Smashing Pumpkins

[GnFnR87]

Okay, I'm out of the loop here.? Can anyone brief me on the bonus tracks?

check ur PM box, [hint hint, nudge nudge]. 


i'm listening to Siamese Dream now, i think this is my favorite album ever. no joke.

[Dr. Blutarsky]

I went to my local Best Buy yesterday to pick it up and I was told it wouldn't hit the shelved till tuesday. I remember reading it was to be released 07-07-07.  Now its 07-10-07. I know new stuff comes out on tuesdays, but why did they promote it otherwise? Got Libertad instead.

[GnFnR87]

I went to my local Best Buy yesterday to pick it up and I was told it wouldn't hit the shelved till tuesday. I remember reading it was to be released 07-07-07.? Now its 07-10-07. I know new stuff comes out on tuesdays, but why did they promote it otherwise? Got Libertad instead.

they changed it to the 10th a long time ago. 7/7/07 was just the date the said when the title was announced.


anyway, its really pissing me off that most of the reviews just focus on how its only billy corgan and jimmy and bitch about james iha and d'arcy not being there and how its a cash grab etc. wtf??? last time i checked MUSIC reviews were about the MUSIC? some reviews i read spend the whole thing on just talking about the history surrounding the release and say two sentences about the actual music.

also, is it really THAT big of a deal that D'arcy and James aren't involved??? the pumpkins have always been Billy's creation, he wrote like 99% of the material and practically recorded all of siamese dream by himself. the only important thing james ever did was co-write Mayonnaise. i love james and d'arcy, don't get me wrong, but the new members are fine and this has been billy's baby from day one.

not dissing on Axl or anything but the whole GNR situation is a little more understandable to criticize since it was much more of a group effort. while practically all the pumpkins records said? "all songs written by billy corgan". 

[Dr. Blutarsky]

I went to my local Best Buy yesterday to pick it up and I was told it wouldn't hit the shelved till tuesday. I remember reading it was to be released 07-07-07.  Now its 07-10-07. I know new stuff comes out on tuesdays, but why did they promote it otherwise? Got Libertad instead.

they changed it to the 10th a long time ago. 7/7/07 was just the date the said when the title was announced.


anyway, its really pissing me off that most of the reviews just focus on how its only billy corgan and jimmy and bitch about james iha and d'arcy not being there and how its a cash grab etc. wtf??? last time i checked MUSIC reviews were about the MUSIC? some reviews i read spend the whole thing on just talking about the history surrounding the release and say two sentences about the actual music.

also, is it really THAT big of a deal that D'arcy and James aren't involved??? the pumpkins have always been Billy's creation, he wrote like 99% of the material and practically recorded all of siamese dream by himself. the only important thing james ever did was co-write Mayonnaise. i love james and d'arcy, don't get me wrong, but the new members are fine and this has been billy's baby from day one.

not dissing on Axl or anything but the whole GNR situation is a little more understandable to criticize since it was much more of a group effort. while practically all the pumpkins records said  "all songs written by billy corgan". 

I feel that music critics know less than most when it comes to fairly assessing  a new CD when they review it.  Billy and Jimmy were and are the core elements of SP. They were never defined by the Bass sound of D'arcey or the Iha backing guitar sound 

Jimmy's drumming along with Billy's bombastic riffs, lyrics and vocal style make SP sound like SP.

[AxlsMainMan]

Cant wait for Tuesday

[von]

That and Melissa Auf der Maur is a way better player than D'arcy. I always preferred the later Pumpkins.

[bazgnr]

My initial reaction to the bonus tracks is that they're more melodic and catchy than most of the actual album itself, which I think is kind of sad...hopefully repeat listens of Zeitgeist will change that impression.

[von]

Now that I've heard all the bonus tracks, I have no problem picking up the special edition with the photo book and regular track listing. If I had to settle on a bonus track, it'd be BestBuy's "Death from Above," but still, I'll be looking for the special edition. I think that'll be the one to hang on to.

[stinson4ever]

Why are you guys saying that the album comes out tuesday. I went and bought mine saturday. Is it the cd's with the bonus material that comes out tuesday.

[GeraldFord]

So does the special edition come w/ the bonus songs?

[GeraldFord]

From the AMG

2 stars (of 5) And keep in mind Erlewine is a dick.

by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Way back before the Smashing Pumpkins were superstars, right around the release of Siamese Dream, it was already an open secret that they were not a democracy; they were a dictatorship, ruled under the iron fist of singer/songwriter/guitarist/conceptualist Billy Corgan. He came up with their sound, equal parts metal and dream pop, he wrote the songs, and, according to most reports, he recorded almost all the guitars and bass on their albums, masterminding their sound down to the littlest details. Anybody that meticulous was also sharp enough to know the value of image too, so Corgan knew it was better to present the Smashing Pumpkins as a full-fledged band, not a solo project, and he came up with a diverse lineup ideally matched for the alt-rock '90s: he was the skinny misfit leader, surrounded by female bassist D'Arcy, Japanese-American guitarist James Iha, and drummer Jimmy Chamberlin, who came across like an old metalhead on the prowl for freaky chicks. They didn't look like a band; they looked like the idea of a band, which was appealing in its own right, but for as photogenic as they were, the reason the Pumpkins turned into stadium-conquering monsters was Corgan's outsized music, which was nothing if not deliberately, self-consciously dramatic. His commitment to grand gestures was cemented when he disbanded the Smashing Pumpkins at the turn of the millennium, about a year after former Hole bassist Melissa auf der Maur replaced D'Arcy and just as Iha was beginning to bolt. The group was beginning to fracture, but the retirement of the band's name seemed like confirmation that the Pumpkins were a concrete idea for Corgan, that they were a band that served a particular moment in time, and once that moment in time had passed, so had the band. The very fact that he pretty much was the Pumpkins lent this move integrity, since it was clear that Billy could keep the ball rolling, ushering new musicians in and out under the same moniker with nobody but the hardcore being any wiser, but instead of taking that easy road, he decided to make a clean break and pursue other projects.

As it turns out, the Smashing Pumpkins era did mark a phase in Corgan's career: the time that people paid attention to him. Without that name, Corgan started playing to an ever-more selective audience, first as the leader in the deceptively sunny Zwan and then on an icy, alienating 2005 solo album, The Future Embrace, where Corgan channeled his inner Martin Gore. Neither was a radical musical departure from the Pumpkins ? even The Future Embrace had its roots in Adore ? but that didn't matter, since taken together they had the cumulative effect of marginalizing Corgan, and if there was ever a place Billy didn't want to be it was on the margin. From the very beginning, he wanted to lead the biggest, most important band in the land, eventually getting his wish as he used the indie rock underground as a catapult to mainstream stardom, but once his star began to wane he panicked and played the one card he had left in his deck: getting the band back together. On the day The Future Embrace was released, he took out a full-page ad in his hometown paper the Chicago Tribune announcing that the Smashing Pumpkins were reuniting. The only hitch was, he didn't tell any of the other members of the impending reunion, but as it turns out, only Chamberlin ? who was already drumming with Corgan ? was interested in signing up, leaving the Smashing Pumpkins as a band in name only, a Billy Corgan project at its core. This was precisely the very thing he seemed to avoid when he retired the band at the turn of the millennium, and returning to his marquee name gave this reunion a sense of desperation, as if he had nowhere else to go, and the ensuing 2007 album Zeitgeist does nothing to erase the suspicion that Corgan is anxious to regain his status as rock & roll god. To this end, he makes Zeitgeist the hardest, heaviest Pumpkins album ever, layering the record with endless guitar overdubs that wind up feeling like overcompensation, not just for the synth-driven Future Embrace but as a blustering retort to any skeptic who questions the validity of this reunion. Of course, bombast has always been par for the course for Corgan and the Pumpkins, but at their peak they truly did achieve sense of majesty, either in their dreamy, softer psychedelic side or their towering torrents of metallic guitar. Here Corgan has blunted his attack, removing any sense of beauty either in the ballads (which invariably are icy, stilted synth sculptures, not the quivering, gentle pop of "1979" or the strings and acoustic guitars of "Disarm") or the rockers, which was a key to the Pumpkins' appeal. What made "Cherub Rock" or "Bullet with Butterfly Wings" work is how the sighing melody acted as a counterpoint to the ferocious guitars, but on Zeitgeist he repeatedly buries his threadbare melodies beneath squeals of guitar that are too processed to either soar or sear. More than anything, it's this digitally dulled sound that saps Zeitgeist from any impact it may have, but it's also true that there's import to the title: for the first time, Corgan is trying to address the wrongs of society, which is a big change for a writer who has spent his career turning the intimate into the operatic, and it doesn't quite work. It's a long way from complaining that the world is a vampire to detailing how it sucks your blood away, and this blatant attempt at capturing the mood of the era ? evident in the very titles of "Doomsday Clock," "United States," and "For God and Country" ? backfires, only emphasizing the desperateness behind Corgan's music here. At his peak, he never seemed to strive for relevance ? sure, he strived to make art, but his music never seemed weighed down with being part of the, well, zeitgeist; it just came naturally to him. As the title of this purported reunion makes all too plain, Corgan is now all too consumed with being relevant, with being part of the discussion, with being part of the zeitgeist, and never has he has seemed less relevant or interesting than he does here.
 

[GeraldFord]

^

While I haven't heard the new album myself, this guy sounds like he went into the review thinking the album would suck. And he spends too much time (3/4 of the review) playing the part of the typical, jaded critic.

[von]

So does the special edition come w/ the bonus songs?

No, oddly enough. A good move would have been a bonus disc with all three bonus tracks, plus the photo book. But from what I've gathered, it's just the photo book with the CD bound inside. Still, that's the classy choice. That's what I'm getting. If I get there and look at it and the book is a real piece of shit though, I'll pick up the BestBuy copy with "Death from Above."

[GnFnR87]

so the pumpkins are on letterman tonite, i won't be able to watch it but i'm sure it'll show up on youtube hopefully tommorow......

they'll be on letterman friday too!! i think tonite they'll play Tarantula and friday they'll play Starz.

[von]

I'd love to see them play "Doomsday Clock" instead of "Starz."

[GnFnR87]

yeah doomsday clock is the only song i've heard from the album other than tarantula and i like it alot, i know theres been alot of negativity toward it in the fanbase but i think it rocks. the ony thing its lacking is a badass solo a la "cherub rock"


i'm so excited for tommorow, i'll probably pick up the record at target cuz their usualy the cheapest place to get albums around here. can't wait to jam to it when i get home fuck yeah!!!

[von]

Where's the controversy? The lyrics? "It's lonely at the top"? Even that's reaching, but I dunno why people feel the need to  bitch about everything and anything. I can't remember the last time a band's "loyal" fanbase was actually enthusiastic about a current release, only much after the fact. Then in retrospect things become classic. Only now are people coming out to say things that I've known all along, like Adore and MACHINA being brilliant. They were really shit on, and still are to a degree. But what the hell do I know, I even liked TheFutureEmbrace.

[sandman]

anyone know how to get the password for the presale?

tix on sale this week.

[GnFnR87]

anyone know how to get the password for the presale?

tix on sale this week.

buy the album on ITunes.

[sandman]

anyone know how to get the password for the presale?

tix on sale this week.

buy the album on ITunes.

thanks!