The Smashing Pumpkins split in 2000 was a rather hurried affair, as was their ‘Best Of’ compilation, released in two versions, one with a bonus disc and one without. The selections of the disc left something to be desired, and didn’t really show off the depth and ability of wunderkind Billy Corgan, the song writing genius responsible for almost everything the group put out. Their impact in the face of the music industry throughout the ninties was not really celebrated and no decent live album was ever put out for fans. It is also impossible to get hold of loads of stuff because Billy Corgan wrote so many bloody songs that he had to release them in separate little boxed sets and compilations and it is very hard to get hold of a lot of these because they have been discontinued or destroyed a long time ago. No album of rarities has been released allowing fans to get access to many songs from albums such as ‘The Aeroplane Flies High’ which are unattainable. This 2002 compilation, which accompanies a equally poorly titled video ‘Vieuphoria,’ is the last thing the band put out, and is a pretty unenthusiastic collection. As a live album, it is not a comprehensive package spanning the band’s career. Absolutely no songs from anything the band did after 1994 are on this, so this album ignores this group’s 1995 masterwork, which is a huge disappointment. I get the feeling from this that Corgan was quite eager to move on and put this band behind him, and focus on his new group, Zwan, who released a fantastic debut ‘Mary Star Of The Sea’ in 2003. This album has no notes with it, and neither did their ‘Best Of’ oddly enough, so what we get is a curt and random selection of live performances from their ‘Siamese Dream’ LP, some unreleased fripperies that are nothing but pointless and two songs from their ‘Gish’ and ‘Lull’ LPs and EPs.

The live performances on this are as excellent, thunderous and as raucous as you would expect from this group, one of the forerunners of the angst-ridden rock revolution of the early ninties. Corgan is a lot more loud and furious here than on some of the records, and the intensity and fury of his performances is something that jumps out at you immediately. There are a few live performances that are recorded poorly and so aren’t very good, but generally this does some justice to the strength of James Iha and Corgan’s guitar playing and Jimmy Chamberlin’s terrific drumming. There just isn’t enough classics on this and you’d expect more considering how popular the band were. There are eight songs from ‘Siamese Dream,’ which is over half of that album. The rest is wasted opportunity and will leave you feeling short changed.

1. Sinfony (0:53)
This is some synthesiser noise that sounds like something Corgan might have used in the very sad bits of the very sad ‘Adore’ album and reminds you perhaps of the fact that the Pumpkins only do gloomy and angry, and so you shouldn’t expect anything more. But this is pointless and as an introduction to the record it’s hardly the sort of thing any other live album would do. This album has no live flow, either, such as Nirvana’s ‘Muddy Banks’ record that kept the crowd noise going throughout the record to get the feeling of an live gig the whole way through. This has four or five second gaps between each of the songs which slow down the pace a little. Not a great way to begin but it’s short at least.

2. Quiet (3:41)
This version is taken from a 1993 gig in Atlanta and is a very good way to get things started properly. The rumbling, thunderous brutality of the album version is turned up to the max here, and this performance is faster and more raging than the original. The terrifying background vocals from the album song are replaced with a pleasing wall of sound and the scintillating guitar solo in the thrd half is nice and piercing. The effect of the original is felt here and then some, the song ending with a nice big scream from Corgan. His vocals here are as nasal and far more cutting than those from the album, and he is louder and as menacing as he can possibly be. A good start and a very good live performace that I think eclipses the album version.

3. Disarm (2:53)
There is a picture of a young Corgan in a tastless jacket playing this song on the back of the album, taken from a 1993 TV performance. This was performed on ‘The Word’ television show, a sort of cultish British programme where Nirvana first played ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ and where Kurt Kobain made a famous declaration to the world that he might have later regretted. This is completely different to the original in that there are no bells, no lavish Butch Vig production but instead just some loud and grinding riffs over Corgan’s drowned-out vocals. This begins messily and remains messy for its short duration and I think I prefer the original over this, but I’m sure many people would prefer this to the original.

4. Cherub Rock (4:20)
This is one of the highlights of the album, an acoustic performance of the anthemic opener to ‘Siamese Dream.’ It might be difficult to wonder how this song would work without the grand, epic riffs of the original, but this is a pretty good transistion from electric to acoustic and Corgan sounds as of he’s enjoying this one, as he does in the second acoustic performance later on. He still lets rip for the final “Let me out!” of the song, and that feeling of suffocation conveyed in the original still comes through in this performance, although it is less severe or frightening on an acoustic guitar.

5. Today (3:34)
Performed in Corgan’s hometown of Chicago, this is the one thing you would expect to be on here, and here it is. This is probably the most positive song the group have ever written, outside of ‘Muzzle,’ and remains uplifting, even if the lyrics are morbid and the riffs are noisy and violent and not particularly cheery. But it brings back many memories for those who grew up to this song and is a nice nostalgic nugget, even if the live performance is identical to the original in every way.

6. Bugg Superstar (1:26)
This is one of the reasons to avoid this album. James Iha’s contributions to the Smashing Pumpkins start and stop with ‘Blew’ and ‘Take Me Down.’ Apart from those songs, the other 100+ were all Corgan’s. So this I guess you might call this one of Iha’s B-sides. Bugg Superstar is some dog that the band put inside the booklet of their first album ‘Gish,’ and this is a piano and synthsiser tribute that sounds nothing like the Pumpkins would ever have dreamt of composing. I don’t know how else to react to this except by scrunching up my face and then hitting the skip button.

7. I Am One (7:53)
This is a big 7-minute rant taken from a gig in Barcelona when the Pumpkins were conquering the globe. The original song from ‘Gish’ is played normally until about 2 and a half minutes in when the bass line of the song is all that is left and Corgan extemporises on the mic and occasionally plays some discordant feedback throughout his 5 minute shouting solo. This gets a little boring after a while and I suppose would have been more enjoyable to watch Corgan, clearly on electrifying form, live. Here he just gets a bit annoying and his improvised stuff a little inane. His swearing goes down well with the Spaniards, the angry rock cuss word obviously a universal thing. This concludes in some messy feedback and indecipherable vocals. I like it, though.

8. Pulseczar (2:22)
The shoddy title of this weird song speaks volumes. I don’t think Corgan ever got to the point where he wrote a song about how the word ‘pulse’ and the word ‘czar’ put together sounds like ‘pulsar,’ but it wouldn’t be that surprising. This sounds like Corgan is on some sort of medication or under heavy sedation and has just picked up his guitar and started playing any old dirge. This is a creepy sounding song that misses the rest of the band and I really don’t have any idea who decided to put this song on this album since it isn’t live and is barely even a song. Why?

9. Soma (6:29)
Live in London, this would have been something pretty spectacular to have seen live. One of my personal favourites from ‘Siamese Dream,’ this is a introspective and sombre ballad interrupted by a scything guitar half way through that cuts into the song like a terrifying nightmare. A wonderful song; wonderfully played. It’s just that it is completely identical to the original and adds nothing that we don’t get from the version on the album.

10. Slunk (2:35)
This is the oldest performance here, taken from Japanese TV of all places, and performed in 1992, when ‘Siamese Dream’ was just a dream. I think this is from the ‘Lull’ EP, which is something you cannot get anymore unless you’re very lucky, but isn’t really a great loss as this is by-the-numbers track that simply doesn’t highlight the Pumpkins at their best and is a waste of disc space.

11. French Movie Theme (1:48)
Presumbly the band were asked to write a theme to a French movie, but obviously weren’t given the title of said movie. This resembles ‘Je t’aime’ in places, which is more than a little disconcerting. It’s pointless and is merely just crappy filler.

12. Geek U.S.A (4:47)
Another ‘Siamese Dream’ song and this time a very poorly recorded one from German TV. It’s certainly as quick and powerful as the original, just not as crisp. Could have been a gem, really, but those inefficient Germans let us down.

13. Mayonaise (4:17)
This is live ‘Everywhere’ from 1988-1994, apparently. No idea what that means but this is pleasant acoustic version of the loud original. Corgan actually laughs during this one and it shows the bonhomie of the band as they toured ‘Everywhere’ in the early nineties.

14. Silverf*** (13:28)
Taken from the same 1994 London gig as ‘Soma,’ this was how the band would round off their set, with a huge, behemoth version of their longest song. The original song is of course notorious for the slow, quiet section and then the leap into a deafening wall of tumultuous guitars, and here they drag this song out for another 6 minutes for a truly eye-gouging and crazy finale. Corgan leaps into random screams, the guitars dive into frantic solos, the drums try to keep up with it all and generally all hell breaks loose. This is easily the greatest thing on the album and showcases the group’s terrific guitar playing and wonderful ability as a live act. The highlight is where Corgan sings ‘Over The Rainbow,’ listed as track 14a, just before the song jumps into it’s very noisy part. A captivating climax that makes the original look rather weak in comparison. Along with ‘Quiet’ this is the only thing on this album I’ll listen to again and again.

15. Why Am I So Tired? (15:13)
It might be because you’ve been trying not to nod off to this ridiculously long waste of disc space. This sounds like the band jamming and practicing and is a repetitive instrumental that is way too long. 6 minutes would have seemed too long - but fifteen minutes is just completely pointless when more of the disc space couls have been filled with, well you know. Lazy and stupid describes this. It also just cuts off at the end, so some it was probably just looped. Very annoying.

The Smashing Pumpkins: Earphoria (76:30)
So, silly name for a silly album. I haven’t seen the video that accompanies this, but judging from some of the reviews on this site I am not missing much. For anoraks of the band such as myself, this is a disappointing collection of live things that certainly will not be played as much as the original albums. So I don’t recommend this at all, and give it two stars based on content and not the quality of songs, which are obviously all good. In saying that though, lots of the live stuff isn’t that great anyway due to poor recording and bad song selection. So for fans like myself, try and stay away from this, you really aren’t missing much. For everyone else I recommend anything by the Pumpkins, it’s all good, and that Zwan album I mentioned is just as good as any Pumpkins album but a lot cheerier. So buy that instead.

Recommended: No

Great Music to Play While: Getting ready to go out