MELLON COLLIE AND THE INFINITE SADNESS
Mellon Collie review - Access magazine - December 1995.
Transcribed by Simon Coyle
Call it artistic vision or simply rock & roll excess, you have to hand it to head Pumpkin, Billy Corgan. Who else would have the bravery - or the balls - to release a double album in 1995?
Mellon Collie... is only the Pumpkins' third record (overlooking 1994's rarities compilation, Pisces Iscariot) but it shows off a noticeable evolution from the big rock sound of 1993's Butch Vig-produced Siamese Dream and their 1991 debut, Gish. Titled 'dawn to dusk' and 'twilight to starlight', the two records compliment one another but show off subtly different sides of the band.
No doubt any hit singles will be culled from 'dawn to dusk' (the first single is the crushing angst avalanche of 'bullet with butterfly wings'); 'twilight to starlight' is stranger, gloomier, more introspective and therefore more compelling.
From the first note, it's obvious that main songwriter Corgan continues to suffer from the self-loathing which made Siamese Dream such profitable 'complaint rock'. 'Intoxicated with the madness / I'm in love with my sadness' he admits on the whiplash rocker,'zero'. Loud guitars and crashing drums bring out the best in the Pumpkins, as evidenced on the vaguely industrial 'love' , the coiled rage of 'fuck you (an ode to no-one)' and the raucous 'jellybelly'.
Only the tender-hearted 'galapogos' and guitarist James Iha's 'take me down' recall the acoustic anger of 'disarm'. Things get decidedly darker on disc two, although the guitars have been turned down for the most part. '1979' is probably as close as the band will ever get to writing a conventional pop song, and they pull it off before heading back into the industrial blackness of 'tales of a scorched earth' and 'x.y.u'.
With a running time of over two hours, Mellon Collie... tests the patience of even the most devoted Pumpkins fan. But it's a worthwhile investment if you appreciate Corgan's particular brand of music self-analysis.
- Sean Plummer