The Smashing Pumpkins Vinyl Records – Siamese Dream, Mellon Collie & Essential Albums on Vinyl

The Smashing Pumpkins are one of the most ambitious American rock bands of the 1990s. Formed in Chicago in 1988 around Billy Corgan (vocals, guitar, main writer) alongside James Iha (guitar), D'arcy Wretzky (bass) and Jimmy Chamberlin (drums), they took the loud-quiet-loud dynamic of the alternative-rock era and scaled it up to symphonic proportions — multi-tracked guitars, Chamberlin's near-impossible drumming, Corgan's distinctive nasal vocal, and a willingness to make 28-song double-CD concept albums when nobody else would.

Siamese Dream (1993) is the perfect guitar album. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (1995) is the sprawling masterpiece — 28 songs across two discs, covering everything from acoustic ballads to industrial metal to chamber pop. The later records have been patchier but the classic run remains one of the great 90s catalogues. The Smashing Pumpkins on vinyl is a particular joy — the density of the multitracked guitars, the orchestrations, and Chamberlin's extraordinary drum sound all need analogue space. The Virgin originals and the recent deluxe reissues are all well-mastered.

Best The Smashing Pumpkins Albums on Vinyl

Siamese Dream (1993)
Their masterpiece. Cherub Rock, Today, Disarm, Rocket, Mayonaise, Hummer, Soma, Spaceboy — a record recorded under enormous internal stress that contains some of the most beautiful and brutal rock songs of its decade. Essential.

Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (1995)
The double-album opus. Tonight, Tonight, 1979, Zero, Bullet with Butterfly Wings, Thirty-Three — 28 tracks of extraordinary variety and ambition. One of the most successful double albums ever released. The 2012 reissue is beautifully pressed.

Gish (1991)
The debut, produced by Butch Vig just before Nevermind. I Am One, Rhinoceros, Siva, Snail — a tighter, more direct record than the mid-90s masterpieces, with some of the heaviest riffs Corgan ever wrote.

Adore (1998)
The post-Chamberlin, electronic-influenced fourth album. Ava Adore, Perfect, To Sheila, Once Upon a Time — divisive on release and now rightly considered one of their finest and most emotionally direct records. A real grower.

Machina / The Machines of God (2000)
The concept album that originally closed the first-era band. The Everlasting Gaze, Stand Inside Your Love, Try, Try, Try — a denser, heavier return to electric-guitar territory. Undervalued at the time and increasingly respected.

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Alternative / IndiePopRock