A New Favorite

For many years the Smashing Pumpkins have been my favorite band. Songs such as Hummer, Thirty-Three, and Window Paine carried me through much of my teenage years. For a time I listened to Siamese Dream every night while I awaited sleep. (And every night I was awakened by Silverfuck’s loud rebirth at 6:46.) Those who know me know that I play my guitar wishing I was Billy Corgan, a master of life and love, sorrow and regret. Even now, as I write this, I can feel the raw pangs of rebellion in Marquis in Spades. I know that Billy wrote Spaceboy for his mentally ill brother. I bought the Australian import of Today even though I had the US version (which is no different) and Pisces Iscariot which carries all B-sides from the Siamese Dream era. Drown and Glynis are quite possibly the best songs ever written by anyone, yet neither were on studio albums.

This height of fandom was bound to crash at some point. When Zwan appeared I welcomed it, even loved it. Billy Corgan as a solo act was bittersweet. Then the Pumpkins were reborn (sans two members; the two that didn’t matter) into a heavy rock insurgent, less concerned with introspection as with declaring a virulent anti-status-quo manifesto. As much as I agree with Billy, Jimmy and the rest of the Zeitgeist crew, the latest Pumpkins effort sadly scored lowest in my personal album ratings of the band. ¹

Somewhere lost in 2007 I found an amazing sound, Iceland-based Sigur Rós. There is no comparison between the Smashing Pumpkins and Sigur Rós like there is no comparison between a coffee cup and a tennis ball. Two different bands, two different entities.

Words simply cannot express the enchanting spell Sigur Rós has cast over me. If you could put beauty, hope, love and the tears of God into a vile and pour it over your soul, you’d come close to how I feel when hearing their music. Blomberg sent me some of their stuff to check out while I worked at Cuker Design. As I listened further into “Takk…”, their 2005 album, I succumbed ever so gently into a captivated stupor. It is that good.

Sometime in September I heard about Sigur Rós’s new movie, Heima, which means “Home” in Icelandic. In 2006, after having toured the world for several months, the band decided to play a series of unannounced free concerts in their homeland. Heima chronicles the various concerts, as well as the background of the settings in which they play, including an abandoned fish factory. I purchased tickets for a screening in LA for November 4. On November 2 the band’s website announced a competition: 50 people will be selected to see the band play an acoustic set, a screening of the movie on followed by a q&a session with the band on November 3. About 15 minutes after Julia and I sent an email each, we both found out that we won.

Seeing the band live is surreal. Their humility is evident as they walk onstage. Perhaps most amazing was how close to the recording the music is; The band requires no studio intervention. The Heima screening itself was beautiful. Expansive landscapes with slowly-paced cuts match up perfectly with the band’s live music. Interstitially, the members of the band (including the off-shoot Amiina) were interviewed about the process of touring their native countryside. As interviewees, the band were, for the most part, humbled and perhaps nervous. Their candor was humbling and absorbing. The more you know, the more you want to know.

It is with a twinge of sadness that I revoke the favorite band title from the Pumpkins and award it to Sigur Rós. It’s been probably 10 years since I first fell in love with the Pumpkins, but we all have to move on.

Here are some selected songs I recommend if you want to check out Sigur Rós:

• starálfur
• untitled #8 (a.k.a. popplagið / the pop song)
• untitled #4 (a.k.a. njósnavélin / the nothing song)
• Music video for Glósóli

1. Gish, 9.5; Siamese Dream, 10; Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, 9.7; Adore, 9.2; Machina, 9.0; Machina II 9.6; Zeitgeist 8.5