Smashing Pumpkins - Machina: The Machines of God
|
List Price: Our Price: $7.99 You Save: $9.99 (56%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.03 (click here) Category: Music CD See more new music releases 
|
|---|
Canadian Music Store
Free Music Notes for Machina: The Machines of God
Free Music Review: Heavenly guitar rock -- welcome back, Jimmy Chamberlin!
Hit: 5 Stars
Machina: The Machines of God kicks off with the exciting, carnivorous first notes of lead track "The Everlasting Gaze" and sets the tone for the album: The Smashing Pumpkins are back in all their aggressive, nuanced glory.Jimmy Chamberlin's jazz-informed, tonally seductive drumming had always been such an integral part of the Pumpkins sound that it's good to see him back in the fold. The uptempo songs benefit enormously from his touch, and if you can live with Billy Corgan's whiny singing, you're in for a treat -- the songs are more mature and lyrically stronger than ever, the production is muscular and adrenalized, and the Pumpkins sound grand and unself-conscious, recalling the best moments of Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness.
Aforementioned riff monster "The Everlasting Gaze" is the best uptempo Pumpkins song since "Bullet with Butterfly Wings"; the juxtaposition of shimmering atmosphere, an indomitable beat and snarling guitar makes "Raindrops + Sunshowers" a sonically addictive, sensual experience; "Stand inside Your Love" is pure melodic paradise; "The Sacred and Profane" flaunts a deep groove, a dark-tinged swirl of sound almost Gothic in tone; "This Time"'s echo-rich guitars almost recall prime U2; "Wound" is a luscious acoustic-electric mix; "Age of Innocence" opens with an optimistic tapped beat and acoustic picking that recalls the amazing "Tonight, Tonight" from Mellon Collie; and then, of course, there's lengthy centerpiece "Glass and the Ghost Children", a highly creepy affair mixing hard-edged rock with swirling sound effects (reminding me of Pink Floyd, The Cure or even My Dying Bride) that shows that the ambitions of this band are boundless.
Machina is the best album The Smashing Pumpkins have created yet, a grand, satisfying cosmos that tops even the double-disc sweep of Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness.
Free Music Review: Buy This CD!
Hit: 5 Stars
Well, I got Machina and I'm pretty amazed at what i hear. Billy Corgan managed a rock comeback without falling back on old tired grunge-rock standbys. He made progress with this very experimental CD. I used to laugh when people called Billy Corgan a genius, but now I'm starting to think the same thing myself. How does he do this stuff? There are really only 3 songs on here that tick me off: and out of 15 thats not bad. "Glass and The Ghost Children" starts out cool but then gets kinda lame (especially with the answering machine), "The Crying Tree of Mercury" and "Blue Skies Bring Tears" are two downbeat, similar-sounding songs that just don't get my blood pumping. If they would have lost those three, this would have been a near-perfect CD. Of course, it's got its bloated and pretentious moments, but it wouldn't be Pumpkins without that stuff. To all the fans complaining that this isn't the return to "siamese dream" they expected: be glad. Grunge is dead, and, especially after "Adore," for billy to make an album of all grunge anthems would be a bad move. And if he did, you'd probably wish he hadn't. This is album, with great music and lyrics all sort of directed to the fans, is a great return to good solid rock.
I just hope this isn't the last album. What would be cool is for the band to tour the heck out of this CD, and for Billy to come back in 2 years with an album of 10 of the best songs he can come up with, put it out and call it quits. If he can trim the fat for the band's final act, it would be an incredible move that would get respect from even people who hate the band. Plus it is the perfect way to bow out. I know he can do it, and if he does it will pretty much secure the band's place in history as one of the best rock bands ever. Anyway, check out "Machina" for now, it is definitely a great album.
Free Music Review: incredible
Hit: 5 Stars
the level of musicality that billy corgan reaches with this album is mind boggling. all of the songs are astounding.Everlasting Gaze- is a treat for old pumpkins fans, since it is slightly reminiscent of tonight tonight and zero.
Raindrops+Sunshowers- rocks like U2. it's one of the best songs on the album.
Stand Inside Your Love - is a pretty song. billy likes to get romantic sometimes.
I of the Mourning - reminds me of the cure, and it probably is my fave song.
Sacred and Profane - isn't one of the best songs, but it still is really cool. the chorus especially.
Try Try Try- picks up where Adore left off. it has soft guitars, soft lyrics, and is softly sung, and is bloody gorgeous.
Heavy Metal Machine - has a great glam-rock crunch to it, but the lyrics aren't the best. it's musically invincible.
This Time - Is surprisingly sad. the lyrics have a desperation to them, and the music is mournful, although it has a fast beat.
The Imploding Voice - has a charm to it. this song is reminiscent of Pissant from Pisces Iscariot. mindless fun.
Glass and the Ghost Children - freaks me out. it's almost ten minutes long, and while most bands who write epics tend to weaken at the end, this song rocks hard and rolls gently. i especially like the spoken part.
Wound - is maybe my least favorite song on the album. that doesn't make it a bad song, but it doesn't do much for me.
The Crying Tree of Mercury - is the strangest oddity on the album. i love how the keyboards and guitar meld into one another
With Every Light - is mellow and dreamy. it definitely floats.
Blue Skies Bring Tears - is an incredibly beautiful song. the lyrics are great too.
The Age of Innocence - may be the strongest song on the album. it changes halfway to a softer bridge, kinda liek parts of Siamese Dream. A great closer.
This album really affected me. i reccomend it to everyone
Free Music Review: If any other band had made this record...
Hit: 5 Stars
If any other band had made this record, it would have been damned proud of itself.I am disappointed in "fans" of the Pumpkins who are giving Machina a hard time... while emotionally it may not be as deep as the previous albums, musically, it is a masterpiece.
I think the apprehension that people feel toward this album is that it is a deviation from what they perceive The Smashing Pumpkins to be, which shows that they do not know anything about the band. The Smashing Pumpkins are a deviation from what everyone perceives The Smashing Pumpkins to be. If you haven't noticed, every album sounds completely different from every other album, but somehow retains that certain something that makes it a Pumpkins album.
This album is the most polished to date (call it overproduction if you wish, it's a normal stage that all bands go through when they become mainstream. If you can't handle a band becoming mainstream, then you have a problem.)
Some of the material on Machina is absolutely beautiful... "I of the Mourning," "This Time," and "Stand Inside Your Love" rank right up there with "Mayonaise" (from Siamese Dream) and "Beautiful" (from MCIS).
Perhaps some of the songs fall short of fans' expectations... and there are certainly songs that should have been included on the album that weren't. I will never be able to understand why "The Crying Tree of Mercury" was included on this album, but "If There Is a God" and "Dross" were not. (If you haven't heard these songs, they were performed live on last year's The Arising! tour, and are available as live mp3's on a very popular service that I won't name for fear that someone else may decide to sue it...)
The best Pumpkins album? Probably not. A great album nonetheless? Definitely so. A Pumpkins album? No doubt.
Free Music Review: It's about time...
Hit: 5 Stars
Wow, it's great to see tat the Smashing Pumpkins are back. Of course, they really didn't go anywhere, after all they released "Adore" just a couple of years ago. But, as I hate to repeat what you've probably read in the vast majority of all the reviews, "Adore" was not, at least in my opinion at all a good CD. Machina/The Machines Of God however, is excellent. Every single song is good, with the exception of "Try, Try, Try" and "With Every Light". For some reason, it doesn't seem like those songs fit the album, and I don't think they are too great. I can honestly say that every other song is a great, or at least a very good listen. My personal favorites are "Age of Innocence" and "The Imploding Voice". It's great to see that all four original members (Billy Corgan, James Iha, D'Arcy, and Jimmy Chamberlain) are together for, probably anyway, their last CD together. So if you want to hear vintage Pumpkins with a newer, sharper sound, this is it. That sounds like a contradiction, but hey, that's what it is. Also, I should mention that the lyrics are outstanding, you can tell instantly that these words have meaning to them, they are definitely not about their girlfriends dumping them (aka Blink 182, not saying anything's wrong with them, but it's good to see lyrics with a lot of heart in to them). Of course, that's the way the Smashing Pumpkin's have always been, full of meaning. The last thing I should point out about "Machina" is that there is a great variety in the types of songs. They are not all "sonic", or soft, like they were in Adore, you see a lot of different styles rolled in to one, and that is a big reason you should give "Machina/The Machines Of God" a try. A definite great buy.