Poor setlist choices, awful-sounding music, and confounding sartorial decisions mixed with heavy doses of audience mockery: These are the reports we’ve been getting about the Smashing Pumpkins‘ “20th Anniversary Tour”, and guesses at Billy Corgan’s motivations can only confuse and infuriate.

That would be Pitchfork’s Dave Maher, hyperlinking his way into an hilariously intense fury at Billy Corgan instead of walking down the street to cover the Chicago Theatre shows. After (maybe) watching a YouTube clip and (probably) reading the Rolling Stone and Fluxblog concert reviews, Maher denounced the tour as a “shitshow” (what?), claimed that Corgan had “lashed out at his band’s fans” with an “outburst”, called Zeitgeist “mediocre”, said the band was “meandering into formless noise jams”, accused Corgan of “ruining people’s nostalgic fondness” for the Pumpkins, said Corgan was “cashing in”, and called Corgan “crazy”.

Can you explain this, Dave? Why all the anger?

Personally, I don’t buy that this intentional audience befuddling is some kind of pure pursuit of an artistic muse. It seems like the flailing around of an artist who has declined and is unwilling to face that truth even when his own fans proclaim it so by their reactions to his art.

You may be on to something there… (more…)

The surefire hit today pulls down the most outlandish of comparisons from Arlington Heights (Ill.) Daily Herald music critic Jeff Pizek:

“A Song for a Son” started on a “Stairway to Heaven” track before swelling upon to a well-developed crescendo - a signature Pumpkins move also displayed Wednesday during “Soma” and “I of the Mourning.”

How much longer can this go on before the song is tossed into the same memory hole where past pop gems such as “Let Me Give the World to You” (total performances: 22), “Chrysanthemum” (4), and “Glorious” (5) rest in silence? Or have things changed, and in the future our bleeping culture will get the chance to embrace a studio version?

Below: This is an illegal video, and I am one of many who don’t care (YouTube)

In wrapping up his review of the Smashing Pumpkins’ “White Crosses” show at Chicago Theatre for the Sun-Times News Group’s PioneerLocal.com, Tony Solano writes about the two-night stand something very similar to what I say whenever I try to express how I feel about the band generally:

Overall, each individual show was solid but not life-changing. Yet the experience of both shows combined was beyond awesome and very special. The music was great…the band rocked, they slowed it down, they were angry, they were sensitive. There was drama, angst, laughs and a lot of weird tension because we never really knew what direction Corgan was going to go in next. And of course, it provided plenty to talk about. The only other time I’ve had so much to write about from a concert is when I’ve gone to music festivals. For as much controversy as there was surrounding these two shows, I could not have asked for a better or more unique experience.

While other Chicago music writers (including friend and rival Greg Kot at the Chicago Tribune) have weighed in this morning with first-night reviews ranging from negative to worshipful, Jim DeRogatis has clearly been the most interested of the bunch in the return of the Smashing Pumpkins — and with a followup blog post this morning, he’s the most interesting as well.

The veteran analyst dives in where others have feared or failed to tread, putting out perhaps the most plausible explanation of this tour that anyone (fan or critic) has yet offered. His entire post is a must-read, but here is the center of it:

[M]y guess is that night one links up with night two (”White Crosses”) to form a two-part story arc tracing, I dunno, his band’s journey from hard-rocking, optimistic early days (it all began with “Everybody Clap Your Hands,” remember, and “Siva” came early on, too) through painful darkness and turbulent destruction (”Superchrist”/”United States”) to his beloved band being reduced to a mere automated facsimile of a superstar rock group (”Heavy Metal Machine”). As a result, the musicians turn bitter and angry and decide to punish their fans with the most extreme noise and tweeness they can deliver (”Set the Controls,” followed by the kazoos).

Then things move toward the white light again (”White Crosses”) and the artistes find their spiritual center and Pumpkins Mach II prevail at the end of night two. Or something like that.

Why, if almost everyone has hated this tortured routine on earlier tour stops, does Corgan persist with it? The man has never been anything less than 100-percent committed (and some say that he should BE committed) to his grand conceptual conceits, even when no one understands or likes them.

The full podcast panel comes back renewed and revived to talk about the 20th anniversary tour. Next week as promised we will discuss the If All Goes Wrong DVD.

Listen to the whole show (1:11:57)

(download)(iTunes)

This week’s topics:

Panelists
-Chris, Jason, Jill, and Andrew

Tour Roundup
-Jason saw Black Sunshine and White Crosses in Washington, DC. Does he agree with Jill’s assessment that Black Sunshine was the better show? Does Jill still agree with Jill’s assessment that Black Sunshine was the better show? (7:09)

-Jill journeyed to the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville to see a lot of hits and even more jamming. We talk a lot about encores. (15:49)

In-Depth Discussion:
-Unlike the August tour, the press has been less than kind to the Pumpkins this time around. We delve into why, I express my opinion on I Am One Part II, and we devolve into a formless, 60-minute digression in the middle. (39:37)

This Week in Pumpkins Zwan History
-Zwan makes their debut in Pomona, California. (3:53)

Song of the Week
-Everything is Beautiful, November 18th, 2008

At the end of this podcast, Jason puts himself in the mind of his audience and wonders aloud: “Did I pay for this shit?” He is, of course, mocking you, but that will be very much the consensus opinion of the few hundred bitter, heartbroken fans who will stop their mp3 players as if on a death march. Really, how else are people supposed to feel about a one hour and eleven minute show that mostly emphasizes new topics, generally avoids old classics, and includes at least 40 minutes of formless meandering tangents and artless, self-indulgent discussions?

In this edition of the intermittent HU feature, Springfield (Mass.) Republican music writer Donnie Moorhouse does battle with Chicago Sun-Times mainstay Jim DeRogatis over the Smashing Pumpkins’ controversial cover.

Moorhouse, on Sunday night’s performance in Connecticut:

The stretch of “Zero,” “Bodies,” and “Cherub Rock,” almost saved the evening, but Corgan put an exclamation point on the madness with a 25-minute encore of Pink Floyd’s “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun,” that included a kettle drum performance that was one bucket of paint away from being a Blue Man Group parody.

DeRogatis, regarding Tuesday night in Chicago:

On the bright side, the mid-evening acoustic interlude was lovely, and for progressive rock done right, you had to love the cover of Pink Floyd’s “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun,” which closed the set proper.

Chicago Sun-Times rock critic Jim DeRogatis has this evening reposted to his blog several of his past writings regarding the Smashing Pumpkins. This segment of an April 2000 exchange (just prior to two shows in Chicago) with frontman Billy Corgan seems particularly relevant to the current moment:

[DeRogatis]. Do you feel that you’ve matured?

[Corgan]. Oh, I don’t know. Just when I would think I wouldn’t write about personal stuff anymore, I would turn around and a write a whole album about it. As I’ve always said, if I could have chosen what I wanted to do, I wouldn’t have chosen these things.

[DeRogatis]. There’s that perverse streak. Do you enjoy confounding expectations?

[Corgan]. I enjoy the energy in that. I don’t find comfort energizing. Inside, there must be some sort of thing in me that needs to be contentious.

Blogspot user Johnna Danielle Moretti, on Sunday night’s gig:

My favorite part of the evening was when Glenn screamed out to Rob and I, “I have been over rocked! My face? Melted.” Billy and his subsequent Pumpkins were putting on an amazing, rocking and powerful show.

Blogspot user Johnna Danielle Moretti, on Sunday night’s gig:

It was torture. My ears bled. My eyes burned from the bright lights. My mind reeled from all the sounds. The boos started echoing over the loud “music” and it was apparent that everyone else shared my same sentiment; this sucked!

The wise Alex Crisafulli, in the process of weighing in on a recent “White Crosses” show:

Early on, while still in slow-down mode, the band played “Sunkissed” from the Zeitgeist add-on American Gothic and a new song called “99 Floors” which might be the best Smashing Pumpkins song I have heard in quite some time.

I personally have not been feeling “99 Floors” so much, but there is now more than one person whose opinions I respect saying that it’s a new favorite of theirs. Also, importantly, Billy Corgan seems to like it.

I don’t think consensus is possible (or desirable) on such subjective matters, but still I am curious to hear others’ feelings: How much do you like “99 Floors” relative to other new or old material? Of what does it remind you? (Do you still care?)

Jonathan Perry reports on last night’s “Black Sunshine” concert for the Boston Globe:

You go to a Smashing Pumpkins show to bask in bitterness and confusion. It’s a place where sadness and self-loathing is plentiful, and loud. Where fragile daydreams give way - as you expect and want them to - to endless nightmares of the soul, fed through a fearsome electric machine of steel, wires, and amplifiers. It’s a bleak purgatory where, despite all your rage, you’re still just a rat in a cage.

What you don’t expect is for the purest distillation of this frustration to come after you’ve experienced 2 1/2 carefully cultivated hours of dark melodrama writ large. And the house lights come up without an encore. And then, bizarrely, an unknown guy (a comedian, perhaps?) dressed in a Los Angeles Dodgers cap, wearing mock Manny Ramirez dreadlocks and clutching a broom, comes onstage to blast Boston. He ridicules Pumpkins’ lead singer-guitarist Billy Corgan for his baldness and “whiny nasal voice” while he’s at it, before being shooed away by Corgan, the good guy in a white tiered skirt.

Given his previous In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida-Being-Manny performance on Halloween in Columbus, is it safe to assume the gentleman in question was Pumpkins tour manager Doug Goodman?

If the first public step was his Time Out Chicago piece praising the Smashing Pumpkins’ August concert in Hammond, the transition appears to be complete with his fresh review of If All Goes Wrong:

One thing becomes clear as the foursome tirelessly practices, jams and hangs out together: The songwriter is dedicated to the bonds of his band. The film depicts Corgan as infuriating, misunderstood, witty, thoughtful and unpredictable. Fans’ and haters’ preconceptions of the unique rock star will only intensify, but it’s hard to not be impressed by his prodigious skills. The narrative is structured around an unending flow of new tunes, which go from scribbles in bed to stage in a matter of hours.

Shawn “Drake Lelane” Anderson reaches oh-so-far to find someone and something against which Billy Corgan and If All Goes Wrong could never, ever measure up:

It’s telling that we see nearly as much of Corgan in a bathrobe writing songs as we do of him on stage playing them, showing that he wanted to give access to his artistic process. But in the end, he comes off more of an egomaniac than what he probably was hoping to convey. Perhaps he saw himself like Jeff Tweedy in the Wilco documentary I Am Trying to Break Your Heart, but Corgan seems far more aware of the camera. The idea of writing a song during the day and debuting it later that night at a show is kind of cool in theory, but that’s only if the songs will resonate, and, for the most part, they don’t.

Yesterday, SP.com featured LiveSmashingPumpkins.com’s newest offering: a bundle that includes download rights to all soundboard shows on the current tour.  Sweet.

So I clicked through to this ad.  And my jaw dropped.

This package includes 23 shows, 16 of which are the two-night Black Sunshine / White Crosses shows.  And, I think the shock of the numbers speak for themselves.  But you might wonder, how much would I be saving if I chose to buy all of these separately?  Well, here’s the number-crunching:

Aside from the reported issues (like gaps, dissatisfaction with vocals, and repeated song segments), the recordings sound terrific.  But for $350?  Why not offer a more reasonable bundle, like a 5-pack download for $50?  Or include a significant discount with concert ticket purchase?

Blabbermouth.net, citing United Stations Radio Networks’ “The Pulse of Radio” entertainment news service, has uncritically repeated this claim:

[A] SMASHING PUMPKINS concert in New York City on Thursday night (November 6), the band’s first in the metropolitan area in nine years, was met with a less than enthusiastic reception by the crowd after Billy Corgan led the band through a show that left many hits off the set list and contained a droning, 40-minute jam session in the middle.

To what could this refer? A scan of the track times on the freely available concert recording reveals only three plausible candidates, none of which approach the reported duration:

• “Superchrist” and “United States”, lasting a combined 22 1/2 minutes
• “Heavy Metal Machine” and “Glass’ Theme”, a combined 14 minutes
• “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun”, 21 minutes

ALSO:  David Lowe-Bianco of Ultimate-Guitar.com (celebrating 10 years online!) is claiming this morning that the Friday night New York gig “eventually ended in a half-hour long jam session”.  According to that pesky actual recording of the concert, final cut “I Am One pt. 2″ did not last even 15 minutes.

Echoing remarks by blogger Matthew Perpetua, here’s Kyle Anderson of Rolling Stone:

New songs like “Song for a Son” and “As Rome Burns” got lost in the theater’s strange acoustics, while even favorites like “Disarm” lacked teeth. Clearly losing the crowd, Corgan invited a fan onto the stage to voice his opinion about Thursday’s show. The fan told him, “Last night’s show sucked,” and for a minute it looked like Corgan was going to take criticism in stride for once. But as the fan was walking back to his seat, Corgan shouted, “By the way, I liked that song you wrote. What was it called? ‘Take Your Dick Out of My Ass and Stick It in My Mouth’? That was a big hit in Europe.” For a guy who has made his money airing out his own tales of childhood torment and abuse, it seemed strange and hypocritical for him to resort to playground name-calling and juvenile homophobia.

Corgan then rewarded his devoted audience with the 20-plus minute prog jam “Gossamer” and an utterly ridiculous version of “The March Hare” that devolved into a percussion jam that channeled Stomp.

Thanks to concert taper and HU contributor Zach, you can listen to the exchange between Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan and that young man. Somehow it wasn’t “lost in the theater’s strange acoustics”, and thus by listening we learn that the direct quotation Anderson attributes to Corgan is a reasonably accurate paraphrasing:

And no, I don’t know how Zach got such a clear recording of “As Rome Burns”…

…nor why his recording of “Gossamer” clocks in at less than 15 minutes.

Below: Partial video of the exchange. Anyone know who the young man is? (YouTube)

Dan Aquilante of the tabloid has spoken:

Twenty years later, on the band’s reunion tour that played the United Palace Theater, that chip is still there. At the close of the two-hour, 23-song set — which often meandered into mind-numbing experimental noise rock — Corgan was visibly upset at the boos that were mixed with the applause.

The bald rocker — clad in his signature “zero” shirt and a floor-length prom skirt — stood center stage and asked if the audience was asking themselves, “Did I pay to watch this sh–?”

He answered himself, saying “We love you so, that’s why we torture you with our music.” That elicited more boos from the crowd, prompting Corgan to counter with a non sequitur that sounded even stranger coming from a guy in a dress: “Those are the kind of boos that put the Yankees on top.”

His we’re-not-happy-unless-you’re-not-happy attitude sank Thursday’s show.

While Corgan might believe that his best work lies in the Smashing Pumpkins back catalog, in concert, fans like hits. He didn’t deliver, and he paid the price.

The fan desire for favorite songs was illustrated by the unabashed love they displayed when he and the band rendered “Tonight, Tonight” and the late-show highlight “Bullet With Butterfly Wings.”