Smashing Pumpkins on the Modern Rock Charts

have never heard of any of the ones after Perfect. Voted TEITBITE after briefly deliberating between that and 1979.

Drown > Rhinoceros > 1979 > Cherub Rock > Zero. I think?

Tough call between Zero, Landslide, and Drown. But went with Drown.

For the latter-day songs, GLOW isn't half bad, but Freak and Celestials are a slog.

"Cherub Rock" by a huge margin. I had no idea the cover of "Landslide" was a single, let alone a hit! I'm pretty sure I've never heard it on the radio.

Drown is one of the most beautiful songs ever

"Landslide" got MASSIVE airplay down here, to such an extent that when Fleetwood Mac scored its own hit four years later it felt like the song dominated the decade.

"Muzzle," because I'm still annoyed that it wasn't part of the official Mellon Collie singles campaign with one of those EPs and a video.

"G.L.O.W." was really awesome and easily my favorite thing Corgan's done since the initial breakup, and it wasn't even on an album or anything.

1979

those early '97 singles blur

In the aftermath of the quadruple-platinum Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Billy Corgan's music publisher suggested he collaborate with basketball superstar and rapper Shaquille O'Neal, who had begun work on You Can't Stop the Reign.[1][2] Corgan began work on a programmed backing track loosely inspired by Dr. Dre, but the collaboration fell through.[

glow/superchrist single definitely the last pumpkins thing i cared about. both songs total monsters. then jimmy quit

"glow"'s quality may or may not be due to the main riff's age, you can hear it in "pastichio medley"

i lied, i just remembered i liked one of the tiearfulgarten by oscillyscope songs

that album seems somehow more heartfelt now that i know Billy owns a tea house

'Tonight, Tonight'.

chup rock

thirty-three by a hair over drown / rhinoceros

only one number one hit! anyhow since 'rocket' somehow didn't chart (but did somehow make the active rock chart) i'll vote 'today'

Rocket had a great video, too. And a great cd single with their cover of never let me down again (yes, I bought it as an import).

I wonder how many memorable songs "bubbled under" before the modern rock chart went from 30 positions to 40 positions in the fall of 1994.

ZERO

only one number one hit!

when Blink 182 reformed a while back, they lamented that they rarely hit #1 on the Modern Rock chart, and that RHCP usually held them at #2. I was curious if the Pumpkins had a singular chart nemesis like that -- "Bullet With Butterfly Wings" and "Ava Adore" were held off by "Name" and "Iris," respectively, so I think Billy has a Goo Goo Doll voodoo doll somewhere in his past.

<3 "Rocket"

NOT VOTING BC WHERE IS ROCKET

i love "Rocket" but i only recall seeing the video on 120 Minutes a few times and then it was like 'perfunctory 4th single, don't worry about it.' the song i heard on the radio the most that i'm surprised didn't chart at all is "Frail And Bedazzled," heard that one quite a bit before "Landslide" became the big hit from that record.

I think I actually already owned the album (I ws 13 or something) bt it took Rocket being singled out (as a "single" you might say) for radio play etc to rly get me into this band

it took me a while to check these guys out because i heard they were 'cool' and i didn't believe i was 'cool'

surprised they didn't play frail and bedazzled more, but then again by the time Pisces Iscariot came out in Nov 94 they were already writing MCIS and killing the Siamese era.

yeah i'm surprised purely on a they were massive, the record was massive, the single before it was massive, pure inertia should've gotten it on the chart. then again there would've been heavy competition at the time (94 easily the peak of altrock)(you can vaguely map altrock's fortunes via lollapaloozas - 94 peak popularity, ability to break acts, 95 exposing limitations of format, inability to break acts, 96 compromise into aor). what kept 'disarm' out of the top spot? cuz if you had asked me what smashing pumpkins songs went #1 on modern rock chart i would've guessed 'disarm' had for sure, though if you'd told me only one did i would've known it had to be '1979'.

lol ELVIS COSTELLO peaked higher than "Disarm," didn't see that coming

http://www.billboard.com/charts/1994-04-02/alternative-songs

Tarantula's their only good song

Muzzle

"1979's" one of my favorite songs ever, so that

tonight tonight

the celestials is a pretty good song but his vocals are too high and are.. not what they used to be/

The week Disarm peaked at #8, the rest of the chart was...

1. Morrissey - The More You Ignore Me, the Closer I Get
2. Tori Amos - God
3. Enigma - Return to Innocence
4. Crash Test Dummies - Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm
5. Alice in Chains - No Excuses
6. Beck - Loser
7. Elvis Costello - 13 Steps Lead Down
8. Smashing Pumpkins - Disarm
9. Sheryl Crow - Leaving Las Vegas
10. Nirvana - All Apologies

fucking crash test dummies

kinda wish post-grunge had gone more in the Enigma direction. missed opportunities.

Drown!

I've never heard that Elvis Costello song, but Disarm was omnipresent for a while.

Didn't know elvis costello had radio hits that recently

yeah that new age niche in modern rock radio - enya, enigma, DEEP FOREST - is another thing that kinda got obliterated when altrock went homogenized.

i always thought cherub rock basically bombed as the lead single from SD bc of the botched video that Billy hated, and that Today was their first major hit. #7 is pretty high tho!

the cherub rock video rules

In the commentary of the home video set, billy says they filmed it in golden gate park (I think) and the psychedelic colors weren't what he was expecting

it is an awesome video, it's just way too dark. kevin kerslake did it (come as you are, in bloom), and supposedly he took the film, processed it in his bathtub and intentionally fucked it up, but it just came out wayyyy too dark…if i could see more it would be tops. that was billy's main qualm too. and his original idea sounds so much cooler: the band would be playing in a school theater with angels swinging around them on stage, and metal kids moshing in front, but now as i'm typing this it sounds an awful like the teen spirit vid???? in any case the cherub rock video was botched imo. it's just too dark and disjointed and out of sync and doesn't fit. feels like a rough cut.

when you CAN see the band and the colors, it's sweet

Disarm flopped in the UK basically as TOTP's wouldnt allow them on/R1 wouldnt play it due to the lyrics ("cut that little child" ) because the Jamie Bulger murder happened.
They still did a cracking version on The Word though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytuA6ZB7FNA

not sure if it was the murder or the actual trial around the time

Disarm got to #11 in the UK which was pretty good for a band with relatively little mainstream profile at the time and zero airplay.

one week in and out?
They refused to speak to Kerrang at the time because "it was a metal mag" they didnt like being in a magazine with ugly kid joe when Kerrang featured them when Gish was out.(still have that issue somewhere)
Then by mellon collie it was 'safe' for billy to speak about liking judas priest/metal despite denying it for a few years and kerrang got loads of interviews and they went mega. Funny how all these alt bands denied being metal at the time; was metal really so toxic in the USA at the time?

they still sold out places like the barras though (as i couldnt get a ticket) despite no mainstream coverage/radio play/kerrang coverage.

mellon collie tour was at the SECC with the incredibly shitty Filter as support

i feel like pretty much every big alt band of the early-mid 90s had at least one member who was an avowed metalhead...SP, Weezer, every Seattle band obv.

this is Cherub Rock methinks.

Then by mellon collie it was 'safe' for billy to speak about liking judas priest/metal despite denying it for a few years and kerrang got loads of interviews and they went mega. Funny how all these alt bands denied being metal at the time; was metal really so toxic in the USA at the time?

There was definitely something of a reaction against hair metal but I actually thought most of these bands were pretty upfront about being influenced by 70s heavy rock (not exactly sure what counts as 'metal' here). Cobain described Nirvana as "The Knack and the Bay City Rollers being molested by Black Flag and Black Sabbath" in the Nevermind-era band bio. I thought Corgan was well-known for talking up his AOR/hard rock influences even early on. (There's almost a direct Rush quote in one of the Siamese Dream solos.) P. sure Soundgarden never hid anything about their Zep/Sab worship.

There was an interview in Rolling Stone iirc where Corgan talked about the first time he ever heard Black Sabbath? Thought that was SD era?

Nov 94: http://www.starla.org/articles/rs94.htm

sure Soundgarden never hid anything about their Zep/Sab worship.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, March 11, 2014 9:20 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Kim Thayil was quite defensive about the Sabbath worship cries. in a late 90s Guitar Magazine interview he tried to say they weren't a major influence, that of course they liked them but they weren't drawing their body of work on their music.

Their music itself suggests that's a load of horseshit but he sounded like he had a chip on his shoulder about it.

drawing *from

jane's addiction never hid their zep influence either. alot of this stuff came up thru headbangers ball also (soundgarden may have been more likely to be played there than more college rock slanted 120 minutes initially, certainly at least as likely). cobain praised aerosmith's rock any chance he got, etc. hair metal could go get fucked and altrock acts made a cleaner break w/ it than yr metallicas and megadeths and there was a general wariness of rock cliches and macho dumbass strutting, cf this incident at the vmas -

A drama was unfolding backstage. Kurt, Courtney, nanny Jackie and Finnerty were sitting with Frances when Axl Rose walked by, holding hands with his model-girlfriend Stephanie Seymour.
"Hey Axl," Courtney beckoned, sounding a bit like Blanche Dubois, "will you be the godfather of our child?" Rose ignored her but turned to Kurt, who was bouncing Frances on his knee, and leaned down near his face. As the veins in Axl's neck thickened to the size of a garden hose, he barked, "You shut your bitch up, or I'm taking you down to the pavement!"
The idea that anyone could control Courtney was so laughable that a giant smile came to Kurt's face. He would have started chortling uncontrollably if it weren't for his own strong sense of self-preservation. He turned to Courtney and ordered, in a robot-like voice: "Okay, bitch. Shut up!" This brought a snicker to everyone within earshot, other than Rose and Seymour.
Perhaps seeking to save face, Seymour created her own confrontation, asking Courtney, with as much sarcasm as she could muster, "Are you a model?" Love, who had just delivered her child three weeks before, was quick for anyone to best her in this type of repartee - particularly Stephanie Seymour - and she fired back, "No. Are you a brain surgeon?" With that, Rose and Seymour stormed off.

aerosmith's rocks rather, though he was a fan in general of aerosmith's rock

If anything, alt/grunge was arguably more of a return to 70s heavy rock aesthetics after the hair/glam-damaged 80s (down to the clothes and haircuts). Not like most of these guys were talking about their Scritti Politti and Teardrop Explodes influences (although Corgan was admittedly probably also the most new wave-influenced, ha.)

yeah there were a good amount of bands who got played on both 120 Minutes and Headbanger's Ball back in the day -- an intersection i call "Weingarten's Alley" -- Alice In Chains, Primus, Faith No More, etc. it amused me when the cross over was very abrupt and deliberate; Candlebox's first video getting introduced by Rikki Rachtman, the 2nd getting introduced by Lewis Largent, etc.

yeah, 'man in the box' probably did get 120 minutes love just cuz seattle connection (i remember before nevermind wondering if seattle sound was ever gonna break out, if badmotorfinger's success was the peak)(and ALOT of coverage of seattle pre-nevermind focused on the posies as the likely breakthrough artist go figure) but nowhere near the love it got on headbangers ball or active rock or the 1990 equiv radio. i never heard them on college radio, curious if they charted on cmj at all (i did hear soundgarden and god knows i heard jane's addiction). funk metal arguably peaked before nevermind (or at least alongside it though 'give it away's much greater success upon rerelease post-'under the bridge' does mean the landscape did change for it somewhat).

thinking back on "Tonight, Tonight", I still like the song but I remember being bothered at Corgan's inconsistency on whether he'd dipthong on "toniiiiiiiight" or not. sometimes it was "tonIIIIIIIIIIIIIIghhhht" and others it was "tonIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-EEE-EEEEIT"

(There's almost a direct Rush quote in one of the Siamese Dream solos.)

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, March 11, 2014 9:20 PM (Yesterday)

is it the outro solo in Rocket?? Corgie admitted somewhere recently that that lick is a direct lift from someone but that he'll never tell. still curious

I have a fondness for Stand Inside Your Love - it's like a loud sheen.

Stand Inside Your Love is their last great song, I think.

(There's almost a direct Rush quote in one of the Siamese Dream solos.)

http://youtu.be/stBOhNxLrbM?t=4m34s
http://youtu.be/EE6u-G1mwWs?t=6m19s

Not saying it's grounds for a lawsuit or anything, just that I don't think the guy was in any sort of denial about his hard rock influences.

-- an intersection i call "Weingarten's Alley" --

let's keep the slash fic out of here

if only Mayonaise qualified that would get my vote

My favorite track on siamese dream by far, maybe in their catalogue

here i'm voting for "Drown" but on here Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream poll it was "Mayonaise" as posted on the first post. it won by a wide margin.

The core, the heart music.

I'm pretty fond of almost everything in this list through 1997 - though I can probably never hear "Disarm" again - and if I skim it down to just straight up great songs/recordings it's still a 7-8 song list easy. Could almost vote for "Cherub Rock" for the intro alone - LOVE that guitar tone in the first riff and then the roaring ocean of Corganism welling up behind it. Would vote for "Rocket" if it were here, think I'm gonna give it to "Muzzle" which was definitely my favorite Mellon Collie single (or pseudo-single) and probably what I voted for in the MCIS poll. So grandiose, so fragile, and the buildup of the "And I knew..." section, culminating in THE SILENCE OF THE WOOOOOOOOOOORLD kinda sums up a dog latin post I always think of when it comes to this band:

If I had been 25 when this came out I'd probably have hated it - the bawling vocal, the post-grunge/proto-emo "you don't understand me OR MY MUSIC" white middle class ethic; the Queen/Prog-inspired pomp and circumstance. It's enough to make a man sick.

But to a 15 year old kid, this tastes like candy-apples.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Voted Landslide. Looking at this list, I feel like Billy really got greedy and extended the Mellon Collie cycle by a full 6 months with soundtrack cuts, and ultimately that led to some backlash/boredom with the Pumpkins with the public at large. They went full-on media saturation for 20 months, then had less than a year of downtime before putting out another record.

I mean, I know it's more than that, that Adore arrived during the time of great change in alt-rock. But even as a teenager who loved them, I felt a palpable sense the Pumpkins were overstaying their welcome by the time they put out something on the Batman and Robin soundtrack AND made a video for it.

Also, it seems like no one got out of Batman and Robin at the same career level they had going into it, except Clooney somehow.

It had a... CHILLING effect.

http://www.film.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/24355864-24355868-large.jpg

allow me to break the ice. my name is carson daly. learn it well. for it's the chilling sound of your doom.

intheblanks and Doctor Casino otm

http://a4.mzstatic.com/us/r30/Features/da/0f/e7/dj.ihccyzsr.227x170-99.jpg

I need to get more diamonds, from my hideout.

nobody's putting that guy in the cooler

http://www1.pictures.gi.zimbio.com/Celebrities+Attend+NHL+Winter+Classic+Wrigley+0P4xIOz05uOl.jpg

"nobody puts billy in the cooler"

http://exclaim.ca/images/pump.jpg

"If revenge is a dish best served cold, then put on your Sunday finest. It's time to feast!"

hahaha

I remember Adore being undermarketed or underpromoted. I didn't even know the followup album was coming out until I heard Ava Adore on the radio one day. And this was back when I read Rolling Stone and had recently discovered the internet. It was almost like they snuck it out to the public, sheepishly aware it wasn't going to fly like Mellon Collie.

OK that last one brought tears to my eyes, thank you DC

I voted Ava Adore btw cos I remember liking it a lot bt haven't heard it in ages, figured noone else'd vote for it much

So glad I brought Batman and Robin into this thread.

The wikipedia for Adore gives the Corgan perspective on its level of success:

Corgan initially blamed fans for the failure, then himself, saying that he "made the mistake of telling people it was a techno record" and that if he "would have told everyone Adore was the Pumpkins' acoustic album we would have never had the problems that we had."

icymi, corgan's 2005 'confessions' entry about the making of adore…

Life in the mansion, or ‘The House’ as it becomes commonly known, is fairly simple and calm…I spend most mornings writing, usually getting up at least an hour before my girlfriend, picking at the typewriter or strumming softly in bed with an old 1950’s acoustic…if I get a decent idea, I just grab my hand-held tape player, hit record, and let it roll…because we are up high in the Hollywood hills, a cool breeze usually rides in with the smell of pine…it is all very quiet, a perfect setting to work and create in…the rooms are decorated in L.A.-Spanish style, which is a faux mix of simulcura old-world ‘espanol’ blended with the need to show off that whoever owns the joint has lots of money…so we sleep on a rustic bed, in a rough hewn room that sits on the second floor overlooking a lower terrace and pool (D’arcy is up in the tower, Bjorn next door, Gooch on the first floor)…we quickly fall into a rhythm of me writing in the morning, and then perhaps my girlfriend getting up and going for a swim to exercise (with me watching and talking to her by the pool)…I’m usually at the studio by 11 or 12, work a full day until say 11 or 12 p.m., and then we hang out at night by or in the jacuzzi, with all of Los Angeles’ twinkling lights spread out in front of us like so many jewels (a beautiful, vibrating sight)…often, we will pop some downers to unwind, some messy pill that we were turned onto by the Manson boys, what everyone commonly calls ‘blue pills’…or, on special nights, take some mushrooms and tread water in the pool until the sun is about to come back up…this is, generally speaking, fairly fun and not that harmful on first look…we are where we are supposed to be, doing what we are supposed to be doing…because if you are in one of the biggest rock bands in the world, you hang out by the pool, take drugs, and shoot the shit with other rock stars in the Sodom and Gomorrah of America…often, other luminaries drop by: Johnny Depp, Anthony Kiedis, Dave Navarro, Kate Moss, Helena Christensen, to name a few, all to take in the sights…it is a typical situation one could find on any night of the week in these hills…so it does not feel special, nor do I feel special doing it…the most notable omission to the party is that James almost never comes by…(by never, I mean he comes to the house just once or twice in the 6 months that we are here)…

The sessions are generally slow paced and technical (we work 6 days a week, by the end 7)…most of my time is spent figuring out how to get new sounds out of old equipment…I have purposely brought none of my usual gear, denying myself access to my most trusted equipment and thereby forcing me to have to work in unfamiliar territory…the amps are old, vintage tube amps, not designed for massive walls of sound…there are almost no guitar pedals to speak of, certainly none that make the guitar distort…I have backed myself into a corner with the hope that I would care enough to fight my way out…the control room we work in is very cramped, which makes it hard for anyone beyond the 3 principals (me, Bjorn, Howard) to hang out leisurely…as is often the case during recording, if they are not needed, James and D’arcy tend to hang out in the lounge, where they can watch T.V…the only problem is this lounge is really small and cramped, so it makes even hanging in there uncomfortable…I tell D’arcy that I really would like her to come and spend the days with me working, that at the worst she can help guide the direction the album is taking (a request I have not made before)…I tell her I need her guidance (she always had a good sense of what is ‘good’), and even though the space is tight, would really appreciate her support…she gets angry and spits at me, “why would I want to sit in there all day with you? It’s so fucking boring!!”…James mostly sits outside in the courtyard and talks on his cell phone…it is a difficult time for everyone…they are used to me working on my own, and any attempt I now make to engage them either doesn’t go so well, or is met with emotional disinterest…things only seem to click if we all play at the same time, but this does not always work for every song, nor is the playing level high enough (on their part) to justify this kind of recording for the whole record…it turns into a case by case, song by song basis, where each song must claw it’s way to a direction, and then based on what I determine is best for a particular tune, set a course that brings the various dysfunctional band dynamics into play…for example, if they aren’t really needed on a song in a fundamental way, they don’t seem to care at all how it turns out …if I ask them to play on a certain idea because I feel their contribution is important (i.e. “why don’t you try out some bass/guitar on this one) our communication is so poor now that if it doesn’t go well fairly quickly, I don’t know how to ‘work’ with them, nor do
they feel comfortable enough to put out their best, most committed effort…sometimes things click, like D’arcy’s 6 string bass ideas on the song “waiting”, but more often than not they offer little and less as the days tick by…the situation is just too damaged, and seems essentially beyond repair…having sold myself on the idea of using drum machines and/or samples instead of a “live” drummer, I quickly discover this is not as easy or as exciting a way to work as I had envisioned…so the drums become a source of frustration and concern, and we start thinking that some songs (though not all) would benefit from the use of a real drummer…

We reach out to Joey, from Beck’s group, to fill in…his style is basically reminiscent of Jimmy’s playing, so this is an easy fit…work with him goes fairly quickly…mostly, I just have him play to tracks that are already somewhat recorded, and his timing is so solid it is a breeze, saving lots of time and effort…(a month later, I ask him if he would like to do the tour---he immediately says yes, and one week later quits without explanation)…the other drummer we work with is Matt, from the now disbanded Soundgarden…Matt is one of the few drummers I have ever felt rivaled Jimmy in the chops department, and we ask him to come in and record live with us…although his style is different than Jimmy’s, he, like Jimmy, takes the songs to a new level of dynamic…the highlight of our work with him is the song I have written for my mother, “for Martha”, a 7 minute or so opus with lots of parts, stops and starts, and even tempo changes…I play the piano live in an “iso” room, while James and D’arcy are out on the floor with him in the main…we do many, many takes to get the whole piece just right (so the master can be just one whole piece), and it turns out beautifully as everyone plays with a lot of passion and soul (a real highlight of the record)…

After so many months of pressure, the contrast of these incredible moments of grace set against the mundane pursuit of the smallest details start to drive me crazy…the album, and it’s concepts, are now sprawling out of control…there are some 30 songs that are half-finished, and I can’t even say I know what it is I am looking for…it’s not acoustic, and it’s not electronic, it is more of a sad, lost feeling with beams of hope shining thru…band, no band, drummer, no drummer…I am there in person, but not really in spirit…I work, speak, but feel disconnected from all of it…as the writer, it is an odd thing to also be the performer…I enjoy the writing immensely, but am very disappointed in myself as “the artist”…and looming in the background are all the events that brought me here, still unresolved…I haven’t even taken a moments pause to mourn my mom…it is all so painful that I cannot bear to hold the entire truth, so I just break it into smaller and smaller pieces that are easy to digest on a day to day basis…but there is no longer a point on the horizon I am marching towards anymore…I have achieved the greatest of success and tasted the stupidity of my own hubris…the old dreams are dead, and now my life becomes more a trudge of survival, and in some messed up way, as long as I keep working I am o.k….there is a part of me that does not want it to end, because I am afraid of what is waiting for me on the other side…

To make myself feel better, I march into a Ferrari dealer and pay cash on the barrel for a brand new 355, the first new car I have ever owned…to complete the charade, I buy 2 pairs of leather pants at the urging of my European girlfriend…if you were to pull up next to me at a red light, you would find a depressed, bald headed, overweight pisces wearing leather head to toe (don’t forget the $300 shades), with a silver-gray poodle panting in the passenger seat…I would be listening to Prince b-sides, avoiding eye contact, but feel as if the whole world was staring at me in my silver spaceship…I realize all of this is absurd of course, but it doesn’t stop me…in fact, it reassures me to know that I am aware that I am living in a cartoon, playing in a fictional band, and going along for the ride…

At about the halfway point of recording, our managers come and visit for a little “look-see”, to find out what is really going on, and hear the record as it stands…(you can see them for yourself in the Metallica movie “Some Kind of Monster”)…I play them most, if not all of what I have, and they sit there song after song in a sort of stunned silence…after it is thru, they look pained to find something positive to say…it is certainly not what they had thought, figuring perhaps it was more of an acoustic record, but now they realize I am way off the plot…they leave me with little hope, encouragement, or suggestions beyond possibly bringing in a producer…I take in all of it, particularly there seeming non-understanding of what I am trying to accomplish, as a good thing…

Off their suggestion, we end up recording one song with famed producer Rick Rubin (who I know a bit socially)…the as of now still unreleased “Let Me Give the World to You” (with Joey playing drums)…after a few false starts of direction, we eventually end up recording the song live, with no vocals…after various incarnations and incantations, I suggest straightening the beat out with a four-on-the-floor tom-tom drive…at first Rick is bored by this, doesn’t agree with where we are headed, and goes to lay on the couch (I don’t blame him)…after about 5 minutes, he leaps up, and says “that’s it, that’s it, let’s do it!”, and we commence doing takes (Rick’s enthusiasm is contagious)…after 68 takes, I am finally satisfied…James, D’arcy, and I are pretty used to working this way all the time, but Joey looks absolutely shell-shocked…he later (in an interview) describes working with us (I’m paraphrasing) as one of the most intense experiences he has ever had in music, but goes on to add that beyond any doubt he may have had in the moment, in the end he realized that what we were after was worth all the effort…

The album seems to finally to have found a solid footing, with it’s odd mix and match approach, and starts to gain a little momentum…I now feel I have
the direction in hand that I wish to go…I make plans with Flood (the producer on Mellon Collie) to come in at the end and help me pull it all together, and mix the album…knowing I will have his support and guidance when I am almost finished gives me a lot of confidence to continue, as I feel that no matter where I go from here, there will be someone there to guide me out of the darkness…the downside is now I have a deadline to meet, so I must start making serious choices about where to put my energy…this also means that I have to start tracking my vocals (of which almost none are done), and come to concrete decisions about lyrics…

It is right about at this moment, where all seems calm, that everything starts to go to hell…

http://billycorgan.livejournal.com/tag/confessions

after 68 takes, I am finally satisfied

This is awesome.

The Stanley Kubrick of alt rock

To make myself feel better, I march into a Ferrari dealer and pay cash on the barrel for a brand new 355, the first new car I have ever owned…to complete the charade, I buy 2 pairs of leather pants at the urging of my European girlfriend

I know his post is lightly self-mocking but, man, this guy was a rock cliché.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

1979 sucks assholes and i always switch the radio station when it comes on

tonight tonight >>>>>>>>>>>> 1979

in Hell I will be forced to read the rest of this dude's diary

I always thought 1979 was super overrated back when it was winning all these awards and getting played all the time. A few years after all that blew over, it kinda 'clicked' and I kinda see what chord it maybe struck, it's a good song, but it still seems a little too much like a bid for doing a Serious Generational Statement or whatever.

1979 was a pleasant song but I never felt it earned the accolades it got. I love the bridge a lot, but to me it's second-tier.

glad Cherub at least placed second!

how far back does Rick Rubin's love of lying on couches go

omg how did i miss that

sad :\ april 8 1994…

As is often the case after a show, we board the bus and hit the road, watching movies and eating bad food to pass the time…this drive is about 5+ hours, so the sun is just about to come up when the bus hisses to a stop…the damp breeze of the ocean rolls up onto me in my half-sleep, and I can spy the water just over the road, so I make a small mental note to come back around during the day and check out the beach…turning, I am a bit stunned to see that we are staying in some sort of motel nightmare, splashed down here on a whim in the 60’s as a heady mix of Jetson’s futurism mixed with hurricane reality…I ask no one in particular, “what the fuck is this place?”, but no one listens cause they have heard it all before and all they really want is a closed door with a bed behind it…my room stinks of mildew and is just big enough for that same sought after bed, but out goes the light, and I am fast asleep…

The phone rings way too early, jarring me out of a sweet, humid sleep…the window is open and the sun pours in as the ocean air sweeps through the room…it looks like a beautiful day…”Did you hear the news? He’s gone and killed himself”…my first twilight thought is that it can’t be true, because even I have been reported dead two separate times in the last year (driving down the road, my father had recently heard a report that I was dead, so it must be a rumor or a bad joke)…the t.v. in the room is one of those standard pieces of shit where you need a remote to turn it on, cause they hardwire the front controls off so you can’t jack the channels around to get the movies for free…I flip on CNN with the sound off, figuring if there’s any truth to it that they would have it…there is nothing on at this moment except a general news report, so it must just be a mistake…then I start to think that maybe they won’t care at all and that this might not be the source for information…about 20 seconds in they flash his picture…the talking head is talking away, and my stomach drops about 1,000 feet…I mumble to whoever is on the line for a minute or so, but I don’t remember what I said…they remind me that they are very glad I am still here…I put down the phone, and all is really quiet now…his picture is still up on the screen, frozen…it is one of those rare moments in life where the entire world seems to be stopped, waiting for the next breath…my mind races around to “where is she? I hope she is alright”…I sit on the edge of the bed and just stare at the screen…I cannot believe my eyes, it is just all so sad…I don’t pray, but I do now…I pull myself down to the floor, my back pressed up against the bed, the t.v. screen just a foot away from my eyes…I say a prayer for his soul, thanking him for all the good he has done…I pray a lot for his child, who is now without a father…and I start to cry and I don’t stop until there are no more tears to cry…

Didn't think he'd get that worked up over Nixon.

Nicky, thanks for sharing all this - somehow id never read it. I think when Billy was posting all this in the first place I just couldn't deal with it.

The post KC entries where Billy's comforting Courtney must be... Interesting

I know it only got one vote bt I suddenly got reminded of how Bullet felt like BC ws suddenly having to work to evoke teenage alienation type feelings rather than just having them

1979 is the one i hum the most, tonight is the most evocative of peak pumpkins for me, bullet and zero most try-hard, but of that era its gotta be muzzle, which sort of puts all the elements together.

I know it only got one vote bt I suddenly got reminded of how Bullet felt like BC ws suddenly having to work to evoke teenage alienation type feelings rather than just having them

totally, although to be fair it's an older song (music was written during SD sessions) and the hook supposedly came very quickly and naturally at the BBC in 1993 right before he recorded the "Landslide" cover.

both were big hits but 1979 really is one of those transcendent, timeless songs like 'Penny Lane' or OMC's 'How Bizarre' that will be in heavy rotation as long as there are humans on this earth…

oh my god last night i stayed up way too late re-reading a lot of his 1992 recollections, will post in a bit… so much gold …
lets just say he has intimacy issues

fall 1992

I hadn’t seen her since high school had ended…she was just 15 when we dated, if you could even call it that…I was a senior when I met her, and we hung out together for awhile and then it just kind of drifted away…we had never even kissed once, say beyond an awkward peck on the cheek here or there…when I would drop her off at her parents, there would always be this stilted silence of wondering, and I could never tell if I was supposed to make a move on her or that it was a deliberate attempt to drive home the simple fact that she just wasn’t that into me…she was, and still is, the quietest girl I have ever met in my whole life…she just doesn’t talk, at all!! Even when you ask her a direct question, she’ll just look at you with those sad eyes and no expression that tells you anything, and you can wait as long as you want but you probably won’t get what it is you’re looking for…even now, she is still very beautiful, a lioness with a fresh faced purity that will never fade…

She picks me up in her car, a nice one, the kind professionals drive, to go out for a bite to eat…we haven’t seen each other at all in about 7 years, totally losing touch after I graduated…I had thought of her a few times, because she was this untouched vision of my youth…she used to come and visit me at this stoner’s house where I lived after I got thrown out of home, just months before my graduation…she loved Duran Duran so much back in 1985 that she would cry real tears, sitting alone on her knees in front of the t.v. when they came on (the only real emotion I ever saw from her)…so we try to catch back up on the good old days, and I realize then she hasn’t really changed a bit…but things do change, however subtly, and I only know her as a child, not giving credit to the woman who sits before me…she really hasn’t aged one iota, and still doesn’t say too much, but when she does, reveals a keen, dry intellect…looking at her, if carefully caught, the innocence is gone, now replaced by a quiet knowing that no one can access…she doesn’t appear to be damaged, rather, events correlate simply for she is just on the normal trajectory many people are often on: childhood, graduate, college, graduate, good job, modern lifestyle, maybe a husband later…she always thought I was a bit strange anyway, so seeing me here, like this now, doesn’t dissuade or inflame that already held opinion that I am a lone ranger…I ask her about the way she used to act towards me…”did you even like me back then? I never even knew whether to kiss you?”…she confides in me indeed, she did like me, and missed me when I left our hometown…I tell her she should have told me all this then, but it doesn’t seem to matter now as we live in separate worlds…she found me because of the band’s success, somehow slipping a note or telling someone to tell me she was at a show…of course, I remembered her right away, so fixed was she as a part of my innocence, forever in my eyes an unrequited love…so this is how we re-connected…

After we eat, we have the normal conversation about where we should go, or what we should do next…it has been so long since we talked that neither of us wants the night to end just yet…she lives somewhere fairly close, but because she doesn’t know the neighborhood so well she says I should pick something for us to do…I say that I really don’t want to go out, that there isn’t anywhere that great to go anyway, especially this early in the evening…the bands space is right down the street, so it seems obvious, and I make her laugh when I tell her I am also living there…she doesn’t understand why I would want to live in a parking garage, assuming rightly so that with the kind of success I have been having that I would have a nice apartment or something…I try to explain to her the whys and wherefores of my mercurial, damaged psyche, but in some ways this enacts the old dynamic between us where I am trying to reach out to her and she only seems to get further away…

As we walk, I point out where I used to work, and betray some of the gossip of the neighborhood…I take her in and show her around, which isn’t that much to see but is an odd contrast to the successes I was just speaking of…there is nowhere to sit but the leather couch, so we both plop down and talk about life and our goals to come…all the kind of conversations you can have with someone who has known you long enough to have known you before you changed into whatever you changed yourself into, and because they are capable of drawing a line between the two points, can sense whether or not the real you is somehow involved…she was always a bit gloomier than I, so the vibe of the dingy space doesn’t really contrast against either of our personalities too much: she as the sorrowful working girl, me as the dark prince in his self-inspired dungeon…somehow, thru time and space and prior connection this all makes sense and the years melt away…

We run out of things to say and things get real quiet, but I don’t want her to leave…she doesn’t seem to be in a particular hurry to go anywhere anyway, so I take a chance and confess to her how confused I was by her when I was around her in younger years…how her silence made me insecure because there was nothing I could do to get her to connect with me, and how much I really did care for her…I tell her all of these things now with the confidence that nothing I am saying can hurt me, or would hurt her because it is all in the past…as I speak, I realize that there is a part of me that still seeks resolution, that still wants to make some sense that my feelings and emotions were real and not some teenage crush, and if she really felt me then thru her strange fog…it is one of those rare moments in life where one can go back into the past, and out of time relive what never occurred but still is inside you waiting…we are both back in that car 7 years ago, hanging on that second, wondering if I should kiss her…

I pull her close and we start to kiss passionately…it is very strange to suddenly kiss someone you have known for such a long time but have never touched, and never thought you would…the sensory memory of what it would be like if you ever did is very old, new data overwriting the teenage charge that lingers but is swiftly being destroyed each and every moment by a brand new thought…I am feeling an overwhelming mix of fluttering acceptance to this and adult style guilt…I bypass it, because I want her now, and there are no parents and schools and Duran Duran songs to get in my way…we are in this moment together, but she is as impassive sexually as she would be in the light of day…she responds more from a willingness to let me in than a need on her part to drag me to where she is…funnily, there is little to show in her eyes that a gear has shifted, or that we are entering a fiery territory that is forbidden…I undress her, touch her, feel the warmth of her body…it is as beautiful as I had wished it to be so long ago, and I feel like she remembers who I was distinctly, and this is her way of saying to me “everything is going to be alright”…that there was no need to worry then, and there is no need to worry now…we start to make love, which seems profane in this horrible bunker…her skin is a translucent white, cutely freckled as if painted on by a brush, seared by a cranky fluorescent tube above…we are awkwardly moving and reaching, trying to find each other in the middle of what feels like some old numbed madness…we tumble across the line into the space where you do not know each other…suddenly, she is some girl I barely know, and I am a stranger…I want to love her, to feel close to her, but the vulnerability and the brazen leap across space and time knocks this reality out of synch…the feeling between us intensifies, becoming less mystical and more blunt…finally, the mask cracks on her, she cries to me, and I see her revealed before me, her flesh and barren soul…I realize that more than anything this is what I always wanted from her, to see behind that mask…the sex has only been a means to that end, and I feel saddened that I have been so reckless to get there…without realizing it before, what we both wanted from each other was to be seen, and to be loved….she has made me wait for so long to find her, and maybe now this has just become our way of saying hello…or maybe goodbye… we see each other once more after this, the same dance repeated under the same light, and then she disappears…I don’t call her and she doesn’t find me, even though she knows where I am…

later on, fall 1992

After reaching a saturation point with new ideas, our primary focus now becomes trying to finish the songs we have in hand…once we go into this state of completion, there is a sort of moratorium ban placed on bringing in new ideas, the general intention being to sort out the best from the best in what we have and get on with the business of finalizing arrangements, lyrics, and tweaking each individual part…sadly, I have been avoiding the issue of finishing the lyrics for some time, choosing instead to hide behind the focus on arranging and re-arranging what were already head spinning configurations of numbers, key changes, breaks, and implied emotional nuances…writing music is easy for me, but it is a new form of truth that I wish to find in these lyrics that I am having the hardest time with…I don’t want to obscure what I am truly feeling in my heart (like I did on our first record), by covering up much of my real sentiments with vague psychedelic babble…putting off the lyrics also has an impact on the day to day songwriting, as we are essentially arranging to implied emotions that are not in reality supported by actual finished lines (by the time we go on to Atlanta, I only have about 25% of the lyrics written)…as we know that we will keep cutting arrangements up until the final hour of recording, this isn’t a big issue of concern…and most of the individual parts are close enough that they can be further developed in the studio…but the lack of a lyrical focus hangs over the album like a dull cloud…

Each remaining song is addressed moment by moment with a laundry list of problems, and we set about tackling each one to everyone’s satisfaction…a laundry list on a particular idea might go something like this: “the intro sucks, the 2nd verse is too long, the lift into the solo is weak, the last bit goes on a little too long, and do you think we should change keys just before the end?”…we don’t vote per se, but rather talk or play thru the suggestions that are tossed in the air, and everyone’s overall body language usually dictates when a concept is or isn’t working…the floor is always open to all possibilities, and we dive into each and every issue with an understanding that all details are important to the overall strength of the album…I choose not to linger or get bogged down for too long on any one idea, because there are so many songs, and therefore, by math, too many problems…the basic thinking goes ‘what you don’t get untangled today you will possibly find a solution for tomorrow’…the only visible downside to this way of working is everyone must remember each days changes as they happen, and also retain the previous days option, say, if the next time we play a new part and go, “oops, that isn’t working”, be able to recall the old change at will…

One last, almost finished idea that has been sitting fairly untouched for a long while is a song simply called “today”…the song is given this name not for any existential reason, but rather out of my laziness, because the first line of the song starts with the word “today”, and calling it that makes it easily recognizable to all (laziness also dictates the title is never changed)…I suggest trying to come up with an interesting intro, and all agree that the blunt start (with the band just blasting in at the top) is boring and obvious…as is often the case of a good intellectual concept, musical silence ensues, shoes are stared at, and all I get in response to my suggestion is the buzz of the amps…frustrated, I look down at my guitar, and without hesitation, place my left hand on the 11th fret, high up on the top two strings…the first thing I feel immediately clicks, a dumb schoolhouse take on “la-dee-dah, la-dee-dah”…I look up, and no one says much, but then again, no one says no…without comment, I play it again, and at the appointed moment, the band kicks in full power…problem solved in 60 seconds…“next!”…

The pecking order on influence to the songs usually falls in this order: Billy, Jimmy, James, D’arcy…although D’arcy contributes very little in the arranging department, she is the person I watch most while we work, because like a child, she is incapable of hiding or masking any displeasure, and it shows readily on her face…James general interest is directly proportionate to whether or not a song is “his”, and following that, whether or not he personally likes a particular tune…he is fully capable of offering a brilliant suggestion at any given moment, and then turning right around and looking completely bored as if there were a million places he would rather be than here…Jimmy stands as the auteur of our power, so great is his unconscious understanding of how to lift the songs to the highest heights…his suggestions tend to be more emotional as opposed to musical…he readily reads my mind, and I read his, and much of our work is eye to eye, soul to soul, and goes on mostly unseen by the other two…my role is one of floor leader and cheerleader, as most of the songs are mine…we have a general rule, which is: ‘your song, your call’…this means that whomever is the writer on a particular song has final call on any decision, including a veto on what other members might play part wise…if a song is a co-write, then both people share this vote/veto…songs like “soma” and “mayonnaise” are true musical collaborations, as I sort thru the issues, making sure the other writer (in this case James) is in full agreement on all aspects of the song, and it’s execution…

During the ‘Gish’ album touring in 1991, we had played a place in Houston called Emo’s…because it was Texas, and usually warm at night, they had a sort of out door patio for drinking…after our show, I spied this incredible looking girl who had long, dyed red hair and an exquisite doe-like face…she was with some guy, who she told me at the time was just her ‘friend’ (I later found out it was her boyfriend)…I tried to get her to hang out with me that night, but she begged off, and that was that, and we said our goodbyes…months later, she wrote a letter me thru our fan club, and we started talking on the phone here and there after that…as I was floating in space emotionally, and definitely on the rebound from the heartache of losing my longtime girlfriend, the idea came up that maybe I could come and visit her sometime…she wanted to know when I could fly down and see her…I said that this was difficult, as we were still in rehearsal, and as soon as we finished, were set to fly to Atlanta to start the record…however, the start date was yet for a couple more weeks, and as the band was pretty tired, I rationalized that a little trip would do me a lot of good…I asked the band if we could work just one more week (instead of the two), and then everyone would take a week off…this was met with great cheer, because everyone was fried from the intense sessions (not to mention the stress of Jimmy’s drug/disappearing issues)…it also seemed a good idea to get out of eyeshot from each other for awhile, if only for a brief moment…

She picks me up from the airport off a night flight, and she is as stunning as I remember her…we joke all the way to a little Mexican restaurant, where we proceeded to stuff our faces and get drunk on margaritas…she takes me home and right into her bed, and it all seems so warm and simple and fun…the next morning, I notice her taking some pills…I ask her what they are, and she says it’s some new pill on the market, “Prozac”…I had heard of Prozac, but only in the context that you didn’t take them if you wanted to get high…it was some sort of anti-depressant, and you would have to take them for two whole weeks before you would feel anything at all (which didn’t jive with our immediate buzz philosophy)…as we talked, I noticed she seemed a little different, but I wrote it off to her possibly having a hangover, as we had drunk a lot the night before and been up fairly late…we decide to go out to get some food, and the first thing she does is turn up some crap metal music really loud in her car, which irritates me because it is about 9am, and I just want to talk to her…when I do engage her, she strikes me as hostile, a totally different person than the one I had hung out with only hours before, or for that matter, gotten to know on the phone when I was still calling her from Chicago…she tries to pick a fight, so I just figure “whatever” and keep my mouth shut…as the days go by, she moves further and further away from me when we go to sleep, and talks to me less and less during the day, so by the 4th day I am feeling pretty strange…what makes this difficult is I have nowhere to go, because the band is not due to arrive in Atlanta for another 3-4 days…I decide the best option is just to try to stick it out, and figure maybe I can talk to her and smooth whatever is bothering her over…I pour my heart out, explaining to her that I like her, I don’t understand what is wrong, and if she wants me to leave, to just tell me and I’ll go…she become very soft, and apologizes, telling me that she has been stressed, it’s not my fault, and she will make it up to me that night by taking me to dinner…the entire effect of this placates me and I figure we are fine…we go out later and have a nice, if not uneventful time, and all seems well…nothing physical is going on between us, but that’s alright because I am more interested in peace than getting a piece of her at this point…the next day comes, and someone has thrown the Sybil switch again, because the monster is back…I cannot believe this is happening, and when she leaves that day to go to work, I seek out her roommate, who is a sweet person…I explain what is going on, and ask her what she thinks I should do…she makes excuses for her friend, but it is obvious to me that she thinks she is a psycho…reading the tea leaves, I pay the friend $20 to drive me to the airport, and I catch the next flight to Atlanta…I later heard from this girl by letter, asking me to give her a call…to my sorrow, I decline, never fully understanding what the deal was down there in Texas…when I arrive in Atlanta shell-shocked, lonely, and stressed, I realize I am really missing the comfort of my band…

i wonder if anyone will beat me to the punch on making a poll for the best bill quote from these. there are like a dozen or more entries left. heres the link: http://billycorgan.livejournal.com/tag/confessions

Don't know if I want to brave those journal entries. But this is on the mark:

I know it only got one vote bt I suddenly got reminded of how Bullet felt like BC ws suddenly having to work to evoke teenage alienation type feelings rather than just having them

But having Bullet as the lead single maybe gave them enough rock-cred that alt-fans wouldn't dismiss "1979" and "Tonight, Tonight." Maybe it's just that I was a jr. high kid at the time, but I feel like "1979" was too much of a departure to be a lead single. At least I know my dopey friends and I probably would have rejected it out of turn.

For not rocking hard enough, obviously

such bullshit that there's no journal entry about Kim Thayil hurting him deeply in his heart

lol

"1979" is great cause it hits that perfect mix of uplift & sadness. Plus nostalgia etc

I finally listened to Oceania and Monuments to an Elegy. You know, there are actually several good songs on there. The rest is just absolute total dross, but unlistenable in a way that the dross of MCIS wasn't. If Billy were more selective he could actually put out a pretty good record.

Have any of you fellow SP weirdos spent any time with these two albums?