The Smashing Pumpkins didn't shy away from making the follow-up to the grand, intricate Siamese Dream. With Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, the band turns in one of the most ambitious and indulgent albums in rock history. Lasting over two hours and featuring 28 songs, the album is certainly a challenging listen. To Billy Corgan's credit, it's a rewarding and compelling one as well. Although the artistic scope of the album is immense, the Smashing Pumpkins flourish in such an overblown setting. Corgan's songwriting ...
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The Smashing Pumpkins didn't shy away from making the follow-up to the grand, intricate Siamese Dream. With Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, the band turns in one of the most ambitious and indulgent albums in rock history. Lasting over two hours and featuring 28 songs, the album is certainly a challenging listen. To Billy Corgan's credit, it's a rewarding and compelling one as well. Although the artistic scope of the album is immense, the Smashing Pumpkins flourish in such an overblown setting. Corgan's songwriting has never been limited by conventional notions of what a rock band can do, even if it is clear that he draws inspiration from scores of '70s heavy metal and art rock bands. Instead of copying the sounds of his favorite records, he expands on their ideas, making the gentle piano of the title track and the sighing "1979" sit comfortably against the volcanic rush of "Jellybelly" and "Zero." In between those two extremes lies an array of musical styles, drawing from rock, pop, folk, and classical. Some of the songs don't work as well as others, but Mellon Collie never seems to drag. Occasionally they fall flat on their face, but over the entire album, the Smashing Pumpkins prove that they are one of the more creative and consistent bands of the '90s. [Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness found Smashing Pumpkins -- or, perhaps more accurately, Billy Corgan -- indulging their every whim, so why should its deluxe 2012 not follow suit? A gargantuan box set where the remastered version of the original double-CD album almost seems like an afterthought, the box also contains three CDs of outtakes, B-sides, remixes, demos, and outtakes, a DVD containing an entire live show from London's Brixton Academy in 1996, plus some live performances from the German music show Rockpalast , two books containing notes, lyrics, and artwork, plus various other tchotchkes, all housed in a big 12 x 12 box set. Clearly, any set this extravagant is for the true believer and it has to be said that for that audience, this super-deluxe edition of Mellon Collie will surely not disappoint, and not just because it's such a handsomely produced set. Most of the alternate tracks here are genuinely interesting, illustrating the origins of familiar songs or suggesting different paths for these tunes, dipping into the dreamy space rock the Pumpkins sometimes flirted with, sometimes evoking the densely colored textures of Siamese Dream, sometimes suggesting the gothic dirge of Adore. Surely, these are details of interest only to the hardcore yet they are interesting, and the three discs of bonus material never get repetitive: it's like a rich meal that is certainly too much for one sitting but hard to sample as one course. It was meant to be digested all at once as it is here.] ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi
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Add this copy of Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness to cart. $183.21, very good condition, Sold by Streetlight_Records rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Santa Cruz, CA, UNITED STATES, published 2012 by Virgin Records.
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Seller's Description:
Very Good. Size: 12x13x1; May be missing info sheet with UPC on it. Outer box shows some visible wear. This item is guaranteed to play perfectly, with all original artwork and materials.
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