Holy mushed melons, Batman! The Smashing Pumpkins are calling it quits! According to this article @ YahooNews. Corgan dropped the bombshell during an interview in LA. There might be a farewell tour in the works, though, and Corgan says there is nothing wrong inside the band, but says it’s getting “hard to fight the good fight against the Britneys”.
Damn does this make me feel old. I was alive when they started up, and I’m alive when they burn out. I guess it’s for the best, anyway.
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Why is it for the best? I know it’s weird to have one of the bands that defined your maturation (mine anyway… okay, and the maturation is not exactly a completed product) but it’s not as if they were just putting out crap by this point. My opinion, anyway. Some of us are still bitter that they contributed to the Batman & Robin soundtrack…
I think there is probably more to the story than an amiable breakup, though. There always is with the Pumpkins. I just didn’t really want to see the band implode on itself. I’m just saying that its for the best that they break up under good conditions.
Also, frankly, my favorite albums are anything up to and including Mellon Collie, my favorite being Siamese Dream (though Mellon Collie and Gish are close 2nd and 3rd). I don’t know if they broke up because Corgan had become apathetic (actually, a little caustic) towards the music scene in general or not, but their music had taken a definite turn. If it was poppy before the Batman fiasco (as i like to call it tee-hee), Corgan took it in an opposite direction, and sad to say, their record sales suffered. I don’t think that Corgan really wanted to keep on in a business that didn’t seem to fully accept him anymore. I could be wrong.
Although record sales suffered, that does not necessarily mean that his art suffered. The last album (before Machina), without Jimmy Chamberlain, was not your typical Pumpkins album. Does that equal bad? Not in my mind. I can definately understand Corgan’s frustration at his fans for abandoning his band when he tried to expand his horizons and write the songs he wanted to write instead of Cherub Still-Rockin’! And now everyone seems to be embracing goofy pop bands or rock bands that are lyrically & musically incompetant at best and dangerously juvenile at worse. Meanwhile, how many copies has Reznor’s The Fragile sold? Bottom line, it’s a bad time for music in a creative sense, but there is a lot of good stuff out there if you know where to look.
And I definately agree with you, much like Seinfeld and Michael Jordan, I’d rather see the Pumpkins split while they’re friends and still-in my mind-at the top of their game.
p.s. Thanks for promoting semi-intelligent conversation.
p.p.s. The song on Batman & Robin doesn’t mean they sold out!