Pumpkins stay familiar yet evolve with new album, Zeitgeist
Zeitgeist: /the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era/
Some things will never be the same. Especially when talking about music. Deep down, everyone knows this to be the truth. Yet somehow, when it comes to our favorite bands, people somehow tend to forget that. Then when a band changes their sound, the fans accuse them of selling out and then they move on.
This has never been truer than with The Smashing Pumpkins. Upon hearing that the band was reforming, a looming question came up: will there be an album?
The answer is yes, a new album would surface. There was doubts and mixed feelings about that. What would this album sound like? You the people like it? If you don’t go into it expecting another Siamese Dream or even Adore you’ll be amazed.
Zeitgeist’s release comes at a time when rock may be on the decline in favor of top 40 music and when more and more bands are becoming political activists through their music. Dubya holds a lot of the blame for that one. (He has, single handedly, made non-political artists rise up in near-zealotry. So, thank you so very much.)
On Zeitgeist, there are songs like “For God and Country” & “Pomp and Circumstance” which replace odes to lost loves. Corgan’s pictorial commentary on the US administration is worth the purchase price alone. I might also add that I have never seen so many pictures of Paris Hilton used in any band’s album booklet. Ever.
“Tarantula”, the first single off the album, seems to be a proclamation of how badly the band has missed being together. The most common complaint about Zeitgeist is how Billy Corgan & Jimmy Chamberlain have done all the instruments themselves, making a void where the pseudo-mystical “band dynamic” should be. What most people fail to realize is something Corgan himself said in 1994. That he usually played and recorded all the studio music for the Pumpkins albums. You can’t fault the guy for taking credit where credit is due, especially not on this one.
If you feel you’re missing good music and angst backed by loud guitar, pick up Zeitgeist. You won’t be disappointed.
I loved Zeitgeist. IWhen I first heard it, I thought “Cool, that old pumpkins sound is back”. Zwan was very disappointing as was Billy’s last solo album. I guess once a Pumkin fan, always a Pumpkin fan. I was surprised when I heard that Billy did the bass, but after I read about him doing all the studio music for the Pumpkins, it made sense that it sounded the same. I don’t care if the originals are all there. The sound is back - just when I’d sell my soul for band that can play music without screaming through the lyrics and numbing the senses with a barrage of overdone bass and drums.
Well done and good to have something I can put on my ipod again.