Up until I heard Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness, I was aware of the Pumpkins mainly through their singles like Today and Cherub Rock, but my appreciation of popular music and rock up until that point was mainly dictated by what the record industry decided was to be played on the radio or TV.

As soon as I heard the piano on MCIS, I was intrigued. Like every other Pumpkins album to follow, the opening salvo defied expectations for a band known for distortion-heavy guitar-driven tracks. This was unlike anything I had heard before from a band supposedly classified as “rock”.

And then the follow-up to the opening instrumental-only track was… the strings on Tonight, Tonight.  I was hooked, and my idea of what a rock band could be and the kind of music they could write would be forever changed.