GISH POLL - SMASHING PUMPKINS (1991) - lots of people say they only like gish...

i'm going to have to go back and relisten before i cast my vote. it could be bury me...

Good album, I will also have to relisten first. Back later with a report.

Never actually listened to Gish. If Siamese Dream is the only Pumpkins album I can really be bothered with would I like it?

you might like it better to be honest. i do.

i agree

definitely

The first three are probably the best grouping of songs SP ever put together, but I have an all-time love for Rhinoceros.

Yeah, Rhinoceros - but I have a feeling that might change listening to the album now. My feeling is that it's probably aged the best out of all SP records, the drums in particular sound great on this.

And also, damn you ILM for making me revisit records from my teenage years once again! :)

Tristessa easily. Who knew you could slow down Immigrant Song and make it sound that heavy? And the solo still triggers a phase change in my face.

The only song which I dont care about is Window paine and I somehow wish they had included Drown (which was a leftover used the following year on a soundtrack) instead of it. The rest of the album is great. Maybe Crush... maybe one of the opening tracks which are amazing.

Rhinoceros vs Bury Me

these two songs sum up everything I love about Smashing Pumpkins, to the point where I almost don't need to ever hear anything else by them

also I like-bordering-on-love Siamese Dream but Gish is one of the best albums of the 90s

"Drown" is so good, the feedback solo at the end alone might have won this for me. Not sure what I would vote for on Gish, would have at various times been "Rhinoceros", "Snail", "Bury Me", or "Tristessa". Probably haven't listened to this record since 1996 or 97 though ....

it's too bad this is currently off spotify

"snail"!

feel like it sonically anticipates siamese dream while also being hippy dippy enough for gish

Yeah if Drown was here it'd be obe of the highlights for sure.

I love Gish because it doesn't annoy me the way other SP released do. Siamese Dream starts great but becomes unbearable on the second act, Mellon Collie drowns in its ambitions and sappy ballads and everything else afterwards is hit or miss.

It might be that Corgan doesn't let his ego take control of it all, he even seems insecure... mumbling half of his lyrics in here. Also the trademark voice tics are barely there and that's a relief.

otm

going with Rhinoceros over Siva

this early version of Daydream is incredible

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94jxBUU-dZI

okay after my last post I started playing the album and "I Am One" is one of the best ways to open an album ever

second act of siamese dream is awesome

Very glad that this was not included in the poll:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7VcHXnf8-E

Voted "Tristessa" (specifically the earlier noisier Sub Pop version) but yikes this album has aged incredibly poorly.

Tristessa Sub Pop link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcTUu23Wt4E

whoops, I missed the memo that https youtubes now embed.

yeah, I like that version as well

this record feels pretty timeless to me, though, so I don't know about that whole 'aged incredibly poorly' business

anyone who thinks this album has aged poorly never really liked it to begin with IMO

fair enough!

Yeah, it's aged more gracefully than many of its peers.

I've always viewed Corgan as a megalomaniac who ran away everyone else in the band to his own detriment, but then I went and relistened to James Iha's solo thing a couple months ago for the first time in forever and it's a wisp of nothingness.

James Iha's *first solo thing

I've since found out there is at least one more.

One thing that I did notice on relistening was that like Alice In Chains, SP were a band that was growing out of hair metal and crossing over into (pre-Alternative) college rock. But there are still traces: certain licks/riffs on Gish that echo Izzy Stradlin's work in GnR. The drummer at times seems to fall into hair-/pop-metal cliches too, like little pauses after the 2nd verse before the obligatory guitar solo.

Everyone's a closet ned. (Johnny Fever),

Now this display name here.

It was a typo by how's life in the Ramones poll thread.

SP were a band that was growing out of hair metal and crossing over into (pre-Alternative) college rock.

yeah there are things in this album that gesture towards a different kind of band than the one they became (at the time their closest peers in my mind were Jane's Addiction, which had a similar hair-metal-goes-art-rock vibe). There's other things in their catalog that I like but it's hard for me not to view it as a long downhill slide, driven largely by Corgan's idiotic narcissism.

I thought Corgan was a classic rock kid/goth teen, not a hair metal dude

cf. THE MARKED https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYObTrOxTV4

Jane's A also classic rock/goth kids

Corgan contained multitudes

I'll be your stumbleine

'Mayonaise'

yeah the early sp stuff is all functionally goth

i don't know if anyone's ever asked how or why billy transferred from a goth sensibility to the psychedelic thing in evidence on gish but it was a smart move

i mean imo not a lot of records sound like this

Well not a lot of FAMOUS records, maybe, but there was a hell of a lot of crossover building up to it from lots of different bands. Love and Rockets is a perfect example.

probably true! (never got into love and rockets)

also there are links to (he says controversially) those first three RHCP albums

Also Fishbone, Bad Brains, Big Black, "Opiate"-era Tool...

Meantime the Cure, Siouxsie, etc. -- a lot of Corgan's self-proclaimed 'core' bands -- also played around with those combinations one way or another. Gish is very much its own thing and Jane's Addiction was definitely the template a lot of people locked into when drawing comparisons -- didn't hurt Jane's broke-up/bowed out right when Gish got released -- but there were plenty of random antecedents, and not just sonically but sartorially.

I think it might also help that for all of Corgan's Windy City pride SP *feels* very LA late eighties. Classic rock, Guns/Jane's, heavy goth underpinning, massive Anglophilia -- that right there is pretty much 25 years back in LA. I can't view it through any other lens.

Add in the more conventionally rock outliers on Independent Project around that time too, homegrown acts like Human Drama, etc. etc.

I can see how the Pumpkins could feel like they sprung fully-formed from the forehead of 90s alternative but, given what I'd been listening to for the 5-10 years prior to Gish, they seemed way more to be a natural outgrowth of a bunch of existing musical trends to me.

will no one speak up for one hit wonders School of Fish (who I guess were after Gish but whatever)

3 Strange Days seemed cool and square at the same time. I don't remember the rest of the album at all.

how could you forget
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HDkzI3UCQ8

Not sure why I never made the connection before now, but 3 Strange Days sounds just like a King's X outtake.

Ha, saw School of Fish early in 1991 opening for the Charlatans. They were...okay. And they did love their covers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAr_SXHtNnM

I have not thought about School of Fish in about 20 years.

yr welcome

Just listened to a little bit of the album on Spotify. You want to talk about things that sound dated? School of Fish is your measuring stick.

haha I thought that exact same thought 5 mins ago

while listening to School of Fish for the first time

kinda liked it though

i loved this one. played the hell out of it, Lull, and that B sides comp.

jeez. these guys got really really bad.

I had the "Tristessa" single before Gish came out -- it's wonderful B-side "La Dolly Vita" really should have been included on the proper record.

Hard to imagine where it would fit. But then it feels perfect for me on Pisces Iscariot tbh.

Bury My for the glorious guitar near the end...

never understood why gish isn't considered the best SP album by the majority

Glorious is the perfect word to describe Bury Me's last third. I think I will have to vote for that.

Man, hard choosing in these polls for a former fanboy. I lived and breathed all this stuff when 15 or so.

yeah me too.

liked this record much more than Nevermind for example

imo Gish and SD are too slight. MCIS is the best pumpkins because of its length and diversity. but i'll stan for just about everything corgan has done except TheFutureEmbrace and Zeitgeist.

Corgan and Pumpkins were dead to me after Machina, when he went all mental and Christian on my ass, but damn, everything before that is gold. Still is.

Nevermind has nothing on any record from Gish to Machina imho. Never did, never will.

The sonic scope of Gish alone beats everything recorded around that time and many years after. Don't know how they did it, but they did it.

drugs

Lol yeah, probably. Still though, listening now again, Gish doesn't sound anything like all the other bands who did drugs to make music. This ain't fucking Soundgarden or what have you. This is real. Just saying.

It's funny how the Zwan record has mostly been wiped from existence/memory. I actually liked it at the time, though I didn't quite understand how it was different enough to warrant a band name change (might as well have been a new SP album).

Zwan has some good tunes, but all in all it was way too religious for me.

where sonic magic happens

sp drug eras

gish = LSD
siamese dream = existential panic, amphetamines (1994 tour)
MCIS = hash cookies
Adore = Ecstasy, speed, opiates
Machina = ^same

Guessing a lot of you here will be of or around my age (35): is Gish as pivotal an album for you as it is for me? As in, a watershed album? The record that distinguishes your boyhood years from your manhood years? (As awful as that sounds). It was an album of awakening for me at the time, steered me in the right direction.

A thousands girls and going online in 95 and rawk: a memory bomb, it's all connected to this record for me.

@Spazzmatazz you forgot heroin, right after MCIS, which nearly killed Jimmy Chamberlain iirc.

ha sorry, i was only counting billy's drug eras lol

nbd :) don't think billy was heavily into heroin. Jimmy was though.

LBI, Gish was a little bit of a seachange along with Ritual de lo Habitual and BloodSugarSexMagic and Loveless (to a lesser degree) that really killed hair metal dead—moreso than just Nevermind itself did. That's how I view it anyway. I don't have any deep emotional tug toward it. I like it. But it's not fundamental for me.

My "watershed" album was The Joshua Tree.

The sonic scope of Gish alone beats everything recorded around that time and many years after. Don't know how they did it, but they did it.

― ambient yacht god (Le Bateau Ivre)

I was 17 when it came out and it got enough college play for me to copy it after hearing "I Am One" and "Crush" often. I couldn't figure out what stopped me, and it took Nevermind, bought a few months later, to realize it was the sugary thickness of the production.

I get that. Never cared for RHCP though, and only got to know Loveless later on in life. But U2 was the first band I was a 'fan' of, Joshua Tree myself (and back into time album wise from then on). But it didn't stick as a true watershed album for me.

Xp that's beautifully described Alfred. Sugary thickness.

All the tweaked out amphetamine performances of the Gish songs from Lollapalooza 1994 trump the record imo. More jams, more energy, more anger, more solos. And a lot fuckin faster

cf. The Lost Tapes from vieuphoria

I saw Smashing Pumpkins open for RHCP on the Blood Sugar tour. Viva Alternative Nation!

I Am One v Tristessa as of today. Crush a darkhorse though.
Man, Jimmy Chamberlin is a beast.

The thing with Gish for me, is that ever since hearing it, at such a formative age,even hearing it right now, it speaks of only two words to me: new dawn. Awakening.

I realize that moment can be any album for any other person, and no matter what the album it is equally formative, but Gish is that album for me.

I voted 'Siva' simply because I love how many twists and turns it takes throughout it's runtime, I especially love that section where the track quietens down to almost a whisper. But this is a fucking excellent album through and through... some of my favourite Jimmy Chamberlin drumming is on this record, and Corgan gets some great guitar sounds throughout.

*its

All the tweaked out amphetamine performances of the Gish songs from Lollapalooza 1994 trump the record imo

lol I have posted about this elsewhere but to this day I would say Smashing Pumpkins at Lollapalooza in 1994 was one of the worst, most offensive performances I have ever seen by anyone ever

only bc of I Am One rant right?

Guessing a lot of you here will be of or around my age (35): is Gish as pivotal an album for you as it is for me? As in, a watershed album? The record that distinguishes your boyhood years from your manhood years? (As awful as that sounds). It was an album of awakening for me at the time, steered me in the right direction.

A thousands girls and going online in 95 and rawk: a memory bomb, it's all connected to this record for me.

― ambient yacht god (Le Bateau Ivre)

I was like 5 when it was released so, no. I actually heard this album for the first time when I was 25. I knew by memory all the songs on Mellon Collie and Siamese Dream in my teenage years but somehow noone anywhere ever mentioned Gish so I assumed it wasn't that good.

A couple of years back I was on a 90's binge and I listened to it for the first time and I was blown away, this was for me better than anything else I had heard by the band, MC and SD felt wearisome to me despite the good memories associated with them but this is a whole different kind of album, it feels more sincere, more timeless. I guess that's the reason it isn't really considered a 90's classic and few people gave a shit about it back then, it doesn't really feel like a 90's album. I mean, it sounds like one but in spirit it feels more like the 60's or the 70's.

also to its tremendous benefit gish is 45 minutes long

I'm 33 and was peripherally aware of the Pumpkins during the Siamese Dream days but it was Mellon Collie that made me a fan, then I worked backwards.

Same with me.

will no one speak up for one hit wonders School of Fish (who I guess were after Gish but whatever)

― Οὖτις, Tuesday, August 26, 2014 8:32 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I will stan for their second record Human Cannonball, which I remember being less faux Paisley Underground and more like Frosting era Posies.

I bought Gish when it came out, I was 18 or 19. Thought it was one of the best things I'd ever heard and nothing else they ever released came close to it.

Same here, nate; in fact, i championed them to a bunch of friends and when Siamese Dream came out, i was a bit embarrassed with its level of panty-wasteness. I have not bought another of their releases since (while i was still painfully aware what they were up to).

drown was written/recorded after the gish sessions

TS: "I Am One" vs. "Cherub Rock"

Not a fan, but "Siva" sounds like the missing link between Mudhoney and "Fountains of Lamneth" era Rush.

Badmotorfinger took this vibe a little further though.

I find it fascinating how this record seems to exist as a fulcrum btwn so many opposing/supporting musical forces for so many

Yeah^ otm

Rhinoceros followed by Siva Crush Tristessa

I bought Siamese Dream when it was new and I was just discovering music, and played it 5 times a day. Then one day at Tower Records I stumbled upon Gish and had no idea they had an earlier album so devoured that too.

Rhinoceros slightly over Snail.

i haven't had a chance to re listen to this but i've plumped for snail. looking at the tracklist, it's a very close call on nearly all the songs though.

I can see how the Pumpkins could feel like they sprung fully-formed from the forehead of 90s alternative but, given what I'd been listening to for the 5-10 years prior to Gish, they seemed way more to be a natural outgrowth of a bunch of existing musical trends to me.

― Star Gentle Uterus (DJP), Tuesday, August 26, 2014 12:12 PM (2 days ago)

yeah, this was how i heard them at the time. natural outgrowth of stuff like janes, soundgarden, dino jr, daydream nation and loveless, liberal doses of both goth and commercial hard rock. was never a fan, as i wanted things scuzzier & more cynical at the time. do enjoy the nostalgia buzz of hearing them now. has to be "tristessa" (and bodig otm abt the b-side).

I was like 5 when it was released

I just died. I'm dead now.

few people gave a shit about it back then

Siva got a lot of play on MTV, or at least on 120 Minutes, at the time, but this album mostly benefitted from a whisper campaign.

It made the bottom rung of Live 105's 1991 countdown in San Francisco:

100. The Meat Puppets - Sam
101. The Smashing Pumpkins - Siva
102. Elvis Costello - The Other Side of Summer
103. Seers - Psyche Out
104. My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult - Sex on Wheelz
105. Matthew Sweet - I've Been Waiting
105.3 Latour - People Are Still Having Sex

Mellon Collie came out four days after I turned 3.

I was born the day Zeitgeist came out.

I was conceived to Teargarden by Kaleidyscope Volume 2: The Solstice Bare

http://cdn3.pitchfork.com/news/55306/793bf317.jpg

^gets better the more it is re-posted

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

missed the poll, would have voted rhinoceros.

jeez, i'm surprised I Am One and Siva placed so low

new 1992 interview

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OU3mT_AeaI8

sweet Gish era live only song (from the Mashed Potatoes boot i believe), i can't believe this didn't make it onto Gish or SD

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoECaGjU8Bg

some of bill's best soloing in the second half of that

1. I Am One
2. I Am Two
3. I Am Three
4. I Am Four
5. I Am Five
6. I Am Six
7. I Am Seven
8. I Am Eight
9. I Am Nine
10. I Am Ten

Now We Are Ten

je suis dix