Cast the POLLs Aside: the definitive SMASHING PUMPKINS albums poll

xpost shows, i meant

I saw the DC show of the current tour, and the crowd was mostly older, very respectful. i feel like the Pumpkins have a good history with DC. like, the biggest laugh of the night was when Billy began to introduce the Siamese Dream suite, people started calling out song titles, and he just stops and says "OK, this isn't the part of the show where you yell dumb shit at me."

Pisces Iscariot

Sort of stunned by all the love for Pisces Iscariot. Why Pisces over SD? By the same token, nobody's said anything about TAFH.

I only see 3 or 4 other people who mentioned it as their favorite.

I'm guessing they had about 40 or more non-album tracks to choose from when putting this together and it seems like they purposely avoided what could have been a more frantic or less-cohesive record. It doesn't feel like anything is out of place. It might be their saddest-sounding and most psychedelic record. It's also the only one where the majority of the songs are shorter without as many huge bloated mid-sections and codas, with "Starla" as the only epic and "Obscured" as the only other song that stretches past 5 minutes. I feel like most of the songs were recorded around the same time as Gish, and I hugely prefer it to that record.

And in a way it gives me the impression that Aeroplane was a wasted opportunity to try something similar. All the b-sides on Zero (minus Pistachio) plus 6 or 7 others pulled from the other discs could have been an equally great record.

i used to have TAFH. i enjoyed the Zero single but would sometimes be a bit overwhelmed by the rest. i'd be curious to see what everyone's top ten were from that box

Only caught them live once, on the Machina tour, one of the last shows with Melissa Auf der Maur. I was so excited to see them - I was about 14 - but they suffered from the worst, most buzzsaw-like guitar tone I've ever endured at a show. It was so awful that I actually took off early, midway through "Soma", even - at 14! One of my first major disappointments in life.

And in a way it gives me the impression that Aeroplane was a wasted opportunity to try something similar. All the b-sides on Zero (minus Pistachio) plus 6 or 7 others pulled from the other discs could have been an equally great record.

Yeah a "third disc" type deal of similar length to the others could have been great, with "Aeroplane Flies High" itself as the big fuckoff penultimate epic.

I feel like most of the songs were recorded around the same time as Gish, and I hugely prefer it to that record.

it's actually mostly songs recorded for SD and post-Gish b-sides. the only Gish era songs are "Blue," "A Girl Named Sandoz," and "La Dolly Vita." Everything else was recorded during the SD sessions. "Starla," "Landslide," and "Soothe" are the in-between songs.

TAFH has some of my all time favorite SP songs. my top 10:

Rotten Apples
Meladori Magpie
My Blue Heaven
The Aeroplane Flies High
Set the Ray to Jerry
The Boy
God
Marquis in Spades
Blank
Pastichio Medley (still one of the coolest things they ever did, the Pumpkins' own Revolution 9-esque riff collage)

Pisces Iscariot is just really pretty!

xp Interesting. I guess I assumed it was an Incesticide type of thing where at least half of the songs were earlier recordings.

It was kind of awesomely bold that they put out TAFH as this fancy-shmancy box set with the 45 case and all that - IIRC at the time, gimmicky box sets of that kind were pretty rare and it did stand out as a prestige Christmas item or whatever. But it also meant that a LOT of fans never heard any or at least most of those songs. Feel like a second Pisces Iscariot would have been the better move if they could find a way to package it where it still felt like an 'event' appropriate to a band at their commercial peak etc.

Like, it could have either been one double-disc with everything on it, or a single-disc deal where you just accept that some songs are only going to be had by those devoted enough to collect CD singles. Who knows though? As it was the thing sold pretty damn well for a five-disc box set with 28 'new' songs on it.

tbf the only songs exclusive to the TAFH boxset were the covers on the BWBW single. all the other singles were released separately w/ all the b-sides throughout 1996. and fwiw i think the covers are the most disposable of all the songs on TAFH. were CD singles more widely available in '96 though?

Yeah, by "new" I meant "new to people who don't buy CD singles," which surely has to be the overwhelming majority of the five million (?) or so people who had bought Mellon Collie.

CD singles always sold better in the UK, right? or was that just vinyl? by the time I started buying music ~1998, they were phased out except at somewhere like Bleecker St and other places that sold bootlegs, too

but yeah, obviously most people that bought MCIS and SD were not searching for CD singles and imports

I'm American and started buying music around 1995, and probably considered it a bigger part of my life than most of my peers, but I think at most I ever owned, like, four CD singles. There weren't that many of them at the stores and price-wise they seemed like a huge ripoff, particularly if you already owned the album and therefore had the 'big' song.

I loved the shit out of maxi singles and so did my deeper music head friends, but it definitely wasn't what most people went for. But then neither were box sets.

were CD singles more widely available in '96 though?

Not really. Many maxi-singles - especially from Gish and SD era - were difficult to find outside of imports. Import singles were always kinda risky - spending $9.99 or $10.99 just to hear 1 or 2 b-sides that could potentially suck. At least in the case of the Mellon Collie singles, they were EP length and "Zero" specifically probably contained about 50 minutes of music.

iirc NIN's "Further Down The Spiral" was a pretty hot deal at $5.99.

NIN also cannily branded every release as a numbered "Halo," pumping them up as essential pieces of the canon rather than just product shoved out by the label.

Now I'm thinking Corgan should have followed this model - Gish as "Pumpkin #1" etc.

CD singles sold very well in the UK throughout the '90s, hitting a peak from 1994 2 1998 or thereabouts. Bands would often release 2 different versions 'o' the same single, with different B-sides on each. At one point, CD singles were almost like EP's... u got the "main" track and then three additional tracks. If they went down the 2xCD route, then u'd end up with six new songs, or remixes or whatever. Of course, the quality 'o' the B-sides varied depending on the artist, others opted 2 put out live tracks or remixes etc.

Of course, digital files ended up killing the CD single, but the rot started 2 set in when the "rules" 2woards CD singles changed. Eye think u stopped being allowed 2 have more than three tracks on a CD single and it had 2 clock in under a certain amount 'o' time. Bands got exhausted with multi-4matting because it meant that they were having 2 write the equivalent of 2 or 3 albums worth 'o' stuff during an album cycle. Think about it, it wasn't uncommon 4 bands to release 3 or 4 singles from an LP at that time. If they released 2xCD singles 4 every single, that would have meant releasing 24 extra tracks, on top of the LP.

*2wards

Anyway, eye happen 2 be one 'o' those people that thinks that MACHINA could have been one of the Pumpkins' best ever albums if it had been done properly, as it was supposed 2 be. Eye think Corgan was writing a lot of great material at that time, and a lot 'o' the songs from then are big favourites 'o' mine.

*r

OK I actually just attempted the Pisces Iscariot of the MCIS era

Medellia of the Grey Skies
God
Ugly
Cherry
Transformer
Rotten Apples
The Boy
Mouths of Babes
Marquis In Spades
Set the Ray to Jerry
Said Sadly
Pennies
The Aeroplane Flies High (Turns Left, Looks Right)
The Last Song

I wanted to be clever and open with "The Last Song" instead but it was just stupid

I need to go back and listen to all of those TFAH tracks. I sold my box set during an era of extreme poverty about fifteen years ago, and now the only tune I can remember clearly (apart from, like, "My Blue Heaven") is "Set The Ray To Jerry" (which is amazing of course).

TAFH, even.

The acoustic demo of Ugly is so much better than the one on the EP. apparently that song went through half a dozen versions only to be rendered in this off-putting minimal palm muted thing and cast off as a b side. the tune is strong enough to have been a single. lyrics would've resonated back then, too

Billy's Home Demos/the Mellon Collie Demos are absolutely gorgeous, i listen to this more than MCIS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urrSfBXa--c

Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
Lily (My One and Only)
To Forgive For Nothing Less Than Forgetfulness
Bullet With Butterfly Wings
Here Is No Why
Galapogos
Frantic Ab Groove
Autumn Nocturne
Ugly
Wishing You Were Real
Thirty-three
Beautiful

i'm still not convinced billy isn't singing 'panties for sale' on pennies

beliebe, belieber meat

if there is a god
i know he likes to rock
he likes his loud guitars
and his spiders from mars

if there is a god
i know she's watching me
she's a spy with bedroom eyes
that cowers in our skies

http://pitchfork.com/news/65103-darcy-wretzky-says-shed-consider-reuniting-with-the-smashing-pumpkins/

Machina 2 is maybe my fifth-favorite album of theirs, but looking back I don't know if they had a better four-song run than "Go," "Let Me Give the World to You," "Innosense," and "Home" (god "Home" is a gorgeous song).

^^^^ otm

"Go" is probably the best Iha-sung tune they ever did

I prefer Blew Away and The Boy, but Go is great. Certainly better than Take Me Down.

Eye must be one 'o' the few people that likes 'Take Me Down', eye've never really understood what was supposed 2 be bad about it. The guitar sounds on it r beautiful.

it works well as a denouement to disc 1, but on its own the song is really uninteresting. like it functions well as a 3 minute intermission between Porcelina and Where Boys Fear to Tread, but I'm never paying attention to it.

There's plenty 'o' nice melodic ideas in it, eye think. Eye'd take it over 'To Forgive' or 'We Only Come Out At Night' or 'Lily' any day.

it does have some nice sounds and tones, but it's so weightless compared to Corgan's material. really shows how undeveloped Iha was as a songwriter and singer. To Forgive, We Only Come Out at Night, and Lily have so much more going on melodically and lyrically.

'To Forgive' doesn't have much 'o' a tune 2 speak of, really. It's a mere scrap over-inflated 2 4 minutes, whereas 'Take Me Down' cycles thru a whole number of vocal melodies in 2 and a half minutes... none of which really repeat, if eye remember correctly.

"take me down" is good but as "the iha tune we allowed on the album" it's like... way less good than "believe" or "the boy"

*'o'

i agree, but there isn't a place for Believe, The Boy, or any of the other MCIS-era Iha songs on the album. This leaked demo of Billy singing "One and Two" (which ended up on Iha's 1998 solo album) is pretty good:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGXwp7sv3IY

Eye think Iha was a more than capable songwriter, 2 be honest with U. Granted, he was far from a great singer, but then Corgan wasn't either. Eye think he could have blossomed as a songwriter if it wasn't for baldy's dominance in the band. Corgan is quick 2 blame people 4 their lack 'o' enthusiasm, but let's be honest, he did his very best to quash people's enthusiasm 2.

I think you're giving Iha too much credit. He complained to everyone that he was a "repressed talent" a la George Harrison - no one agreed, not producers, record label execs, or other members of the band. Iha wrote more songs in the late 80s period of the band, and they're all awful. I mean, listen to his solo albums. They're garbage. To blame Iha's mediocrity on Corgan is unfair. John and Paul were just as discouraging to George but he blossomed and showed them. Iha has yet to prove he has anything better than "The Boy" or "Go" in him.

He's a fantastic guitar stylist. He came up with a lot of really cool atmospheric parts for live shows. He was generally lazy in the studio, and not as productive as Corgan.