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Billy Corgan's track-by-track take on his album

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D

Diablos

Member
DO NOT ASK FOR THE LEAKED A100 MP3, THANKS

Billy Corgan on TheFutureEmbrace

David Wild

Here's what Billy Corgan says about the places TheFutureEmbrace, his first solo album, took him:

ALL THINGS CHANGE:
This was the zero point for the record. We'd been messing around for a couple months, but "All Things Change" was the first time we found the feeling we were going for musically. I knew I wanted to sing something at the end, and the words "We can change the world" came into my head when I was driving around. I thought, "Oh man, you're asking for it." But there's something so car-crashy about someone actually saying something like that -- you don't want to look but you have to. The feeling is authentic. I do feel we can change the world, but it's not a Michael Jackson sense. There's a sense here that it's not going to be easy.

MINA LOY (M.O.H):
The guys I worked with on the album would label the soundscapes I had. This song was originally called "My Old Heart" and they abbreviated the name in the sound file as "M.O.H." At first I wasn't sure about my lyrics to "Mina Loy" because I felt like I was returning to one of my old themes -- rage. Yet it expressed my general feeling of paranoia. I live in Chicago and I love my city so much -- I love it like a woman. I was thinking how I'd feel if anyone ever set off a dirty bomb and destroyed this place I love so much. This is not some vague Soviet threat. It's the thought that someone on a whim can put their finger on a map and destroy something beautiful.

THECAMERAEYE:
This is like one of those poems where you vaguely know what it's about, but can't quite explain it. It has something to do with this feeling that love is constantly being perverted. You're constantly asking yourself what true love really is. I've been with women and I thought I found my true love and it's turned out to be the worst, most hurtful thing. You think, is that true love? I've been with woman who are completely devoted and would lie across a railroad track for me, and I think this is kind of boring. So what is true love anyway? Somehow the words and the images in "TheCameraEye" communicate that to me.

TO LOVE SOMEBODY:
The original song by the Bee Gees is in a major key and very up-sounding, and I knew it wouldn't fit that way. So I slipped it all into a minor key, so it's the same melody but sadder. We finished the demo and my engineer thought it was one of the best things we've ever done -- and that was just the demo. So I'm pretty good friends with Robert Smith from the Cure who were a big influence on me. We're not just rock buddies, we sort of have a loving relationship from afar. So I called Robert up and said, "Will you sing on my record?" He said, "Sure, whatever you want." I said, "It's a Bee Gees song." Over the Transatlantic line I hear Robert Smith going "The Bee Gees?" I said, "Trust me, just do your thing and it will be fine." He did and it was great.

A100:
Just your typical God is Disco Love Song. I come from Chicago, the home of house music. We grow up there in a place where for a lot of people it's really all about the kick drum. That's why New Order was so big in Chicago -- they really captured that feeling. There's still something in me that just resonates to that Big techno moment. That said, the song is still semi-sarcastic. I've got my tongue in my cheek a little bit there.

DIA:
One of the last songs written for the album. I figured out some new ways to write songs this time and by this point in the process I'd gotten comfortable with new approach. So I went back to my old process. To me, it's sort of an old school song written in a new way. "DIA" has got a nice Gothic vibe. Actually, Courtney Love was staying at my house at the time. She’d come into town for me to write songs for her record. I had this one and another one. I liked the other one, but Courtney picked this song.

NOW (AND THEN):
This one's just really sad -- some fucked up, weird tale of teenage isolation that never really happened to me. It's a sad devotional about willing to be hurt and consumed by someone. At first the song had a different feel and I was ambivalent about it. Perhaps it was a bit too Pumpkins for me right now. Then Bon said he really loved the song, and thought it was the best thing we'd worked on. He said, "Mind if I f*ck it up for you?" So then I went away, came back and thought what Bon had done was really beautiful. Then the whole song clicked for me.

I'M READY:
Bjorn wanted me to take this one off. He said, "It's not that I don't like it, I'm just not sure if it fits the record." And in a way, that's what I do like about "I'm Ready." It comes at the point in the record where you need a different feeling. I often like the underdog songs on any album. And to me, there's something satisfying about knowing it will be someone’s favorite song.

WALKING SHADE:
I like where this song comes on the album. Someone I work with told me, "It's that point where you want to put your foot on the accelerator and drive a little faster." Without it, the album tailed off into a blissful thing, and I didn't want that. I wrote this song at the last possible second -- I wasn't sure what I was writing about. Then a week later, this whole thing blew up with this girl, and I had pretty much written what was going to happen but a week before. It's the psychic breakup song. We've made a video for it with all my pasts coming back to haunt me.

SORROWS (IN BLUE):
Now that's a weird one. Besides "All Things Change," I think this song captures what I was trying to say emotionally and sonically with the album. But it's a strange song and I don't even know what I'm trying to say exactly. It's definitely a feeling-based song and not at all intellectualized.

PRETTY PRETTY STAR:
Yes, this is the most Bowiesque title imaginable and that's the point. It was my way of winking and saying that I know what's going on here and I'm not going to pretend I’m not going there. I know David halfway decently, and I've always been open about my love for his work. Then having played with Mike Garson who was the Aladdin Sane pianist and all that stuff, my heart is close to that feeling.

STRAYZ:
This is just one of those things we did and everybody loved it. If I even brought up ever taking it off, there would have been a mutiny -- which was nice. The guys I was working with on this album really made an emotional investment in this music. They really helped me fight for the idea that the best music should be on the album. And I hope that it is.
Click to expand...
 
D

Dead

well not really...yet
A100 is pretty much everything I hoped his solo album would be like. Can't wait.
 
D

demi

Member
DO NOT ASK FOR THE LEAKED A100 MP3, THANKS
Click to expand...

[10:42pm] <Diablose> WHO HAS IT
[10:42pm] <Diablose> WHO HAS IT

[10:43pm] <Diablose> shit
[10:43pm] <Diablose> dam
[10:43pm] <Diablose> fuck
[10:43pm] <Diablose> shit
[10:43pm] <Diablose> where can i get this fucking song
 
D

Diablos

Member
Anyway, I really like the descriptions and I cannot wait for the album.
I would not expect a leak anytime soon because every single person that has it also has a unique watermark embedded into the waveform. :|
 
M

Mifune

Mehmber
A100 seems to be kind of aimless. And yeah, it really lacks a strong main hook. But sonically it's pretty amazing....dense and atmospheric and gloomy. Star Power, your Massive Attack comparison is a good one.
 
D

Diablos

Member
At least Billy's trying to branch out and do different things. Another Siamese Dream would be nice but... it'd be more of the same.
 
S

Star Power

Member
head.corgan.jpg



...

no comment.
 
F

FrenchMovieTheme

Member
billy... no longer ashamed of the birthmark on his arm. maybe he will wear some short sleeve shirts now. motherfucker must have been dying wearing long sleeve shirts in the middle of the day during a summer festival show
 
G

God's Hand

Banned
Owner of a Lonely Heart is better than every song on this album. And I haven't even heard them yet. Nothing can beat that song...
 
D

Diablos

Member
FrenchMovieTheme said:
billy... no longer ashamed of the birthmark on his arm. maybe he will wear some short sleeve shirts now. motherfucker must have been dying wearing long sleeve shirts in the middle of the day during a summer festival show
Click to expand...
It's not that, it's just that he looks so... vulnerable? Yeah. I mean the cover is just really stupid IMO. Definitely not him. Just put on a black shirt and hold a guitar or something. Jesus.
 
K

kitchenmotors

Banned
A100 sounds so damn over-produced. It's like Machina all over again. :/ Those were always his weakest songs, he has a big problem leveling out sounds with he tries to layer textures. They sound muddy and bland when they're at the same volume and all bassed up. He needs to take a step back and make an album with just the basics.
 
D

Diablos

Member
kitchenmotors said:
A100 sounds so damn over-produced. It's like Machina all over again. :/ Those were always his weakest songs, he has a big problem leveling out sounds with he tries to layer textures. They sound muddy and bland when they're at the same volume and all bassed up. He needs to take a step back and make an album with just the basics.
Click to expand...
Huh? A100 sounds more simplistic than overproduced. It's just the nature of the song that makes it sound overproduced.

The new Corgan blog entry is really good.

Saturday, April 23, 2005

On Broadway

I am strolling casually down the street…not just any old street, mind you, this is Broadway I’m walking…no, not the famed Broadway of high-steppin’ chorus girls and garbled librettos, um, actually, this is my Broadway, Chicago style, avenue of shifty malcontents, painted queens, porno peddlers, ‘authentic’ taco dealers, progressive feminist tomes, and many men in really tight short-shorts…I am a-strolling fairly inconspicuously down this thoroughfare over to the practice space we share with the group Catherine, a sludge throwing, LSD drippin’, beer coddlin’ unit with which we both share women and rock and roll affinity…our palace de rock is located, or should I say nestled, just inside a working parking garage that you enter from the street…I walk right through the bay doors where the cars skid in and out, veer softly to the left, past a steel fire door (usually propped open), tackle the rusted iron gate with a padlock that offers up yet another padlock with a steel door attached…once in, I am assailed by a dingy, clammy, never been cleaned concrete shit box that smells like oil and stale food…and oh, by the way, I live here too…our year of the Lord is 1992…

We are supposed to practice today, that is, if Jimmy shows up…he regularly ‘disappears’, and delicately insures we have no way to track him down…numbers don’t work, girls he is sleeping with don’t sleep with him anymore, nobody has seen him but he is everywhere…James and D’arcy arrive together, because even though they are no longer a couple, James still plays the boyfriend role as far as picking her up and taking care of her whenever she needs something (which is frequent and curious)…us 3 people ‘up front’ almost never miss practice, so it is with bemused bitterness that we stare at the clock doubting our pummeling skinsmen’s arrival, who I have affectionately (and accurately, I might add) dubbed ‘Brutal Jim’ (Jekyl and Hyde is=to Jimmy and Brutal Jim)…we have a constant rule amongst us, which we hold to be true about 97% of the time, and that is: “if he is late, he isn’t coming”…because Jimmy is always on time, and Brutal Jim is always late (at 15 missed practices over 6 weeks, I stop bothering to count anymore)…we have come to masochistically appreciate his ‘my dog ate my homework’ excuses, and the fact that he thinks we believe him at all just adds to the hilarity…we have been working feverishly to be prepared enough to go show up in Atlanta in about a month to once again make a record with Wisconsin-bred producer Butch Vig, who not so ironically also worked with us on our first album ‘Gish’…this date happens to be set in stone, because ironically Butch is suddenly in the highest demand after producing Nirvana’s last record, the number one world phenomena that has forcefully changed what it means to us to play numb, dumb, angst driven muzak…

If Jimmy doesn’t show, we will stand around for about 15 minutes before James shifts his body language and starts looking at his watch…this is a sign to me that says, “I’ll stay if you really want me to, but I’ve got a lot of stuff to do”…his no shows are frustrating to all of us, and though we sometimes try to work on music without Jimmy, it’s just not the same, so at this point if he doesn’t show we usually just call it a day right then and there…but today he shows!...bursting through the door as usual with his bull-like stomp and sideways glances…no one says shit if he looks like shit, because we can’t afford to drive him away…it’s a business as usual ‘thank God he’s here’ under breath, and then everyone springs into action (fire up the amps) and it’s off we go…we will usually work for somewhere between 4-6 hours per day (depending on if we throw in a little late lunch break---sometimes we might do double sessions and come back at night)…we almost always practice in the afternoon…we play so unbelievably fucking loud that the volume just wears down your body after a time, so it is a welcome relief to go outside in the sunshine and grab a taco to keep the spirits up and break the sustained tension…when we do play, we will work virtually non-stop until we just can’t take it anymore..it is either-or, either blisteringly brutal crushing sound, or bad take-out food…

We have been simultaneously working on about 30 songs, most of which are pretty long and have very arcane, idiosyncratic arrangements…practice often times sound will sound like a trigonometry class with all the mathematical theories we throw around, in a stunted language few outside of us would understand, much less care to (a sample conversation would sound like: “4’s are predictable, so let’s flip on the 3’s---lean on the 1’s please---breaks and hangs should feel like 8 ½---it’s 1, 2a, 3, 1, 2b, 4, and then when we get to the 5 play whatever note you want”)...calling these pieces “songs” is generous because most don’t even have a vocal melody or words…many are just jams and concepts gone awry…we assign these children vacant boring names like “james’ song”, or the ubiquitous “song in d”…often, a title is given in the vain hope that the very name itself will stir some meaning into us where there isn’t any to be found (like naming a song ‘wings of sunshine’)…

When the 4 of us are alone together, playing music, we get along really, really well…our reputation outside of this room is that of a difficult crazy bunch, a thought we relish because it keeps the lame poseurs away from us…but even the people who know us individually well cannot possibly know us collectively, for it is a totally different animal and we keep a pretty tight circle…we have never been one of those hang out type bands that attracts a gang, for we are the gang with our own sense of justice and steel brutality…we live in our own bubble and we go out of way to keep it that way…our practices are (and will ever remain) a closed door secret society meeting where few are allowed to enter and witness how we work our special brand of magic…because in here, we forget, for we are learning how mix disaster and build tornados…we never argue about music…we may argue about one’s attitude, or lost arrangements, but never, ever about the musical direction of the band...in that way we are fearless, and there is total trust…the true reason for this harmony is that the sound we are manifesting is a complete an accurate portrayal of the blend of the “4” personalities in the room: distant, coy, ambitious, feral, dark, lucid, dreamy, strange, bored, sad, and ultimately desperate…

Much of our time will be spent balancing the many parts each song seems to encompass…in order to effectively tweak each moment to it’s maximum impact, we usually start songs over at the ‘top’, or beginning, so that when a critical moment arrives we are in complete unison as to the dynamic that follows…for example, let’s say 2 minutes into a given song, there is a transition from a very loud part to a very quiet part…we assign a number value to the 2 parts: the loud, say, is an 8 out of 10 (10 being full blasting power), and the quiet part is a 3 (which would be above a whisper and lower than the band playing just quietly)…when we arrive, the critical moment is question (the transition from a number 8 part to a number 3), must be seamless and smooth…in our parlance, it cannot sound “obvious” or “forced”…we go to the top of the song, playing all the previous parts according to their already agreed upon dynamic intensities…if we lose track even before we get to the coupling we are working towards, we stop and start all over…this is critical, because you cannot have a train where each car following the engine is moving at different speeds…they all must move together, speeding up and slowing down in a relative value equally….this is key to the way we work and write, the pure notion that all moves must be in a mutual harmony consistent with what came before…so, for example, if we arrive at the loud part playing at an intensity level of 9 (which is quote unquote wrong), the following relative value must be a 4 (which is +1 like the 9 is to the 8), and not a 3…this keeps all of us on the same wavelength at all times, no matter what is happening…in order to practice the correct transition on a section to section change, we must “arrive” at the moment playing at a level 8 loudness in order to get used to going to the soft 3…this really helps when we play concerts, where invariably everyone gets juiced up by the adrenaline of the crowd…if we are playing the loud part as a 9, we all calculate up together so that the following part is a reflected value, which is 4…this also holds if we are depressed, and not into a show…if we arrive at the part at a 7, the following section becomes (ready class?) a 2…we therefore are able to adjust on the fly, under any circumstance, so that we will always sound like what we know what we are doing, even in the midst of our own total and complete chaos…

This process requires a lot of patience on everyone’s part…in addition, songs are constantly being re-written, hacked and chopped and reborn, sometimes 4 times daily…many changes are talked through as opposed to being actually played through…this means I might say “ok, when we get to the 2nd chorus, cut it in half but hang the ending so that Jimmy can set up the next part by playing a fill”…again, starting from the top, everyone is expected to know how to play a given section precisely even though, technically speaking, none of us have ever played it this way before (we do this before we go on stage as well, expecting results under the duress of a live concert)…this saves some time, but also creates a lot of misunderstanding if someone (usually D’arcy) thinks you are speaking of another section…so when she gets to the part she thinks you mean, she does what you “asked” (not really), creating a car crash effect as everyone collides…so then it’s re-explain again, a little de-program to lose the error, and then back to the top…we do this day after day, week after week until you get so used to the language and the insanity of this kind of thinking that it becomes second nature…and you can “feel” when something is wrong, and you know just how to fix it…

We record our demos on an 8-track cassette unit…Jimmy’s drums take up 4 channels: kick, snare, and 2 overheads…one channel is for left for her bass, one for James’ guitar, one for mine, and the last one for vocals…I never sing ‘live’ for the demos, opting instead to add the vocals later…the general idea is this will force me to write words and have to sing them to finish the songs…but when we play, I sing ‘blah-blah’ lyrics mostly so there is something there…once the band goes home, my ears ring for hours and the room takes on a chill which makes living here all the more ominous…in order to insure my safety at night, I padlock the iron gate from the inside, effectively locking myself in, which terrifies me because in the event of a fire I am dead…once I close the door, I deadbolt it from the inside…I use a small space heater to take the chill out of the air, but it doesn’t do much good unless you are right up next to it…you can’t get any broadcast signal in here, so I have a vcr-tv set up so I have something to kill the time…I sleep on a leather couch that someone left in here, in my clothes so I don’t get too cold…if I have to use the bathroom, say in the middle of the night, I have to get up, flip the deadbolt, take off the gate padlock, then proceed to re-lock the door so no one can go in there when I’m taking a piss (the bathroom is in an outside hall), then circle back and re-do the whole process, locking myself in once more (sometimes in the middle of the night, strangers will bang on the door, but I never answer)…

just before I go to bed, and often in the dark watching the bounce of the red LED lights, I listen back to the days tapes, usually only once thru…my brain will process the arrangements while I sleep even if I am not consciously thinking of them… this is a strange talent, because when the band arrives the next day to work, I already know what needs to be cut and moved around even though I haven’t given it one single thought! And so I live like this for months, this cycle of waiting, playing, and waiting some more…It is a very detached, lonely existence being in here like this…no telephone, few visitors, and no sunshine at all (no windows)…it is really like being in a cave that I won’t come out of for any reason…and what makes all this even stranger is that I have a million dollars rotting, unused, in my bank account…
Click to expand...


This is a big reason why Siamese Dream is my favorite album of all time. He's living in a garage, life is beyond bad, yet he somehow completed that album. People usually coming from that type of place do not craft masterpieces like Siamese Dream, it's impossible. Where they're coming from prevents anything like that from happening. Unbelievable what people can do when they put their mind to it.
 
K

kablooey

Member
Well, the bit about their playing methods during Siamese Dream makes me appreciate that album a bit more. Geek USA is probably still one of the few Pumpkins songs that I really like...now even more so. :)

*runs*
 
T

TheDrowningMan

Member
Walking Shade video....

rtsp://rx-lvl3-wa02.rbn.com/farm/*/realguide/music/c/video/104057_billycorgan_walkingshade_reprise_rv10hi.rm

I like it, but that bike bit.... :lol :lol
 
T

TheDrowningMan

Member
FrenchMovieTheme said:
the link is down! does anyone know anywhere else to get the video?

the song is supposedly released to music stations today (walking shade i mean)
Click to expand...

Copy the link into Real Player for it to work. :)

Edit: Nevermind, I just checked and it is indeed down now.
 
D

Diablos

Member
It's not like Billy was gonna sell 10 million copies of the album had he not used that as the cover, so whatever. I really shouldn't be surprised, he's always had a weird approach to photographs.

I really like the direction Billy's heading in, I've heard both Walking Shade and A100 (now both leaked, don't ask thanks). Of course after listening to a couple bootlegs from 1996, I really miss what the Pumpkins were. But that was nearly 10 years ago. God damn, time flies. Billy doesn't even look the same anymore... they're all starting to show their age. Especially Jimmy.

But the best way to describe Walking Shade is a cross between electronica and folk. The production is clearly electronic, but the song structure is much like a folk song.

Piston, I really like Pearl Jam, a lot. But Riot Act is a horrible album (save Bu$hleaguer and a couple other songs).

They may kill us in our sleep
+ they may dance on our stars
but they will never pull us apart
(not now, not ever!)
I Am Yours -
in The Future Embrace
Click to expand...
 
I

Infinitemadness

Member
Sorry to bring this back again, but just saw the Walking shade video...the video looks nice, but the song just isnt a great single. A100 should of been his first single, it seems more radio friendly while WS seems like it lacks direction, I feel like hes going all over the place with that song.

Billy is the king of gloom, and A100 somewhat has a dark tone to it. Meh, I'm just ranting cuz I REALLY want this album to be successful for him.
 
M

Macam

Banned
Infinitemadness said:
Meh, I'm just ranting cuz I REALLY want this album to be successful for him.
Click to expand...

I think it already is to him, judging by his comments in making it. Besides, under the current musical climate, it's unlikely that's Billy Corgan, as a solo artist of all things, will be able to push the kinds of numbers to be judged a success by most critics.

I'm just happy enough to hear that him (and Jimmy) are continuing to make music as, aside from their immense talents, they constantly seem to be trying new sounds and styles, and that's something that can't be said for a whole lot of major artists. I just wish James Iha would leave APC and get back to doing more solo work or more collaborative work. Some of the songs he wrote & co-wrote stand out as among the best SP stuff out there.
 
D

Diablos

Member
I like Walking Shade. After the first listen I was kind of like "meh," but it's a really good song. And the video is beautiful. Outstanding artistic directrion and use of special effects.
 
M

Macam

Banned
Gotta love how this thread is essentially a conversation between Diablos, FrenchMovieTheme, and myself. Guest starring Star Power.

Rawk.
 
D

Diablos

Member
Yeah, it's better to keep this thread going instead of making 10 until the album comes out. I can't wait to hear more tracks from this album. Did you know it's only 46 minutes long?
 
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