What is your earliest memory of the band? - Page 2

Cool As Ice Cream · 03-21-2021, 03:23 AM

In the summer of ‘91, my sisters and I were cleaning the backyard and we had brought out a radio to listen to as we worked. Between the 5 of us, we each got to choose a station for 10 minutes. I clearly recall turning to the local alternative rock station which I had only just started listening to a few weeks earlier. A song came on whose lyrics I couldn’t make out but which sounded like a very calm melody with a slow drum beat in the background. Suddenly these louder guitars started playing, and this crazy guitar solo was playing, and I was thinking to myself, “What is this?! It rocks!” At the tender age of 10, I had my first impression of a band which I would later be fanatic about. I heard the song again months later, and mid-way through the song, I recorded it onto a tape, missing the first few minutes of it. I still wasn’t familiar with the name of the band who played the song, and I rarely to never heard the song again on the radio.

A year later I heard the song Drown and I didn’t know at the time that this was the same band whose song I had taped off the radio so long ago. The unique sound of the guitars always made me smile, but once again, this guitar solo on a song made me think, “What is this?! Who is this?! It rocks!”

It wasn’t until ‘94 that I finally knew the name of the band: Smashing Pumpkins. I hadn’t been listening to rock music much as my school friends’ interest in music was mostly hip hop. In ‘94 I had heard some kids that I hardly knew talk about a music video with a guy in an ice cream truck. I had no idea what they were talking about as my family didn’t have cable TV. These kids said that it was the best video “ever” for some song called “Today.” So as an impressionable youth, I started to listen to the alternative rock station again and heard Today and Disarm played back to back on a “block party” weekend where the radio station played 3 songs in a row of the same band. I later taped Today, with its memorable riff and powerful guitar tones, and listened to it over and over again.

It wouldn’t be until September of 1995 that I heard these same kids who were talking about the “Today” video mention the amazement of the Smashing Pumpkins recording a double album and how the band misspelled Melancholy. It was at that moment that I knew something special was going to happen when their new album came out. I remember listening to the radio and the excitement around the time of its release with an upcoming live concert broadcast that was going happen. The DJ came on the radio saying that they just got the new Smashing Pumpkins album and they were going play some of it. They played “Tonight, Tonight,” “Jellybelly,” “Zero,” and then “Bullet with Butterfly Wings.” It was so amazing to me at the young age of 14, rocking my air guitar as Bullet was playing. They continued by playing more songs off of Mellon Collie and my mind was made up: I wanted this album!

I listened to the now famous broadcast of the ‘95 Riviera show: how they started with the same songs I had rocked out to just a few days earlier and then the sudden power failure during Zero. That night I told my mom that I wanted the new Smashing Pumpkins record for Christmas (even though I knew it was months away).

On Christmas day 1995, I was opening presents and found 2 small gifts wrapped – one larger than the other. I opened the smaller one first and saw this red cassette box with 2 smiling little girls on it. I didn’t know what it was, but I saw the title, “Smashing Pumpkins * Siamese Dream.” At this time I had no idea what was possibly on it. The larger package I opened up and recognized right away! It was Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness on cassette. I must have jumped 2 feet in the air with excitement by the arrival of this gift. I opened up the Mellon Collie cassette and looked at all the art, amazed with the kitty cats that were being married and the bunnies playing baseball. Then I saw the band’s picture for the first time: Billy Corgan standing there with his dark hair combed back, D’arcy holding a carrot as if it had some magical power, Jimmy looking like he was about to fall over, and James, well, looking like James. I would later go upstairs and open up this new — unknown to me at the time — cassette of Siamese Dream. I put on side A and these familiar drums started playing. Once again I grabbed my trusty air guitar and rocked out! The album I had never heard of ended up being one of my favorite albums of all time. I later listened to all of Mellon Collie and rocked out so much and also enjoyed “To Forgive” as it brought me back down. I even remember fast forwarding through “Tales of a Scorched Earth,” finding it too heavy for my liking, and acting super silly as I heard “We Only Come Out at Night.”>

reprise85 · 03-21-2021, 01:43 PM

i skipped school (pretended to be sick) to watch billy on regis and kathy lee lol

Reyngel · 03-21-2021, 02:44 PM

The first time I’d ever heard of them was seeing the Today video on MTV in September of 1993. It was a warm sunny day in Southern California, I was 12 years old, and the video looked and sounded like how everything felt that afternoon—so it kind of stuck with me.

I would go on to see the video in rotation on MTV for the next few months, and then it popped up in that one episode of Beavis and Butthead... which, at the time, was huge.

But the first time I actually stopped and thought, “Damn, I’m really loving this” was when I saw the Disarm video drop in early 1994.

wHATcOLOR · 03:59 PM

1994 i think, in my room looking out the window at some trees and disarm came on the radio. "what's up with this guy's voice?" was my initial reaction. he sounded wounded or deformed to me. then the emotion and the bells and cello, etc. caught me equally off guard

i saw it on mtv a few weeks later and i remember 2 shots in particular, the old man going down the sidewalk with his shadow on the wall, and the little kid angry holding a stick or something. oh also that shot of d'arcy's leg flying over rooftops or something, but that seemed dumb even then

i was only 13 or 14 and there was no internet and so i just kind of filed it away in my mind of "i really like that song" but didn't hear any other songs of theirs

when i was 15 and MCIS came out, i bought that cd pretty quickly and was hooked. there was a concert a couple hours away in 1996 i wanted to go to, but didn't know how to make that happen. they broadcast the show on the radio and i was pretty surprised with how sloppy it sounded, it was my first time hearing sound of them live

teh b0lly!!1 · 03-22-2021, 08:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by slunken

i mean no wonder she never let me finger her. i played adore and she was into WWF. lol

hey i mean the guy DID end up in the Rassling business

and it IS his mellowest record

not all things were meant to be. you did the best with what you had

T&T · 03-22-2021, 09:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cool As Ice Cream

In the summer of ‘91, my sisters and I were cleaning the backyard and we had brought out a radio to listen to as we worked. Between the 5 of us, we each got to choose a station for 10 minutes. I clearly recall turning to the local alternative rock station which I had only just started listening to a few weeks earlier. A song came on whose lyrics I couldn’t make out but which sounded like a very calm melody with a slow drum beat in the background. Suddenly these louder guitars started playing, and this crazy guitar solo was playing, and I was thinking to myself, “What is this?! It rocks!” At the tender age of 10, I had my first impression of a band which I would later be fanatic about. I heard the song again months later, and mid-way through the song, I recorded it onto a tape, missing the first few minutes of it. I still wasn’t familiar with the name of the band who played the song, and I rarely to never heard the song again on the radio.

A year later I heard the song Drown and I didn’t know at the time that this was the same band whose song I had taped off the radio so long ago. The unique sound of the guitars always made me smile, but once again, this guitar solo on a song made me think, “What is this?! Who is this?! It rocks!”

It wasn’t until ‘94 that I finally knew the name of the band: Smashing Pumpkins. I hadn’t been listening to rock music much as my school friends’ interest in music was mostly hip hop. In ‘94 I had heard some kids that I hardly knew talk about a music video with a guy in an ice cream truck. I had no idea what they were talking about as my family didn’t have cable TV. These kids said that it was the best video “ever” for some song called “Today.” So as an impressionable youth, I started to listen to the alternative rock station again and heard Today and Disarm played back to back on a “block party” weekend where the radio station played 3 songs in a row of the same band. I later taped Today, with its memorable riff and powerful guitar tones, and listened to it over and over again.

It wouldn’t be until September of 1995 that I heard these same kids who were talking about the “Today” video mention the amazement of the Smashing Pumpkins recording a double album and how the band misspelled Melancholy. It was at that moment that I knew something special was going to happen when their new album came out. I remember listening to the radio and the excitement around the time of its release with an upcoming live concert broadcast that was going happen. The DJ came on the radio saying that they just got the new Smashing Pumpkins album and they were going play some of it. They played “Tonight, Tonight,” “Jellybelly,” “Zero,” and then “Bullet with Butterfly Wings.” It was so amazing to me at the young age of 14, rocking my air guitar as Bullet was playing. They continued by playing more songs off of Mellon Collie and my mind was made up: I wanted this album!

I listened to the now famous broadcast of the ‘95 Riviera show: how they started with the same songs I had rocked out to just a few days earlier and then the sudden power failure during Zero. That night I told my mom that I wanted the new Smashing Pumpkins record for Christmas (even though I knew it was months away).

On Christmas day 1995, I was opening presents and found 2 small gifts wrapped – one larger than the other. I opened the smaller one first and saw this red cassette box with 2 smiling little girls on it. I didn’t know what it was, but I saw the title, “Smashing Pumpkins * Siamese Dream.” At this time I had no idea what was possibly on it. The larger package I opened up and recognized right away! It was Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness on cassette. I must have jumped 2 feet in the air with excitement by the arrival of this gift. I opened up the Mellon Collie cassette and looked at all the art, amazed with the kitty cats that were being married and the bunnies playing baseball. Then I saw the band’s picture for the first time: Billy Corgan standing there with his dark hair combed back, D’arcy holding a carrot as if it had some magical power, Jimmy looking like he was about to fall over, and James, well, looking like James. I would later go upstairs and open up this new — unknown to me at the time — cassette of Siamese Dream. I put on side A and these familiar drums started playing. Once again I grabbed my trusty air guitar and rocked out! The album I had never heard of ended up being one of my favorite albums of all time. I later listened to all of Mellon Collie and rocked out so much and also enjoyed “To Forgive” as it brought me back down. I even remember fast forwarding through “Tales of a Scorched Earth,” finding it too heavy for my liking, and acting super silly as I heard “We Only Come Out at Night.”>

bring the feels.

teh b0lly!!1 · 03-22-2021, 11:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cool As Ice Cream

and acting super silly as I heard “We Only Come Out at Night.”>

:bananadance:

Cool As Ice Cream · 03-22-2021, 12:11 PM

write a memory on each petal

Rider · 03-22-2021, 02:02 PM

I knew the name. I think at some point one of the Gish singles either made it onto Headbangers Ball or Late Night rotation on MTV I hadn't started watching 120 minutes yet. My first solid memory is Rhinoceros on 120 minutes. I think I had seen I Am One before that but the Rhinoceros video sticks in my memory more for being weird and different. The band never really clicked for me though until on a road trip I listened to the Singles soundtrack about a hundred times.

cork_soaker · 03-22-2021, 02:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rider

on a road trip I listened to the Singles soundtrack about a hundred times.

nag champa visibly emanating from the upholstery

selection7 · 03-24-2021, 09:00 PM

Wish I could say I remember, but I don't. Possibly the Today video.

What's funny to me is that I borrowed the SD cassette from a friend and really enjoyed it, yet somehow that album, which decades later is in my top 5 all-time, apparently didn't make enough of an impression to get me to actually go buy it. I didn't become a true fan until I saw them live for MCIS. I had a ticket to see them but it got canceled after the overdoses and death of Melvoin. I was going to see the opener, Garbage, actually (TSP was just a 'bonus', haha). The concert was rescheduled to about 3 months later. The year that followed was a whirlwind. Along the lines of what another poster said, that era lived up to every bit of fanaticism I could manage and then some.

slunken · 03-25-2021, 04:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by teh b0lly!!1

hey i mean the guy DID end up in the Rassling business

and it IS his mellowest record

not all things were meant to be. you did the best with what you had

Thanks buddy. At least it made me stop listening to Marilyn Manson

slunken · 04-06-2021, 07:46 PM

dunno who needs to hear this but scoring with girls > listening to marilyn manson

teh b0lly!!1 · 04-11-2021, 04:00 AM

vixnix · 04-15-2021, 06:30 AM

Today video, 1993, must have been watching whatever the chart show was called back then, Saturday evening
I waited to see who the band was and couldn’t decide whether smashing pumpkins was the name of the band or the name of the song

smashingjj · 04-15-2021, 06:54 AM

which one was it?

ilikeplanets · 04-15-2021, 10:26 AM

1979 on MTV. Loved it immediately and didn't realize who it was until I truly discovered the band as a teen. I was in elementary school when I first heard the song.

smashingjj · 04-15-2021, 10:39 AM

I remember waking up in some room, hanging upside down, with the worst headache I ever had. fucking body parts were all over the place. someone was raping a cat. in the background Widow Wake My Mind was playing and from that moment on I was a fan.

Shadaloo · 04-15-2021, 11:11 AM

Bullet video on MTV. Shortly afterward, Simpsons appearance and a radio station playing WBFTT on a late-night rotation.

LoveIsSuicide42 · 04-15-2021, 06:16 PM

I had always known the name The Smashing Pumpkins and always thought it was such a cool band name. I assume I must have picked it up from stray TV or radio chatter. I didn't grow up in a very musical household and other than video game soundtracks and Weird Al, I didn't really care about music as a kid.

Thanksgiving 2006, my cousin has Guitar Hero and I got wrapped up in it for the entire day. I was really good at it and my cousin started talking to me about the music in the game. It was really my first big introduction to rock music. For some reason my cousin starts talking to me about Nine Inch Nails, even though they weren't in the game. He convinces me to buy tons of Nine Inch Nails albums. I am enthralled. I devour every piece of NIN related music and media I can find over the course of the next six months. In taking it all and reading about it, I hear bits and pieces about this Smashing Pumpkins band that I'd always kind of had at the back of my mind. I mark them down as a potential band to get into after NIN.

Summer 2007 rolls around and I see that the Pumpkins are playing on Letterman in promotion of their first album in many years. Intrigued, I stay up just to watch them play Tarantula. I loved everything about how Billy played a guitar and that he could sing while playing. I loved how strange his voice was-- it would have been unpleasant and awful in most circumstances, but it paired so well with the sound of the guitars and the melodies he used. I ended up going to my cousins wedding in the city that same weekend (same cousin who showed me NIN) and this felt like a big deal, because I rarely got to go to big cities with good record shops. Made a point to go to the record shop before the wedding and buy my first SP album. I wound up going with Mellon Collie. I remember looking through the booklet before I could even listen to it, and loving the art. It felt like my favorite album before I even played any of it. Wound up sneaking away from the wedding party around 10 PM and went into my parents' car and listened to probably the first 30-40 minutes of it. I recognized Tonight, Tonight immediately although I have no idea where I heard it. Love Jellybelly, Zero, Here is no Why... I wanted to savor the album as long as I could. I played the first five or six songs over and over and only gave myself new ones when I felt really ready for it, in those following weeks. I fucking loved that album so much.

Zeitgeist was next, and I thought it was terrible. Then I got SD, which never left my car stereo that whole last year of high school. I got Adore the day my grandpa passed away that fall. Total coincidence, but the themes felt so perfect for what I was experiencing. Got Machina during a very snowy december day and listened to it while a blizzard raged outside, which went so perfectly with the production on that album. Gish was last but I had listened to so many of the songs on youtube by that point that I don't really remember what was going on when I got it, other than that my collection of their main albums felt complete.

Have seen the band 7 times and that feels pretty tremendous, considering I never thought I would. A whole long term relationship in my life started out of a mutual love and obsession with SP. They're a huge part of my life.

soniclovenoize · 04-15-2021, 06:38 PM

trev · 04-18-2021, 07:34 AM

for me it was hearing disarm on the radio weekly top 40 chart countdown. thought it was a cool song, taped it off the radio. but didn't hear anything else until after mcis came out.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cool As Ice Cream

In the summer of ‘91, my sisters and I were cleaning the backyard and we had brought out a radio to listen to as we worked. Between the 5 of us, we each got to choose a station for 10 minutes. I clearly recall turning to the local alternative rock station which I had only just started listening to a few weeks earlier. A song came on whose lyrics I couldn’t make out but which sounded like a very calm melody with a slow drum beat in the background. Suddenly these louder guitars started playing, and this crazy guitar solo was playing, and I was thinking to myself, “What is this?! It rocks!” At the tender age of 10, I had my first impression of a band which I would later be fanatic about. I heard the song again months later, and mid-way through the song, I recorded it onto a tape, missing the first few minutes of it. I still wasn’t familiar with the name of the band who played the song, and I rarely to never heard the song again on the radio.

rhinoceros?

Cool As Ice Cream · 04-18-2021, 07:36 AM

dunno
you'll have to ask monty

SomaPhreak · 04-18-2021, 01:18 PM

I heard my older brother listening to Gish in his room during the summer of 1991. I loved it right away. It was so fun to blast the first four songs of that album back then.

Joey Goldberg · 04-18-2021, 02:19 PM

James Iha came to my house asking to borrow a guitar

said he had just smashed his over his brother's head but it was his only one and they had a gig that night

i gave him a very nice Gibson SG i had hanging in my living room, he said thank you then proceeded to break that guitar as well that very evening, right in front of my eyes

then it dawned on me, that wasn't James Iha, it was Noel Gallagher of Oasis

& I am Johnny Marr

Eulogy · 04-20-2021, 06:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thedeadofnight

2007, I was 11 and heard Today on the radio and was just mesmerised at the guitar sound and vocals. Afterwards, the DJ just said "Smashing Pumpkins are back with the new album Zeitgeist", my mom had obviously heard of the band and said she'd look out for the CD as she worked beside a HMV. Soon after that I got Zeitgeist and was disappointed Today wasn't on there but I did like some stuff. Bought the Greatest Hits about a week later, found Today and I was on my way.

Jesus I remember when I was the young one here.

Anyway it’s probably the tonight tonight video for me.

TheAlter · 04-20-2021, 08:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joey Goldberg

James Iha came to my house asking to borrow a guitar

said he had just smashed his over his brother's head but it was his only one and they had a gig that night

i gave him a very nice Gibson SG i had hanging in my living room, he said thank you then proceeded to break that guitar as well that very evening, right in front of my eyes

then it dawned on me, that wasn't James Iha, it was Noel Gallagher of Oasis

& I am Johnny Marr

Noel Gallagher has never played an SG in his entire life, so your story is probably true.

incubator · 11:15 AM

I was outside some club having a smoke and this guy with a big mouth was blah blah blah about the band being crap or some shit and being generally annoying. then this girl stars arguing with him and it's like two drunk idiots yelling at each other. just a whole lot of noise and really ruining my buzz. trying to ignore them and then the guy stood on top of something and he's kinda clapping his hands, banging a bit of wood against a trash can lid and yelling like addressing everyone there "stop stop everyone may I have your attention please" and then he goes on saying we've all been settling for low standard bands but no more! someones got to stand up and that someones him and he's going to have the biggest band in the world and he's got this whole plan mapped out with concept albums, albums within albums, **** pop albums which are about pop albums, late career albums that purposely upset the fans, a trilogy of concept albums that are only revealed to be linked on the commencement of the 3rd album which will be recorded decades after the 2nd album, a 44 song mid career album representing the fools journey, a tea shop, he's gonna wear silver trousers (he mentioned this several times)....he was going on for about 10 mins then stopped expecting applause or something but the blonde girl said you know shut up you crazy motherfucker and stop standing on that thing it's gonna collapse and everyone laughed and someone said "I'll have one of whatever she's having!!". then a few years later I saw a video on tv and thought the guy looked familiar and whoa it's the guy from the alley and what the hell it's the girl too

Ram27 · 04-20-2021, 10:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eulogy

Jesus I remember when I was the young one here.

Anyway it’s probably the tonight tonight video for me.

it's good to know the youth today still gravitate towards depressing forums

in my defense or something i was still listening to weird al in 2007

Disco King · 04-20-2021, 01:03 PM

I literally don't remember what the first SP song I heard was, or the first time I encountered them.

I remember when I got into them. I was downloading random shit on Limewire and trying to get into new music. I was just typing in names of bands I was vaguely familiar with and kind of remembered liking. I downloaded some of their songs, and I was like, "Woah dude."

But I already knew of them in some capacity before this. I just don't know from where, or what made me think to look into them deeper in particular.

Yeah, my story is pretty dumb and unromantic. I just listened to a good song one day, idk.

03-22-2021, 03:04 AM	#34
wHATcOLOR THIS IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!! Location: \|\| MY NAME IS KIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIID ROCK!! Posts: 47,247	1994 i think, in my room looking out the window at some trees and disarm came on the radio. "what's up with this guy's voice?" was my initial reaction. he sounded wounded or deformed to me. then the emotion and the bells and cello, etc. caught me equally off guard i saw it on mtv a few weeks later and i remember 2 shots in particular, the old man going down the sidewalk with his shadow on the wall, and the little kid angry holding a stick or something. oh also that shot of d'arcy's leg flying over rooftops or something, but that seemed dumb even then i was only 13 or 14 and there was no internet and so i just kind of filed it away in my mind of "i really like that song" but didn't hear any other songs of theirs when i was 15 and MCIS came out, i bought that cd pretty quickly and was hooked. there was a concert a couple hours away in 1996 i wanted to go to, but didn't know how to make that happen. they broadcast the show on the radio and i was pretty surprised with how sloppy it sounded, it was my first time hearing sound of them live Last edited by wHATcOLOR : 03-22-2021 at 03:59 PM.

04-18-2021, 01:18 PM	#54
SomaPhreak Ownz Posts: 547	Earliest Pumpkins Memory I heard my older brother listening to Gish in his room during the summer of 1991. I loved it right away. It was so fun to blast the first four songs of that album back then.

04-20-2021, 09:15 AM	#58
incubator Apocalyptic Poster Posts: 1,235	I was outside some club having a smoke and this guy with a big mouth was blah blah blah about the band being crap or some shit and being generally annoying. then this girl stars arguing with him and it's like two drunk idiots yelling at each other. just a whole lot of noise and really ruining my buzz. trying to ignore them and then the guy stood on top of something and he's kinda clapping his hands, banging a bit of wood against a trash can lid and yelling like addressing everyone there "stop stop everyone may I have your attention please" and then he goes on saying we've all been settling for low standard bands but no more! someones got to stand up and that someones him and he's going to have the biggest band in the world and he's got this whole plan mapped out with concept albums, albums within albums, **** pop albums which are about pop albums, late career albums that purposely upset the fans, a trilogy of concept albums that are only revealed to be linked on the commencement of the 3rd album which will be recorded decades after the 2nd album, a 44 song mid career album representing the fools journey, a tea shop, he's gonna wear silver trousers (he mentioned this several times)....he was going on for about 10 mins then stopped expecting applause or something but the blonde girl said you know shut up you crazy motherfucker and stop standing on that thing it's gonna collapse and everyone laughed and someone said "I'll have one of whatever she's having!!". then a few years later I saw a video on tv and thought the guy looked familiar and whoa it's the guy from the alley and what the hell it's the girl too Last edited by incubator : 04-20-2021 at 11:15 AM.

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03-21-2021, 03:23 AM	#31
Cool As Ice Cream Just Hook it to My Veins! Location: František! How's the foot of your turtle? Posts: 32,743	In the summer of ‘91, my sisters and I were cleaning the backyard and we had brought out a radio to listen to as we worked. Between the 5 of us, we each got to choose a station for 10 minutes. I clearly recall turning to the local alternative rock station which I had only just started listening to a few weeks earlier. A song came on whose lyrics I couldn’t make out but which sounded like a very calm melody with a slow drum beat in the background. Suddenly these louder guitars started playing, and this crazy guitar solo was playing, and I was thinking to myself, “What is this?! It rocks!” At the tender age of 10, I had my first impression of a band which I would later be fanatic about. I heard the song again months later, and mid-way through the song, I recorded it onto a tape, missing the first few minutes of it. I still wasn’t familiar with the name of the band who played the song, and I rarely to never heard the song again on the radio. A year later I heard the song Drown and I didn’t know at the time that this was the same band whose song I had taped off the radio so long ago. The unique sound of the guitars always made me smile, but once again, this guitar solo on a song made me think, “What is this?! Who is this?! It rocks!” It wasn’t until ‘94 that I finally knew the name of the band: Smashing Pumpkins. I hadn’t been listening to rock music much as my school friends’ interest in music was mostly hip hop. In ‘94 I had heard some kids that I hardly knew talk about a music video with a guy in an ice cream truck. I had no idea what they were talking about as my family didn’t have cable TV. These kids said that it was the best video “ever” for some song called “Today.” So as an impressionable youth, I started to listen to the alternative rock station again and heard Today and Disarm played back to back on a “block party” weekend where the radio station played 3 songs in a row of the same band. I later taped Today, with its memorable riff and powerful guitar tones, and listened to it over and over again. It wouldn’t be until September of 1995 that I heard these same kids who were talking about the “Today” video mention the amazement of the Smashing Pumpkins recording a double album and how the band misspelled Melancholy. It was at that moment that I knew something special was going to happen when their new album came out. I remember listening to the radio and the excitement around the time of its release with an upcoming live concert broadcast that was going happen. The DJ came on the radio saying that they just got the new Smashing Pumpkins album and they were going play some of it. They played “Tonight, Tonight,” “Jellybelly,” “Zero,” and then “Bullet with Butterfly Wings.” It was so amazing to me at the young age of 14, rocking my air guitar as Bullet was playing. They continued by playing more songs off of Mellon Collie and my mind was made up: I wanted this album! I listened to the now famous broadcast of the ‘95 Riviera show: how they started with the same songs I had rocked out to just a few days earlier and then the sudden power failure during Zero. That night I told my mom that I wanted the new Smashing Pumpkins record for Christmas (even though I knew it was months away). On Christmas day 1995, I was opening presents and found 2 small gifts wrapped – one larger than the other. I opened the smaller one first and saw this red cassette box with 2 smiling little girls on it. I didn’t know what it was, but I saw the title, “Smashing Pumpkins * Siamese Dream.” At this time I had no idea what was possibly on it. The larger package I opened up and recognized right away! It was Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness on cassette. I must have jumped 2 feet in the air with excitement by the arrival of this gift. I opened up the Mellon Collie cassette and looked at all the art, amazed with the kitty cats that were being married and the bunnies playing baseball. Then I saw the band’s picture for the first time: Billy Corgan standing there with his dark hair combed back, D’arcy holding a carrot as if it had some magical power, Jimmy looking like he was about to fall over, and James, well, looking like James. I would later go upstairs and open up this new — unknown to me at the time — cassette of Siamese Dream. I put on side A and these familiar drums started playing. Once again I grabbed my trusty air guitar and rocked out! The album I had never heard of ended up being one of my favorite albums of all time. I later listened to all of Mellon Collie and rocked out so much and also enjoyed “To Forgive” as it brought me back down. I even remember fast forwarding through “Tales of a Scorched Earth,” finding it too heavy for my liking, and acting super silly as I heard “We Only Come Out at Night.”>

03-21-2021, 01:43 PM	#32
reprise85 BOTTLEG ILLEGAL Location: I'm faced with so many changes that I just might change my face Posts: 32,800	i skipped school (pretended to be sick) to watch billy on regis and kathy lee lol

03-21-2021, 02:44 PM	#33
Reyngel Apocalyptic Poster Location: Seattle Posts: 3,682	The first time I’d ever heard of them was seeing the Today video on MTV in September of 1993. It was a warm sunny day in Southern California, I was 12 years old, and the video looked and sounded like how everything felt that afternoon—so it kind of stuck with me. I would go on to see the video in rotation on MTV for the next few months, and then it popped up in that one episode of Beavis and Butthead... which, at the time, was huge. But the first time I actually stopped and thought, “Damn, I’m really loving this” was when I saw the Disarm video drop in early 1994.

03-22-2021, 12:11 PM	#38
Cool As Ice Cream Just Hook it to My Veins! Location: František! How's the foot of your turtle? Posts: 32,743	write a memory on each petal

03-22-2021, 02:02 PM	#39
Rider Minion of Satan Location: I was born a snake handler, and I'll die a snake handler Posts: 9,517	I knew the name. I think at some point one of the Gish singles either made it onto Headbangers Ball or Late Night rotation on MTV I hadn't started watching 120 minutes yet. My first solid memory is Rhinoceros on 120 minutes. I think I had seen I Am One before that but the Rhinoceros video sticks in my memory more for being weird and different. The band never really clicked for me though until on a road trip I listened to the Singles soundtrack about a hundred times.

03-24-2021, 09:00 PM	#41
selection7 Demi-God Location: Tulsa, OK Posts: 313	Wish I could say I remember, but I don't. Possibly the Today video. What's funny to me is that I borrowed the SD cassette from a friend and really enjoyed it, yet somehow that album, which decades later is in my top 5 all-time, apparently didn't make enough of an impression to get me to actually go buy it. I didn't become a true fan until I saw them live for MCIS. I had a ticket to see them but it got canceled after the overdoses and death of Melvoin. I was going to see the opener, Garbage, actually (TSP was just a 'bonus', haha). The concert was rescheduled to about 3 months later. The year that followed was a whirlwind. Along the lines of what another poster said, that era lived up to every bit of fanaticism I could manage and then some.

04-06-2021, 07:46 PM	#43
slunken Virgo Posts: 42,781	dunno who needs to hear this but scoring with girls > listening to marilyn manson

04-11-2021, 04:00 AM	#44
teh b0lly!!1 Braindead Location: PROWLING THE BADLANDS Posts: 17,399

04-15-2021, 06:30 AM	#45
vixnix Socialphobic Location: we are champions, bathed in the heat of a thousand flame wars in the grim future of the internet there is only netphoria Posts: 12,467	Today video, 1993, must have been watching whatever the chart show was called back then, Saturday evening I waited to see who the band was and couldn’t decide whether smashing pumpkins was the name of the band or the name of the song

04-15-2021, 06:54 AM	#46
smashingjj real estate cowboy Location: if Monsanto and Purdue Pharma had a baby Posts: 36,902	which one was it?

04-15-2021, 10:26 AM	#47
ilikeplanets Braindead Location: Ignore List Posts: 17,229	1979 on MTV. Loved it immediately and didn't realize who it was until I truly discovered the band as a teen. I was in elementary school when I first heard the song.

04-15-2021, 10:39 AM	#48
smashingjj real estate cowboy Location: if Monsanto and Purdue Pharma had a baby Posts: 36,902	I remember waking up in some room, hanging upside down, with the worst headache I ever had. fucking body parts were all over the place. someone was raping a cat. in the background Widow Wake My Mind was playing and from that moment on I was a fan.

04-15-2021, 11:11 AM	#49
Shadaloo Apocalyptic Poster Location: up on the cross you go little fella Posts: 2,676	Bullet video on MTV. Shortly afterward, Simpsons appearance and a radio station playing WBFTT on a late-night rotation.

04-15-2021, 06:16 PM	#50
LoveIsSuicide42 Demi-God Posts: 269	I had always known the name The Smashing Pumpkins and always thought it was such a cool band name. I assume I must have picked it up from stray TV or radio chatter. I didn't grow up in a very musical household and other than video game soundtracks and Weird Al, I didn't really care about music as a kid. Thanksgiving 2006, my cousin has Guitar Hero and I got wrapped up in it for the entire day. I was really good at it and my cousin started talking to me about the music in the game. It was really my first big introduction to rock music. For some reason my cousin starts talking to me about Nine Inch Nails, even though they weren't in the game. He convinces me to buy tons of Nine Inch Nails albums. I am enthralled. I devour every piece of NIN related music and media I can find over the course of the next six months. In taking it all and reading about it, I hear bits and pieces about this Smashing Pumpkins band that I'd always kind of had at the back of my mind. I mark them down as a potential band to get into after NIN. Summer 2007 rolls around and I see that the Pumpkins are playing on Letterman in promotion of their first album in many years. Intrigued, I stay up just to watch them play Tarantula. I loved everything about how Billy played a guitar and that he could sing while playing. I loved how strange his voice was-- it would have been unpleasant and awful in most circumstances, but it paired so well with the sound of the guitars and the melodies he used. I ended up going to my cousins wedding in the city that same weekend (same cousin who showed me NIN) and this felt like a big deal, because I rarely got to go to big cities with good record shops. Made a point to go to the record shop before the wedding and buy my first SP album. I wound up going with Mellon Collie. I remember looking through the booklet before I could even listen to it, and loving the art. It felt like my favorite album before I even played any of it. Wound up sneaking away from the wedding party around 10 PM and went into my parents' car and listened to probably the first 30-40 minutes of it. I recognized Tonight, Tonight immediately although I have no idea where I heard it. Love Jellybelly, Zero, Here is no Why... I wanted to savor the album as long as I could. I played the first five or six songs over and over and only gave myself new ones when I felt really ready for it, in those following weeks. I fucking loved that album so much. Zeitgeist was next, and I thought it was terrible. Then I got SD, which never left my car stereo that whole last year of high school. I got Adore the day my grandpa passed away that fall. Total coincidence, but the themes felt so perfect for what I was experiencing. Got Machina during a very snowy december day and listened to it while a blizzard raged outside, which went so perfectly with the production on that album. Gish was last but I had listened to so many of the songs on youtube by that point that I don't really remember what was going on when I got it, other than that my collection of their main albums felt complete. Have seen the band 7 times and that feels pretty tremendous, considering I never thought I would. A whole long term relationship in my life started out of a mutual love and obsession with SP. They're a huge part of my life.

04-15-2021, 06:38 PM	#51
soniclovenoize Minion of Satan Location: Minneapolis, MN Posts: 5,595

04-18-2021, 07:36 AM	#53
Cool As Ice Cream Just Hook it to My Veins! Location: František! How's the foot of your turtle? Posts: 32,743	dunno you'll have to ask monty

04-18-2021, 02:19 PM	#55
Joey Goldberg Minion of Satan Location: andy dick NAKED Posts: 8,227	James Iha came to my house asking to borrow a guitar said he had just smashed his over his brother's head but it was his only one and they had a gig that night i gave him a very nice Gibson SG i had hanging in my living room, he said thank you then proceeded to break that guitar as well that very evening, right in front of my eyes then it dawned on me, that wasn't James Iha, it was Noel Gallagher of Oasis & I am Johnny Marr

04-20-2021, 01:03 PM	#60
Disco King Minion of Satan Location: Banned Posts: 8,875	I literally don't remember what the first SP song I heard was, or the first time I encountered them. I remember when I got into them. I was downloading random shit on Limewire and trying to get into new music. I was just typing in names of bands I was vaguely familiar with and kind of remembered liking. I downloaded some of their songs, and I was like, "Woah dude." But I already knew of them in some capacity before this. I just don't know from where, or what made me think to look into them deeper in particular. Yeah, my story is pretty dumb and unromantic. I just listened to a good song one day, idk.