Spot on...

Every other release was fucked or diminished by the production value...

Zeitgeist.. Yes, we've beaten those issues to death

Teargarden... Holy shit, we didn't think the production could get any worse from Z and they go and make it 3 times as bad.

Oceania.... Step in the right direction but still sounded so sterile and plain. Theres literally no life or character in the drum sound, and it was later revealed that they had to do a massive cut/paste job with Mike.

Monuments... It FINALLY sounds awesome. I think it might be the best post-reunion release.... Z strongly rivals it due to the BC/JC chemistry. Even awful production doesn't completely tame the magic between those 2.


Bottom line: Keep the monuments production on the new album with Jimmy! Don't experiment with new production landscapes... Just stick with what works for fuck sakes and worry only about the musicianship!

"Okay."
-Billy Corgan

"Nah, my new music can't be anything like the past."
-William Patrick Corgan

"Nah, my new music can't be anything like the past."
-William Patrick Corgan

It's so frustrating hearing about how he threw out good music for reasons like that

Like...the reason people like the Pumpkins is because they have a certain sound. And it's not even like he honestly, artistically didn't want to make that stuff anymore. He wrote all kinds of stuff, then threw out stuff that sounded like SD because it would...make too many people happy, I guess.

Oceania.... Step in the right direction but still sounded so sterile and plain. Theres literally no life or character in the drum sound, and it was later revealed that they had to do a massive cut/paste job with Mike.


http://labs.echonest.com/click/?songId=SOGDTRY13B1DD84043&artist=The+Smashing+Pumpkins&title=Panopticon

^ that's not really fair, a lot of jimmy's best performances are all over the place tempo wise too. with the right player, it could make everything ebb and flow beautifully

you can start listening to plenty of Pumpkins songs and then skip to the end and they have gotten noticeably faster. Jimmy doesn't like click tracks. Many rock drummers don't have high regard for perfect tempo though. Stairway to Heaven is a famous example of a song that ends significantly faster than it begins.

Oceania drums do sound cut and pasted somehow though

MTAE does sound great but shame there's not a single good song on it :(

Keep the monuments production on the new album with Jimmy! Don't experiment with new production landscapes... Just stick with what works for fuck sakes and worry only about the musicianship!

i disagree with this. one of the things i love about SP is that they are always experimenting with different production asthetics.

MtaE, production-wise sounds good, but almost too much like it's trying to sound like SD-era production. been there, done that... it'll never be as good as SD... move along.

gimme something new AND good.

http://labs.echonest.com/click/?songId=SOGDTRY13B1DD84043&artist=The+Smashing+Pumpkins&title=Panopticon

I thought you were trying to say it was all over the map. So I decided to see what Jimmy played like...

http://labs.echonest.com/click/?songId=SOYRXJB14B91A53867&artist=The+Smashing+Pumpkins&title=Bullet+With+Butterfly+Wings

http://labs.echonest.com/click/?songId=SOBERAK12AF72A3C2C&artist=The+Smashing+Pumpkins&title=1979 (drum machine, for reference)

I thought you were trying to say it was all over the map. So I decided to see what Jimmy played like...

http://labs.echonest.com/click/?songId=SOYRXJB14B91A53867&artist=The+Smashing+Pumpkins&title=Bullet+With+Butterfly+Wings

http://labs.echonest.com/click/?songId=SOBERAK12AF72A3C2C&artist=The+Smashing+Pumpkins&title=1979 (drum machine, for reference)

I was trying to say (and probably should've specified) how oddly uniform parts of Burns' part was

you can start listening to plenty of Pumpkins songs and then skip to the end and they have gotten noticeably faster. Jimmy doesn't like click tracks. Many rock drummers don't have high regard for perfect tempo though. Stairway to Heaven is a famous example of a song that ends significantly faster than it begins.

Oceania drums do sound cut and pasted somehow though

i think it's the actual drum sound. almost no room sound, just individual hits that are compressed to sound like a bouncing basketball.

from what i remember it's pretty extreme on oceania (please don't make me go listen to it again) but it's a pretty common technique for drum processing these days, especially with metal bands. i really detest it. it's hideous

Drums on Oceania sound like every single hit is the same velocity / volume and everything is a bit too bright and loud. Modern, I guess.

What Mike is playing is maybe ok.. I dunno.. I can't believe any drummer would intend for My Love Is Winter to sound like that. That extra snare hit in the beat shouldn't be at full volume like that?

The cymbals sound weird as hell on the record, it's like they fade in and out rather than starting with an attack and decaying. Like listen to 0:46 in Quasar, it sounds like he's tapping a ride cymbal instead of banging a crash between the snare hits. I can't imagine why you'd want it to sound like that.

The cymbals sound fine/good on Teargarden though.

re: My Love is Winter
I think that's just his style. That can sound good in some contexts, but certainly not the Pumpkins. remember reading something in 2011 about how it sounded like Mike learned to play on an electric kit and never learned proper dynamics, which makes sense. The whole album sounds like it has triggered drum sounds, actually. I guess that's partially the mastering technique.

I'm at college right now and I can't play my real acoustic drum kit, so I bought a cheap electric kit and all the things I don't like about the samples are exactly what the drums on Oceania sound like. I cannot imagine why, if you had a big rock band budget, a professional studio, a real kit, good mics, professional producers....you would want your drums to sound like that.

Shit I am so excited for Jimmy to record an SP album again.

The snare hits on Oceania have one of two volumes: medium and medium-low. There is no range. Jimmy, his ghost snares were sometimes virtually inaudible (as they should be) and if he wanted to blast a snare flam in your face, he did that too. It's part of what added to climaxes like the one in Hummer. Jimmy was mixed to full range, and by golly he played to that full range.

Yeah the flams into the guitar solo in Cherub Rock are kickass too

Like if you listen to the isolated track it's the only time in the song where the snare hits that pitch and volume and it sounds so fucking good

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3nO33J_3lY&t=3m12s

It's so frustrating hearing about how he threw out good music for reasons like that

Like...the reason people like the Pumpkins is because they have a certain sound. And it's not even like he honestly, artistically didn't want to make that stuff anymore. He wrote all kinds of stuff, then threw out stuff that sounded like SD because it would...make too many people happy, I guess.

I haven't kept up with Corgan's interviews, so I didn't hear about this, but does anybody actually believe him when he says shit like this? "Yeah, I could totally write another Siamese Dream anytime I wanted to. I still have it. I just don't wanna. I'm writing more interesting stuff and growing as an artist."

I mean, it's not like Corgan is exploring some uncharted territory. Plenty of songs on Oceania sounded like he was trying to recapture the Siamese Dream sound without the vigor of it.

Just seems like a typical Corganism to make excuses for why he's still a great artist despite the fact that nobody liked that thing he just put out.

I used to think he could make another SD like he said, but now, I don't think so. He doesn't care about the music as was made clear with MTAE.

he should stick to wrestling cats.

Shit I am so excited for Jimmy to record an SP album again.

Amen brother. I'm trying to temper my expectations cause it's so easy to be let down as a SP fan... but shit, think about Z with monuments production? That would have been monster. Keep in mind Billy's vocal performances have gotten better with Oceania and even more so with Monuments, so we might be finally getting the record we've pined for.:rockon:

I haven't kept up with Corgan's interviews, so I didn't hear about this, but does anybody actually believe him when he says shit like this? "Yeah, I could totally write another Siamese Dream anytime I wanted to. I still have it. I just don't wanna. I'm writing more interesting stuff and growing as an artist."

I mean, it's not like Corgan is exploring some uncharted territory. Plenty of songs on Oceania sounded like he was trying to recapture the Siamese Dream sound without the vigor of it.

Just seems like a typical Corganism to make excuses for why he's still a great artist despite the fact that nobody liked that thing he just put out.

This ^^^

It was the same thing he was ranting about when Adore tanked... "Oh I have this masterpiece song that would have been a smash hit that Rick Rubin produced but I left it off the album cause it didn't fit".... It was a cool enough version of LMGTWTY and all but it wasn't something that would have been a hit or saved Adore. As someone mentioned in this thread, The Machina 2 version is far superior.

Well way back when "Untitled" was released wasn't the line "See we could've made classic pumpkins stuff all along but we didn't want to" ? That song wasn't great and more like Zwan than SD.

I'll never forgot the first time I heard the drums on "Quasar" and literally laughed out loud. It sounded like something from a Super Nintendo game.

Well way back when "Untitled" was released wasn't the line "See we could've made classic pumpkins stuff all along but we didn't want to" ? That song wasn't great and more like Zwan than SD.

Yeah Untitled has the dumb happy-happy Zwan vibe. Songs super lame.

Hopefully the new album isn't all upbeat, sugar and lolipops Zwan stuff due to his happiness about being a father.

He's fucking miserable to be a father, did you see his most recent photos? Guy is dying inside before our very eyes

Yeah, it's gotta be an awkward relationship with Airplane mode... I don't see any possibility of it ending well... Which is sad when theres a child involved.

If they're actually being parents and not passing the kid off to a team of wet nurses or whatever out of touch celebs do then they're going to be sorta miserable and tired for a while.

This ^^^

It was the same thing he was ranting about when Adore tanked... "Oh I have this masterpiece song that would have been a smash hit that Rick Rubin produced but I left it off the album cause it didn't fit".... It was a cool enough version of LMGTWTY and all but it wasn't something that would have been a hit or saved Adore. As someone mentioned in this thread, The Machina 2 version is far superior.

LMGTWTY wasn't some masterpiece, but it surely would have made a better 1st single than Ava Adore, which IMO was a turd. As was Perfect. LMGWTY would have been the most single worthy song out of the bunch, and I could have even seen it being a radio hit in that time.

Not sure it alone would have completely saved Adore, but I think Ava Adore as a single pretty much killed it (along with the video, and pretty much everything Corgan was doing and saying at that time).

Putting Summer on there would've also helped balance out the weird goth vibe that I don't like and I don't think anyone likes

Hopefully the new album isn't all upbeat, sugar and lolipops Zwan stuff due to his happiness about being a father.

I Would take MSOTS 100x over any Pumpkins 2.0 albums.