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I remember hearing Disarm when it first was released, but that's about it. Never really hearing any of their other tunes on the radio, I thought maybe they were a one hit wonder (for this album anyway), and never went out and bought it. Almost a decade and a half later, I've heard quite a few tunes from the Pumpkins and thought maybe I should have this one in my collection if not for just Disarm alone, and upon buying it I realized that I've heard Mayonaise and Today and I also liked them. I listened to Siamese Dream and found out I should have bought this album a long time ago. I totally respect what Smashing Pumpkins did in a time when grunge was hogging up the airwaves. Billy Corgan has a voice that would've fit in perfectly had they decided to go the grunge way just to make some bucks. Instead they did something that was a little ahead of their time. They decided to be creative and didn't dominate the airwaves, which is our loss and not theirs. Since then, they've created a lot of radio friendly (not that most of the stuff on Siamese Dream isn't radio friendly, it just wasn't played much) music to bring in a larger group of fans that had just been casual Pumpkins fans before. I'm not trying to knock grunge. Grunge is an important part of music, but record companies seem to just go with what's cool at the time. That's why so many 80's bands struggled, even though there were some cool albums out there, it's just that no one was listening to them (Great White's Psycho City being a glaring one). Regardless, Smashing Pumpkins survived and eventually had a larger fan base. I bought Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness when it came out because I liked the tune Bullet With Butterfly Wings. There were some other good songs on that double album, but I think Siamese Dream is a far better album. If you take the best 13 songs off of Melon Collie, they don't measure up to this album. Disarm is the most well known one on this album, but the whole thing is good. Disarm's success might have actually hurt album sales, because that song isn't a true picture of what the Smashing Pumpkins really are. Bullet With Butterfly Wings doesn't show it either. Nothing that they do really defines them, because they're so creative. Cherub Rock actually reminds me of the band Screaming Trees. If you remember the movie and soundtrack "Singles", they did the song I Nearly Lost You (or at least I think that's the name of the song). I don't believe I've heard another Screaming Trees song so that may not be their true band sound (maybe I'll have to check them out too, just out of curiosity). Anyway, enough about Screaming Trees. Cherub Rock rocks. As does Quiet. Today is kind of in between, it rocks and then it slows down to Disarm's pace. That one I'd heard before and didn't realize it was one this album. Hummer has kind of a strange beginning then goes into a cool slower rocker. I Hear is a cool song. I don't really have a favorite as far as Siamese Dream goes. They are all listenable songs and none stand out that much, which I think is a good quality of a good album. Unfortunately, that is also a quality of bad album, but that is not the case here. Disarm I guess stands out a little, but if I had never heard that song before, that song wouldn't stick out really at all, which isn't a knock on that song (I actually really like that song). It's me giving props to the Pumpkins for making a very creative enjoyable album.Read full review
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