The Optical Files #48: The Smashing Pumpkins - Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (1995)

I think by now, 30 years after the Nirvana explosion, most people acknowledge that "grunge" was never a music genre so much as a media term describing a style & youth subculture. The bands that make up the so-called Big 4 of Grunge (Alice in Chains, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden) sound nothing alike outside the general heavy rock umbrella. If anything unites them, it's a diffuse attempt to filter '70s rock through a '90s lens, which is a natural result of the ages of the musicians. Smashing Pumpkins mostly escaped being tagged with this label because they were from Chicago, hence a bit removed from the Seattle scene. But the other reason is that, instead of the '70s, the Pumpkins reached back a bit further & took their musical cues from '60s rock--everything from psychedelia to the Velvet Underground's art rock to the Beatles' melodic pop mastery to Laurel Canyon folk melodies. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, their true commercial breakthrough & their only #1 album, was a sprawling double disc with ample room to cram all those influences & more.

I'm not 100% sure how I obtained this CD, but I have a strong feeling I stole it from one my sisters. So if either of you are reading this, you can't have it back, but since you purchased it at Sam Goody for probably the 1996 equivalent of like $35, I'll gladly reimburse you that amount. I think I was first drawn to this album more by the visual aesthetics than the music. Fancying myself an antiquarian, I loved the fantastical, old-timey artwork, & especially the music video for 2nd single "Tonight, Tonight" that interpolated Méliès's A Trip to the Moon.

The album seems to announce a less rock direction with the first 2 tracks: an eponymous intro with a lovely piano melody (later interpreted on disc 2 tracks "Thru the Eyes of Ruby" & "Farewell and Goodnight." Then straight into "Tonight Tonight," where the orchestral strings overwhelm the guitars. But then the album drops 2 of its heaviest numbers: the sludgy, extremely downtuned "Jellybelly" & the equally metal-adjacent "Zero." Familiar Pumpkins territory follows, with "Here is No Why" & "To Forgive" sounding closest to Siamese Dream songs: atmospheric folk-pop progressions in a crunchy grunge context. Specifically, "To Forgive" is this album's "Disarm," complete with the return of those ascending chorus strings. "To Forgive" also sounds noticeably Beatlesque, a quality the band returns to a few times on this album, particularly in the promotional single "Galapagos." Elsewhere, "Porcelina of the Vast Oceans" spends its epic 9 minutes not so much unfolding a complex composition as simply taking its time. I'm reminded of Jimi Hendrix's "1983."

Disc 2 takes the opposite approach, opening with 2 numbers on the sludgier side before softening up for the rest of the album. Like is often true of this sort of affair, there is more filler on disc 2, like the plodding, 2-riff "X.Y.U." that attempts some opaque Doors-esque poetry & takes 7 minutes to get nowhere. On the other hand, the songs on this disc tend to be more experimental: "Thirty-Three" introduces a drum machine, which returns on "1979" & again on the late-album 3-song stretch of "We Only Come Out at Night," "Beautiful" (which, with its programmed drumbeat, processed guitars & keyboards & syncopated rhythms sounds like nothing so much as a Beck song!), & stalker story "Lily (My One and Only)."

This is not exactly a concept album, but most of the songs concern themselves with letting go of childhood & all the emotions that come with it. Even though it was their biggest single ever, I happen to think "1979" is the best song the Pumpkins ever wrote. Lyrically & musically, it unpacks the push & pull of nostalgia for childhood, with an earnest rhythm guitar & tentative leads testing the waters of adulthood. Caught between the open arms of the guitars & the cold future of the drum machines & samples, "1979" holds you over the abyss until you work up the courage to let go.

Musically, Siamese Dream is a better album, & pound for pound Gish might have better songwriting, but Mellon Collie came around at an important time in my life (I was 11) & spoke to themes that were captivating to me then & are captivating to me now. I don't return to it as often as the abovementioned albums, but when I do, the feelings run deeper.