Apparently, Billy Corgan created such an emotional tie with his audience, they were willing to publicly dress like the Addams Family to show their admiration about 40,000 little monsters were out in force at the United Center in downtown Chicago, for the Smashing Pumpkins’ second-to-last gig, and it was scary as hell. A kid in a cape was buying every shirt the band was selling, and little Frankenstein was crying in the arms of his mother, Morticia, upset that Uncle Fester and the rest of the Pumpkins were about to be smashed.
The truth is, Billy Corgan seems an arrogant, mediocre, smock-wearing baldy portrayed as a generational spokesman, totally undeserving of the maniacal praise surrounding the Pumpkins. However, his music can be quite good, and can partially justify why his fan base is so devout. So, he took the stage with guitarist James Iha, bassist Melissa Auf Der Maur and pianist Mike Garson, for one of his final rock apologies.
Having said that, the first few tunes were quite depressing both thematically and musically. The band opened acoustically with “Glass and the Ghost Children,” the ten-minute epic from Machina/The machines of God, and it felt like a funeral. A reworked “Today,” excluding the exuberant 10th-fret riff that gave us goose bumps, followed. Artistically this was admirable, but the monster squad’s roars had died down. This was the end of the Pumpkins, and it should have been rocking.
Finally, after a passionate version of “Drown,” Corgan and Iha picked up their Stratocasters, and off they went. “Glass’ Theme,” “The Everlasting Gaze” and “Bullet With Butterfly Wings” pummeled the audience with the classic Pumpkin wall-of-guitar sound, and the kids were smiling again. What followed was a welcome sampler of Pumpkin past including “Rhinoceros” from Gish, “Mayonnaise” from their best album, Siamese Dream and “Zero” from Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness.
Their best song, “Cherub Rock,” began the first encore, and accurately defined what the Pumpkins were. It’s no secret that they were never the best band in the world, but with moments like this, they will be missed. Despite the insidious arrogance, and album titles like Machina/The Machines of God, the Smashing Pumpkins were a welcome antidote to diseases like Creed, Stone Temple Pilots and Limp Bizkit.
Billy Corgan Sr. joined the band during “For Martha,” a tribute to Billy’s late mother, as the audience tried to savor those final moments. “Starla,” the rarely played fan favorite and a touching “1979” closed the show with Corgan encouraging fans to sing along and celebrate the end of an era.
The ghosts and goblins were bawling by now, but it wasn’t as funny as before. Although some of us weren’t at Corgan’s beckon call, there should be some respect for what the Smashing Pumpkins accomplished. They were a self-indulgent band that translated the sounds of Black Sabbath, Boston and Judas Priest into nineties music, at a time when groundbreaking bands like Nirvana and Mudhoney thought otherwise. They didn’t go out on top, but they went out fighting. We’ve still got superior bands like Queens of the Stone Age, and we don’t have to listen to Fester’s interviews; but the music world is a bit gloomier without them.
