Memories | The Smashing Pumpkins

The weekend before the debut of MCIS

Andrea Dooley (DeFilippo) Bloomington, IL, US

Well, here’s to hoping we can submit more than one memory! This would be memory number one for me. We went to the two surprise shows in Peoria and Dekalb, IL(with a complimentary after show pass from Billy)..leading up to the infamous show and debut of MCIS at the Riv! We will never forget the amazing shows-Us figuring out that Evil Clown had the free tickets for the Riv and then heading to the show. Omg, what a night. Even with the power outage. I will never forget hearing the songs for the first time. What a surreal time! So, who introduced us to the album?

The Pumpkins!

At the Library

Alexander Huber San Jose, US

I was 11, thee year 1997. I moved to San Jose from Sacramento. There was a library across the street and I noticed one day they has CDs and MCIS was jist there staring at me. I checked it out, listened and was so enthralled that I never returned it. I got what I could from the record as an 11 year old and found new lessons and feels from each listen since then.

First album/concert

Lance Entrekin Crawford, TN, US

I was a trumpet player in beginner band and my section leader told me she had a band I need to hear. I was 13 and just getting into music. She told me if I liked it to let her know bc they were going to the concert the next weekend. I took Mellon Collie home and devoured it. It changed my life and is still my favorite album to this very day. I immediately asked my dad for a guitar for Christmas. So two weeks later, my friends (who were older than me) along with one of our substitute teachers, snuck me out of the house and took me to the SP concert at the Mississippi Coast Coliseum in Biloxi, MS. I remember it was right before Thanksgiving and WPC said something about remember that turkey you are eating was once wild and free lol. That night and that album changed my life. It was my first concert. Will forever be the ruler I measure every show against for the rest of my life. Thank you.

On Repeat

Heather Van Pelt Stratford, Ontario, CA

I remember purchasing MCIS as soon as I could save up enough babysitting money. It was a double album so it was more expensive than other albums I’ve bought but I didn’t care.

Both CD’s remained on constant repeat in my Sony CD player for at least a year, maybe more.I was OBSESSED!

ZERO is still one of my favourite songs today! Thank you for this masterpiece ❤️

Untitled

Stephen Cambridge, MA, US

When I was around 13 I had not had much music exposure outside of movie soundtracks. I had a friend who really enjoyed the alt rock of the 90s and he introduced it to me, so I asked my parents for a stereo. When I got it for my birthday, I plugged it in and quickly tuned it to the radio station my friend told me he liked. The Very first song I heard on that radio was Tonight Tonight and I instantly fell in love with the smashing pumpkins and stayed that way for the next 23 years of my life.

Cupid De Locke

Annie Freeman Jackfield, Shropshire, GB

I remember the lushness of a summer as a teenager whilst I was meant to be studying for exams. Listening to this album on repeat gave me so many ideas, I sacked off my work and made this video for Cupid De Locke. It blows my mind that a 17 year old version of me running around their garden with a camera and flowers in their hair has been seen around the world nearly three quarters of a million times and connects me with other SP fans. I’m honoured my face even comes up when you google the song!

Sp saved me

Wim Van Kelst Antwerp, BE

When l listened cinstantly to Mellon Collie, I was in my 2nd year of nurse studies, it was a tough year for me with a lot of techniques to learn and demands getting higher in our hospital practice. Your music kept me going and your concert @Flandersexpo was the highlight of that academic year.

What I still remember was Filter warming up, the set started with Tonight Tonight, the whole crowd going up and down during Bullet. Amazing light show and never ever saw such impressing drumwork as I saw tonight by Jimmy. I missed out your gig in Antwerp because I was afraid of losing my good memory but if you come back, I will be there. Love to you all, Billy, James and Jimmy from the bottom of my heart.

Ps the box “The aeroplain” is the only box I ever bought, love the artwork 💜

CD walkman

Stef Wolverhampton, Shropshire, GB

The day it came out I queued outside the recordshop to buy it. Double CD, I loved it instantly. A 90s grungy girl with short cropped hair and huge headphones excitedly got the CD Walkman out, but it was the 90s, so you had to hold the Walkman perfectly flat, the slightest jolt and the CD would stop. Every day on my journey to and from school, two jerky bus rides. It could take 20 minutes to get through a single song 😂

That album is perhaps the most played album of my teenaged years, but the strongest memory is that CD Walkman jerking to a stop

With my vinyl copy, October 2017

Beau Boudreaux Birmingham, AL, US

I first heard this album on a thursday night in late March or early April during my sophomore year in high school (weird the details we remember). When the title track gave way to the opening strains of ‘Tonight, Tonight’, I knew this was something big. Since then, SP has become one of the artists that I associate with that time of year; a time of rebirth, a time for discovering new things and exploring life’s possibilities.

Once a thief…

Víctor Merida Arica, CL

I was around 15 or 16 yo and had no money to spend on anything. So, when I saw that one of the guys I used to be around of, friend of a friend, had the album, I ask him if we could listen to it at his place. The guy lived alone almost, so we gathered around a pack of cigarettes and wine, laying on the carpet and my mind was blown.

So I decided it. It is to this day, the only time I’ve stolen something.

And it changed my life forever.

I won’t deny the change

Josh Groppel Nashville, TN, US

In early 2016, my then fiancé and I called off our wedding and went separate ways. This mentally and emotionally crushed me in so many ways and I fell back into music. MC&tIS was one of my most played albums that year, and Galapagos was so impactful in helping me move on. I got the words of growth tattooed to my ankle. “I won’t deny the change.”

Teenage Years

Shaunagh New Mills, Derbyshire, GB

My memories may seem boring compared to some, but smashing pumpkins are my total fave. In my teenage years I wasn’t exactly popular and had a lot going on, I may have been 19 years late but this album really helped me through all that and made me feel like I belonged. Love the merge of thrash and peaceful tracks. All I can say is thank you 🙏🏻

Mellon Collie saved my life

C IE

In the summer of 1995 I was subjected to child abuse that left lifelong scars. That October an album came out that showed me there was hope in the darkness and that I would survive. That it was not my fault these things happened and others have been where I was and persevered. MCIS will always be my favourite album period. It is a light in a dark year for me and has remained a constant in the 25 years since. It is impossible to express my feelings other than to thank WPC and the pumpkins for this masterpiece. Singular, Beautiful, timeless. From a lifelong fan

My Grandmother Hazel

Sarah Slancauskas Hereford, GB

Melan Collie and the Infinite Sadness (Track One) was played at my beautiful grandmother’s funeral. We wanted a song to begin her service, but couldn’t find one that fit. Then my brother, the one who introduced me to the band, suggested this song. We agreed straight away. It was such a beautiful piece of music, and she was as beautiful as Marilyn Monroe, and deserved a perfect end. We sobbed as the piano started. When I hear it now I remember her, not her funeral. Hazel. I do cry sometimes when the first keys sound, and other times I just sit quietly and contemplate life, death and the after. I think about her. It’s painful and tender. I love it. It’s very dear to me.

Winter Tunes

Ryan Park-Lopes Brantford, Ontario, CA

I used to do this long 2 hour drive from Hamilton to Barrie Ontario during the winter, and I would always pop in Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness and blast it the whole way there. Now, whenever I listen to it, it reminds me of those melancholic (haha) winter drives, with the cold wind on my arms and snow on my windshield. Especially songs like Galapagos and Thru The Eyes of Ruby.

Pushy Sales Woman

Joe McCullagh Launceston, Tasmania , AU

In 1995 a friend of mine recommended buying the Siamese Dream CD, and I loved Disarm, so I did. The sales woman was pushy, and I ended up pre-ordering the deluxe edition of MCIS as well. I love that woman, she changed my life! 17 at the time, and just getting into alternative music, and this album was like a reflection of my soul.

Love of my life!

Paul Ramsey New Cumnock, East Ayrshire , GB

I was a young British Solider based in Canada. There I met an amazing woman called Margo! We would stay in her room talking to the early hours listening to MCIS album. At that time I didn’t realise I was sitting across from the woman who I would be married to for over 24 years and have 3 amazing children together. The power of the pumpkins 😍 x

May it hold you through the winter of a long night

Marcin Warsaw, PL

I remember buying Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness on CD in early 2016. I was nearly 18 at the time and little did I know, this album was everything I needed at that time. The feeling of some kind of an inevitable closure of youth and beginning my adult life, was terrifing. Add to that the loneliness and (then) untreated depression and you’ll get the idea. So when I first heard the music that was the ulltimate mix of those feelings, I couldn’t help, but fall in love. All this instrumental rage, passion, yearning and unnamed nostalgia was all I wanted from art. And the lyrics completed that. I was “in love with my sadness”, “burning up in speed in my teen machines” and “I hurt where I couldn’t feel”. To this day, that album is my everlasting inspiration and, truly, my savior, that kept me – and it still does – from the loneliness of myself.

Smashing Pumpkins - Memories!