| Siamese Dream is easily one of the best albums of the 90's. Corgan creates a guitar-heavy atmosphere that can be credited to his long hours in the studio. Maybe he was a bit of a "stiffly stifferson" by playing all of the guitar parts himself, but his efforts resulted in a near flawless album. One thing that sets Smashing Pumpkins apart from their angry-sounding contemporaries like Nirvana and Alice in Chains, is the ability to make songs with starkly different moods and emotions. "Cherub Rock" begins the album with beautiful, crunching, heavy riffs that are present in all of the album's heavy songs. The rest of the album's tracks range from darker, harder songs like "Quiet" and "Silverf***" to light, pleasant songs like the triumphant "Disarm" and "Spaceboy", with its hopeful acoustic guitar. The highest point in this incredible album is "Hummer", which starts off with a simple but irresistible heavy riff, and near the end completely switches to 2 minutes of a gorgeous wandering guitar solo on top of an angelic, deeper solo. That's what Smashing Pumpkins is all about, guitar atmospheres. This album is a must for any 90's rock enthusiast, as well as rock fans from every genre and time period. |
