, D’arcy said that Corgan initially made a contract offer to her, Iha and Chamberlin, which was agreed upon by all parties. However, a month later D’arcy says Billy told her “well, that wasn’t a real offer.” It’s unclear whether or not the initial offer remains for Iha and Chamberlin, although D’arcy is under the impression it is.

An explanation as to why the offer was rescinded, too, remains unclear. Cryptically, she said she has an inkling but “that is a whole other can of worms and a big, ugly one! Another time.”

https://www.stereogum.com/1982667/darcy-wretzky-says-billy-corgan-rescinded-her-invitation-to-play-in-smashing-pumpkins-reunion/news/

i dunno maybe after playing music for decades she forgot how to play dead simple bass lines

I'm trying to picture Van Halen with a McCartney or Entwistle on bass and while YMMV, in my head it sounds like a total mess. Basically I don't think "has a lot of memorable bass parts" is a really good measure of whether a bassist was an important or hard-to-replace aspect of a band's sound. Especially since it's also so dependent on arrangements and composition - Kim Deal's bass part on Monkey Gone To Heaven is memorable despite not being very unique, because the soft/loud dynamics and the lopey pace of the verse vocal put it way way up front in the mix as the main thing tracking your way through that song. The Pumpkins' guitar-orchestra sound, like Boston's, isn't going to do that most of the time, so yeah, the Bullet With Butterfly Wings type songs are the count-on-one-hand exceptions. But that doesn't really tell us that D'Arcy didn't bring anything to the band on other songs.

But I know you know all this, JiC, and I don't mean to come onto a board full of heavy musical hitters and do a rehash of every "is Ringo a great drummer?" conversation ever. I think I'm mostly just talking myself into paying attention to the bass parts next time I put some Pumpkins on!

removing bookmark bc i hate this thread title that much

xpost Ha, no, I totally get you. But I'm not saying VH needed a better bassist. The *last* reason Michael Anthony made it as long as he did was for his bass playing. Reading their manager's book reaffirmed that he was kept on for his harmonies and for being an all-around good guy. As a bass player, he was absolutely replaceable. In a way that EVH (obviously.), AVH (debatable) and DLR (for sure) were not. In the Pumpkins, you need Billy (duh) and Chamberlin (for that classic sound), but D'Arcy and Iha were just there to take up space (in every sense). That said, given Corgan is a shredder and Chamberlin a virtuoso, and that the band essentially operated at its prime like a prog band (vs. VH's bar band boogie rock), they probably would not have been hurt by the presence of some bass wiz. Then again, they might have just ended up sounding like the Mars Volta or something.

Bouncing off your aside, btw, the Pixies example is apt. Kim's no virtuoso, but she was essential to the band's sound, as a player (simple or no, she found a way to stick out), as a singer and as a presence. Her ouster was probably the total flip side to D'Arcy's - Deal was competition, D'Arcy was distraction.

Iha was crucial to the classic band’s sound, and totally not replaceable as the last 11 years have shown. Also yeah, complicated bass playing would’ve made the Pumpkins’ already insane music cross over into, you called it, Mars Volta total prog territory.

Re: Iha, a confession: I was just wondering to myself, hmm, who was the second guitarist all those years when Melissa was in the band? And then I remembered it was still Iha! But I don't know, I think it was less that he was so essential and more that Billy kept picking bad replacements. As opposed to Melissa, who was perfect.

There's a great scene in the Metallica doc where they are trying out bassists, and this one girl totally rocked it, and then they went with lame but obv. more than capable (as are countless bassists) but imo still not right Suicidal Tendencies guy. There's a replacement, and then there's the *right* replacement, and to say Corgan has overthought pretty much everything/one the last decade+ would be an overstatement.

There are some great stories of Daryl Jones in the Stones. Clearly the guy can play anything, and the Stones don't need that. But I think they liked that he wasn't that familiar with them and half-assed his audition (which, of course, probably still sounded better than most). Jones said he had to learn to play with fewer fingers, iirc, to keep things simple but also make things more challenging.

There was that other great story with Dire Straits in the studio with Omar Hakim, after they sacked their regular drummer. They were amazed that Hakim basically flew in and cranked out the whole record in just a day, which should surprise no one who has ever heard him fusion-ing out.

A statement from the band:

In reuniting The Smashing Pumpkins, the band's dedication remains to its fans and its music. To that, James Iha, Jimmy Chamberlin, and William Corgan haven't played a show with D'arcy Wretzky for over 18 years. But it's not for a lack of trying. For despite reports, Ms. Wretzky has repeatedly been invited out to play with the group, participate in demo sessions, or at the very least, meet face-to-face, and in each and every instance she always deferred. We wish her all the best, and look forward to reconnecting with you all very soon.

Pretty much exactly what I expected: she's either not interested or not well enough to participate. She's not being left out of anything. This really sucks, but at least it's not like 2007 or the decade that followed.

Set the ray to jerry is driven by a bass riff and awesome drums.

― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Monday, February 12, 2018 3:57 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

So sick

Pretty much exactly what I expected: she's either not interested or not well enough to participate. She's not being left out of anything

if you 100% discount her words in favor of Billy's account then yeah. i guess "believe women" is for only certain circumstances.

https://www.alternativenation.net/smashing-pumpkins-darcy-shares-billy-corgan-guns-n-roses-reunion-offer/

here's more details from D'Arcy. the whole thing seems like a bit of a mess

I saw that it was a set of texts and I couldn't get very far. peering into peoples' communications makes me queasy. I'm sure plenty will summarize.

Weird ... leaked text exchange? Something seems to be missing. Corgan seems (operative word) amenable and maximum flexible, she seems fine. And then it gets strange.

xpost Corgan tells her she can participate as much or as little as she wants, and seems very flexible and understanding. She can get her own bus at the ready, she can just show up to sing a song or two, or play several songs, if she wants, and in the meantime is welcome to record with them as much or as little as she wants. And she seems excited about it. But then there's stuff about an injured shoulder that may or may not need work, and her mom, and Peter Hook's son playing bass for most of the set and ... t-shirt sales? It's weird. Corgan says he hasn't seen her in 19 years.

Super uncomfortable that all of this was (apparently) attempted without a face-to-face. What a weird bunch of folks.

Well, who knows what is up, but it's pretty clear that D'Arcy is the recluse, or the one who has otherwise vanished. Corgan and Jimmy have been in the studio, James has at least made an appearance, or otherwise been in contact over the years.

Maybe D'Arcy can form a band with Meg White and her husband (Patti Smith's son) and just quietly tour Michigan.

Meg and her husband divorced four years ago, though that's never stopped her starting a band with someone obvs.

It's weird, isn't it? There's obviously a world of hurt feelings here, and it's hard to understand from the outside. Also, artists are often damaged and super-sensitive people and struggle to function. And yeah, I can understand Billy being anxious that Darcy is up to the job, and seems to be handing this as sensitively as possible (and I say this as someone who found him hella unpleasant the time I interviewed him, though that was circa Zwan so who knows?). There are definitely texts missing there, too.

I mean....this is gonna suck either way so

d'arcy is in the comments of that alternative nation post

can we just not do this whole reunion thing

I mean....this is gonna suck either way so

hahahahaha i mean obviously

https://www.facebook.com/darcy.wretzkybrown she's posting about it more on her fb too

it sounds like Corgan was open to having her involved a little on tour as well as recording with them (which she couldn't make and James couldn't for most of the time either weirdly) but she wanted to at least try to prove she was up for the whole thing and he wasn't interested? a very weird way to go about having a reunion, especially deciding on all this without even a face-to-face meeting but that's Billy I guess