It’s a shame that The Smashing Pumpkins seldom get the true recognition as one of the most significant bands of their generation. Although their fans and the millennials that grew up in the nineties are all aware of their prevalence in the pop scene, critics and music journalists have been more reluctant to give the Pumpkins’ their proper due since the band’s rise to prominence. A combination of band leader Billy Corgan’s brazen acceptance of his genius and controversial politics, his idiosyncrasies ladened in the band’s music, and their contemporaries being some of the most iconic bands of all time (such as Nirvana), the Smashing Pumpkins have yet to be formally immortalised.
Nonetheless, 2023 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the band’s spectacular LP Siamese Dream. Produced during the darkest period in the band’s career: Bassist D’arcy Wretsky and lead guitarist James Iha’s break up, and drummer Jimmy Chamberlain’s drug addiction considered; the Pumpkins (with the help of producer Butch Vig) summoned a stunning album from the depths of personal despair and immense commercial pressures. In a 120 Minutes MTV interview in 1994, Corgan said this project is an expression of everything he is, and I couldn’t agree more. Siamese Dream encapsulates the band’s best aspects that propelled them to mainstream success, characterising their discography in their prime, as well as the foibles that would manifest into fatal flaws that colours the band’s latest output. Siamese Dream is the Smashing Pumpkins.
Famous music critic Robert Christgau said that the strongest aspect of the LP is its sonics. This is true. When the Pumpkins were at their peak, their genius primarily resided in their soundscapes and Siamese Dream demonstrates how well the band managed to seamlessly incorporate heavy metal, grunge, shoegaze, and alternate rock with pop sensibilities to gratifying effect.
Tracks such as the closer ‘Luna’ with its glitzy string arrangements are as enjoyable as songs like ‘Rocket’ with its garish and stinging guitar lead that shimmers throughout the number until it ends in an emphatic fashion – as if an actual rocket went caput. At times, I’d say, the sound makes up for the more weak parts of the album, primarily the lyrics (which we’ll get to later).
The opener ‘Cherub Rock’ is amazing and effectively introduces the album. A song written as a response to the criticism Corgan was receiving by fellow bands like Pavement for his careerism, Corgan saw fit to write a single stating his agency in directing the band. Despite the song’s dark, hard rock aesthetic, it has such a great groove and such a rousing hook that it’s evident that Corgan & co. grew up on seventies rock radio: the chorus has a satisfaction that rivals songs like Cheap Trick’s ‘High Roller’. The classic ‘Today’ screams Pixies with its play on high-low dynamics and its lighthearted presentation of a disturbing topic (suicide). No alternative rock playlist is complete without it, and I do appreciate the demented edge to it (particularly at the bridge), it reminds me of The Beatles’ ‘A Day in the Life’ (“I want to turn you on” anybody?). It’s a sheer force of sound; a great pop song.
The LP generally doesn’t contain a bad song, though one of the problems with the album is its lyrics. Take ‘Quiet’ for example. The lyrics are poor (“we are the fossils/the relics of our time/we mutilate the meanings/so they’re easy to deny”?). I wrote more realised poetry at 17! The lyrics are inconsistent, its verbosity laughable at points, its sentiment ham-fisted. This problem would become glaringly obvious in albums like Cyr (2020). But in this case, Wretsky’s fuzzy bass and Corgan’s vocal delivery does sell it somehow. The sound really is that good. Other tracks like ‘Hummer’ have suspect lyrics too (“life’s a bummer/when you’re a hummer”, really?). Yet the music is so strong that Corgan’s lyrics can easily be phased out beyond recognition, like it’s a My Bloody Valentine song.
Corgan’s overambition would surface on Siamese Dream too. ‘Disarm’, though beautiful and justly acclaimed, is a tad overrated. The textures the song has with its bells and strings are admirable, and the song’s depiction of child abuse is powerful, but I do think its style of song was mastered on the following LP with tracks like ‘Thirty-three’ or on Adore (1998) like ‘Once Upon a Time’. I think ‘Disarm’’s sound is a bit over the top, a touch too saccharine. ‘Soma’ is an attempt at a progressive rock epic (it unfolds like Zeppelin’s ‘Stairway to Heaven’). Though it’s not bad at all, it just doesn’t cut the cake like some of the other songs on Siamese Dream and I think it’s because Corgan’s strength always lain in his pop songcraft: epics like ‘XYU’ or ‘Porcelina of the Vast Oceans’ didn’t hit either on Mellon Collie.
‘Mayonaise’, however, is the centrepiece of Siamese Dream. The lyrics are largely irrelevant given that they were made through a series of one-liners, but this shoegaze-y ballad carries the Pumpkins’ alt-rock punch and Corgan’s genius decision to incorporate a broken, whistling acoustic guitar to the instrumental works wonders. It’s for good reason that it was voted the best Pumpkins song in the Rolling Stone – it’s probably the band’s finest songwriting hour.
Retrospectively, Siamese Dream has been acknowledged as one of the finest achievements of the alt-rock boom in the nineties. For instance, Alternative Press ranked it fourth best album of the decade in 1998. The LP is a successful advert for The Smashing Pumpkins’ sound: in their prime, the band was one of the most eclectic, adventurous, and perceptive acts of their generation. Although it has the flaws that comes with a band leader convinced of his own genius, Siamese Dream is unmistakably grand, alternative, and impressive. The LP is the stuff of alt-rock dreams.
Words by Keith Mulopo
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