The Academy, New York City show review - January 12, 1996
SPIN - April 1996
"It's a pleasure to be with you tonight," Billy Corgan announced about ten minutes after Smashing Pumpkins took the stage at the Academy. "That is, assuming we know what pleasure is." Corgan and guitarist James Iha then engaged in a lengthy moment of wry existential banter, suggesting what vaudeville might be like if it were revived by brooding modern-rock stars.
Fortunately for those 1,500-or-so fans lucky enough to grab tickets (the second of three dates in a warm-up for an arena tour later this year), Corgan is a rock hero not because he can so eloquently express literate-slacker ennui but because he can use that ennui as fodder for a killer pop song. Over the course of the band's two-and-a-half-hour set, the moody melodrama of Corgan's lyrics was consistently upstaged, and uplifted, by the dynamic beauty of his music and the exuberance of the group's playing.
The concert began with a low-key, low-volume segment evocative of an Unplugged taping, in which the band members sat around the stage in what looked like their jammies and crafted organic-sounding variations on the recorded versions of their songs. Rather than try to recreate the grungy wall-of-sound on "Today," for instance, they achieved a stripped-down urgency centered on Corgan's coarse, pining vocals and rigorous acoustic guitar work. During "Beautiful," bassist D'Arcy-looking as spacey as ever in her elegant white nightgown-softly harmonized with Corgan. On the floor, kids swayed politely, clearly eager for moshing time to begin.
After a brief intermission, the Pumpkins reappeared in gloriously tacky '70s garb and thrashed out "The Bomb," "Zero," and "Fuck You (An Ode to No One)." From there the band segued into a scorching version of "1979," then into a series of numbers that offset psychedelic lyricism with blistering punk angst. Iha's riffing ranged from savvy to inspired, at times evoking the Velvets' trippy, minimalist splendor. It was a terrifically cathartic, liberating performance, but in the end Corgan didn't appear any closer to resolving or even explaining his ambivalence. Perhaps Smashing Pumpkins' frontman is merely, as he sang on "Zero," "in love with my sadness." That is, assuming he knows what sadness is.
--Elysa Gardner