ThePumpkins.net

Me, it was the end of 2005 or 2006. I know, a bit late. I'm 17, gimme a break.

I first got interested, whenever SP were played on the radio. I always thought "FUCK this song is brilliant! I must know who it is!" and then usually afterwards, I find out that it was The Mighty SP.

SO I decided to borrow the SD cd from my local library, and I was converted...

My friend had MCIS, although it was her parent's, and neither she nor her parents listened to it much. I also borrowed this, and I had to have moremoremore....

And now I can't get moremoremore, because I have everything. Minus American Gothic, I can't find it in any CD stores. (I'm not in the USA, btw)

Somewhere around 1994: Nirvana was definately over. Kurt died, we lost our hope and playing the songs on our guitars became really annoying.

I remember one day my best friend came over to me (somewhere in the middle of '95) and told me about another alternative rock band called THE SMASHING PUMPKINS. I laughed about that name. It sounded so damn crazy. He played me some songs like Today and Disarm and Geek U.S.A. I didn't like the singers voice.

Weeks or months later he played Bullet with Butterfly Wings. The first thing I noticed (again) was the singer's squeezed, pressured high voice - I didn't like it. But the riff was okay... hell, after listening to it several times the whole damn song was ok! I started to like it. Some weeks later I bought myself Siamese Dream and I loved it from the first song to the last. All that special arrangements, the hate, the love, the emotion in it. Nirvana was ok. But Nirvana was past. In my heart, The Smashing Pumpkins started to be the only reason I survived my puberty.

In 1996 it began. It all began. Love, hate, afraid of loss, parents equal problems, afraid of everything - the typical puberty shit. Every mood was supported by a special Smashing Pumpkins song.

When I think back now, it amazes me how I connect all these things with this band. I mean... everything we did was connected to the pumpkins. My friend and I remembered just a few days ago that we saw a documentary about the pumpkins with excerpts from the Viewphoria VHS and there James was talking about "putting weights on the hands" so that when they took it off, they played faster :-) We were sitting in front of the TV and we were going WOOOW! I remember how we discussed about D'arcy being hot or not. I remember playing their songs in our school rock band (and me singing 1979 playing the drums).

When I listen to a song today, I can even smell the summer back then in the years 1995 & 1996. I can remember every single detail and how we wanted to form a band, how we learned ourselves to play guitar. E-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g !

So that's how The Smashing Pumpkins are a part in my life forever. They're more than just a good memory. I always laughed when my dad told me when he was a kid and listenting to The Beatles. Now I know what feeling this is. There so much more behind it.

But after Mellon Collie things started to get complicated. Adore was a dark part of my life for me. First I hated to album. It wasn't like I wanted it to be (I wanted their sound to be more like The End is the Beginning is the End). But now I understand, how beautiful and fragile Adore is. Machina was twisted. New love, breaking apart, coming back together... breaking apart in a war - that's why I'm not really connected in a positive way with Machina.

And now with Zeitgeist - The Smashing Pumpkins are different. So am I. I'm much older. But I like to talk with my best friend about the old times. I like to lie down, listen to Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie and dive into this nostalgic world where we fought the walls of puberty.

Zeitgeist is nice. It just doesn't get me like their sound got me back in the 90ies.

well, let's see, it would have been the spring/summer of 1992 for me. I got my first CD player as a Christmas present that previous winter. The first CD I ever owned was metallica's ride the lightning.

we had a little independent record store in my town that bought and sold used CD's so I basically spent all of that summer buying up used CD's and trying to expand my musical horizons. I bought anything that caught my eye more or less. I honestly bought Gish because I liked the look of the cover art, and it was cheap.

from the first play I was hooked. I was blown away by how expansive that music was in comparison to everything else I owned at the time. every time I listened to it I discovered something I hadn't noticed before...and believe it or not that still happens to this day. I knew this group was something special from the beginning.

I didn't really have any friends that were into them...there was one girl who moved to my town from out of state in high school who liked them. she was basically the only person I had to talk about them with but I was cool with that...it was like I knew I was in an exclusive group of fans and I didn't give a shit if anybody else liked them or not. my best friend to this day actually made fun of me for liking them (we constantly give each other shit over anything we can think of...haha...)because he couldn't stand billy's voice. then all of a sudden one day he came to me and admitted he was getting into their stuff. I guess he was intrigued enough by my passion for them to give it a try. now he is the 2nd biggest pumpkin head I know (next to me of course...)

I've bought every subsequent release on the day it came out. And every time I feel like I've time warped back to 1992 and feel like a kid again.

the first time i heard the pumpkins was in the summer of 1996, and my babysitter and i were getting ice cream. (I was eight at this point) Tonight, TOnight came on the radio and i've been hooked ever since.

I'm a relative newbie to the world of SP: I only really got into them around 1999. Until then I was only vaguely aware that there was some band somewhere called the Smashing Pumpkins, I had no idea what they sounded like or what kind of music they played (apart from seeing a clip of Tonight, Tonight on TV when I was younger and being freaked out by the creepy bald guy).
Then one day I was over at a mate's house, playing video games with a few friends. My mate stuck Mellon Collie on in the background and I was absolutley blown away by it! The aggression, the tenderness, the hate, the love; it was everything I could possibly hope for in music. I went out the next day and bought the album and never looked back. Siamese Dream is probably a better, more cohessive album, but Mellon Collie will always have a special place in my heart for introducing me to one of my favourite bands. And now I've finally seen them live, after all these years

1995 - seeing the BWBW video on MTV changed my entire perspective. Up until then, the most poignant thing I listened to was Alanis! Hehe. But when I saw this beautiful, blue-haired woman playing guitar in a hard rock band, I was hooked (and subsequently learned to play guitar myself later that year.)

I didn't get my first SP album until 1996 (MCIS) but from henceforth, I was a true devotee. Their music touched upon that adolescent alienation no other artist could for me. And so over the years, their influence saved me from being a social pariah (seriously, I looked like Ugly Betty in my teens.)

And now, 4 concerts (11 if you count Zwan and Corgan solo shows), 3 interviews (Billy, Jimmy and Ginger) a multitude of meetings (all band members except Jeff and D'Arcy) one cover band (Death By Twinkie) one fan club (SoCal Smashing Pumpkins Fan Club) and 13 years later, they are still my favorite band.

Thank you, Pumpkins!

I was kind of a late bloomer as far as Pumpkins fans go as well. It was about 2005 and I was 15-years-old, at the time I only really listened to metal, the bad kind of metal. Like nu-metal and death metal etc. One day I heard Where Boys Fear to Tread. It wasn't on the radio, I think it was someone's mix CD at a party or something. I decided I liked it and looked more into the song and the band that played it. All I really knew about the Smashing Pumpkins prior to this was the episode that they guest starred on The Simpsons, but I basically started to gradually get into the Pumpkins after this. Like most 15-year-olds I opted to download their music at first but I only had bits and pieces of their music.
Eventually, when I was out one day, I saw Mellon Collie at a local CD store. I thought "why the hell not," and bought it. I brought it home, listened to it from start to finish and fell in love with the music and became an obsessed fan ever since. After this, of course, I started buying up all their albums and following their reunion closely. I seemed to really become a fan as word of a reunion got out.
Now I own pretty much everything they've released, their music takes up a good 90% of the music on my computer's playlist and I shudder at the thought of listening to the horrible bands that I used to listen to. I'm also seeing them for the first time in April:D .
And that's the story of how I started listening to the Smashing Pumpkins.

it all began for me back in 1993 watching mtv when i saw the today video loved the song loved the video, found out who the band was bought siamese dream right away loved it, since mellon colliie billy and company have been my favourite band nothing can top them as my favourite they have it all as a band.

Geek N.Z. wrote:
What country are you in? I have taken note of some of the release dates for other countries. I don't all of them, but I know some have later release dates. Most of the dates are in February that I have seen, except Australia's release date is March 1 and in Canada the physical release is slated for March 4 for some reason (even though it was released on iTunes on Jan.2 in Canada and the US simultaneously, yet the US gets a much earlier release date for the CD version).

It's so interesting reading all this... I'm a bit like you, masterofinsanity and Zer0, I'm a really late fan. And like you, Zer0, I'm seeing them the first time this year. Should be immense!!!

I'm in New Zealand, so we should probably get it March 1st, like Aussie.

Oh, and I was also reminded of myself when you said that you had heard of this band which was called Smashing Pumpkins, but never knew who they were or what they played...

29th of July 1996. I was given my first cd player and Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, two seperate gifts, on the occasion of my Bar-Mitzvah. I was also given a Simply Red album as well as a compilation album of some sort. I had never heard music as expressive, soaring, driving, inspiring or as personal as MCIS before.

It wasn't long before I went and bought Gish, Siamese Dream, Piscis Iscariot and anything else I could get my hands on (lull, peel sessions, and eventually - TAFH box set). I bought Adore and Machine the day they came out. It didn't bother me in the slightest how 'different' or 'unsuccessful' Adore was. It was beautiful and I loved it.

When I arrived at school the day The Pumpkins broke up a good friend of mine told me he had heard the news on the radio that morning...I didn't believe him. At first I thought he was kidding. The day wore on and his story didn't change. I began to tell myself that he had missheard. I remained in denial until I heard it for myself, and I was completely gutted.

I saw Billy in 2005 on thefutureembrace tour, (Linda was there on keyboards too) and it was great being in the same room as him, watching him play his guitar in person, bending his strings, rocking. I will get to see The Smashing Pumpkins play live for the first time at the V Festival on April the 5th, and I can't wait.

Btw Trillian, do you dye your hair blue?

I was just beginning University in January 1995. I was 17. And a new friend was playing a cassette tape in her room when we were hanging out. I loved Disarm and borrowed the tape. I loved Siamese Dream. I still do. I bought myself the tape, and since then have bought 4 copies of the CD over the years as it was scratched and once stolen when my car stereo was nicked. When MCIS was released I was over the moon. I have followed the band through the years... 13 years later I am finally going to get to see them... March 22

aron wrote:
Just for Halloween, that spray-on stuff. And I used to use "hair mascara" that smelled like blueberries, haha.

I was D'Arcy for one Halloween, to the best of my efforts. Braided my hair like hers in the Disarm video, wore my Pumpkins shirt and jeans ripped at the knees.

My dad got me into the Pumpkins.
I think all their music was somewhat pushed into my brain.
Like when some parents say "Play Mozart to your todler. It'll make him smarter." Instead, my dad, who loved the Pumpkins at the time, would play MCIS all the time.
I was only two at that time, but my dad tells me that I used to sing along with "Bullet With Butterfly Wings".

Anyway, years later, when I was in 7th grade (2006), I asked my dad if I could borrow a bunch of his CDs. In the collection I borrowed there was MCIS Adore and Machina. I listened to a few MCIS songs and I was hooked.

Now, being 15, I've blown all my money on all the Smashing Pumpkins stuff I could get my hands on.

And now I'm a hard core fan

^^^ That's the kind of dad I'm gonna be.

PistolPete wrote:

I also got into the Pumpkins fairly recently. In 2004 my older brother's mate sent him Today and by chance I found it and played it. At first I thought Billy's voice was strange but not in a bad way and after a few more listens I grew to love it and had to hear more.

As above, I had been vaguely aware of the name 'Smashing Pumpkins' throughtout my childhood probably through hearing the name on Sabrina the Teenage Witch and the Simpsons but never knew what kind of music they played.

I feel lucky that I found their music when I was 15/16 when my passion for music was just beginning to develop.

Only one person I knew liked the Pumpkins and we got talking about them and since then we've grown to be good friends when I don't think we otherwise would have.

Since then, there haven't been many days that have elapsed without me listening to a Pumpkins song and last year I got my first chance to see them live at Leeds Festival. I was central and on the front row and loved every minute even though my ribs took a hell of a beating.

Two nights ago I saw them again in Manchester and just loved it. I never realised what a good song That's the Way is until I heard the acoustic version with Lisa on keyboard.

Eric Cantona once said "When I think football, I think Manchester United" in the same way that when I think music, I think Smashing Pumpkins.

I was trying to impress a boy.

I met a guy about five years ago, when I was 15 and he was 17. I really liked him... unfortunately so did my friend. We started talking about music, and he mentioned that he was a big fan of the Smashing Pumpkins. I had heard of them, but I really didn't know about them. He asked me what my favourite Pumpkins song was and I stuttered out the only one I knew at that point... Ava Adore. (I had seen the music video a few nights prior on one of those '90s special things) He was impressed... we kept talking.

Of course, to keep up with my claim of being a Pumpkins fan, I had to learn more. I went home that night, and downloaded every Smashing Pumpkins song I could find, and listened to them. And I actually liked them. Over the next year, I bought every Pumpkins CD I could find.

Now, 5 years later, he's probably one of my closet friends. But I still haven't told him it was all based on a fib.

It was 1996 and I was 16 I wasnt into music too much at the time, my parients took me and my two younger brothers on our 1st holiday abroad too Salou in Spain but as we did not have much money we traveled there (and back) by coach.

Now let me say in advance oh god was that one of the most crappy trips of that part of my life(by the end)however I remember thinking Southern France was very beutiful from that coach window, lol.

My friend had given me two cassette copies for my couch trip one had a mix for Sound Garden, Nirvana and that kind of great stuff on it and the other had Siamese Dream on it and the amazing dreamy heavy chaotic sounds of that album help me a hell of a lot to get though that stuffy, hot, long coach trip that ended up taken two days as the driver got lost.

Well after that musics allways been a major part of my life, I got MCIS, britpop kicked off and I lived the 90's. Great days.