“i'll burn my eyes out before i get out” was scratched on the wall, inside monmouth county, NJ jail. i was there in 2018 for the petty crimes that come with addiction, i don't know what, maybe shoplifting.
i kept reading it, and i could not place it. it pissed me off, i knew a lot of shit, where was it from?
Smashing Pumpkins is solid in my top 5 favorite bands, and its another kind of “HEY! new surprises from a band you've listened to since 1991”. I eventually placed the line from the jail cell wall, it was from “Today”, the big single from their 2nd album, Siamese Dream. Now, i was glad to have the mental block removed, that’s not the really notable thing about “Today”, though.
i specifically remember my aunt owning the compact disc release of “Siamese Dream”. i won't google what a CD is for you, some of us remember. With “Today” being the big radio single, i know i listened to it in my grandmother’s barn over and over. i estimate this was around 1992 when i was 6. my parents we’re really young, so i got to the MTV age at around 5 years old. i remember it, i remember the video music awards that pearl jam swept with “Jeremy”.
the point is that i found a new lyric to relate to in “today” in 2021, 29 years into being familiar with the tune.
“bored by the chore of saving face”. that hits me hard at 35, with all the disdain for false pleasantries and social anxieties that have blossomed in me since my social butterfly 20’s. anyone who’s read any of this blog knows that i can't abide small talk, and other procedural social garbage.
do not +1 me to a wedding, i can dance but i’d rather eat hot broken glass than generate time filling dialogue about fuckin commutes to work, the weather and bitcoin.
im tongue in cheek laughing out loud, but I'm serious: oh, new years party with friends?? yeah right, fuck that all the way out of town, cant make it.
so 29 years into knowing “today”, i relate to it more than ever. that’s something only a few bands can do for me, in that way.
on SP being in my top 5 favorite bands: music effortlessly falls out of some people. Billy Corgan pisses music. in 1996 they put out a double album and A 5 EP boxed set, just like that. i still listen to all of it almost every day. i have of course put all of my favorites onto a spotify playlist: it’s over 6 hours long. it isn't grunge music (as was the style at the time). the sound is this very distinct “chased by a hive of bees” tonality. it reminds me more of a decadent classic rock band (see: Kansas)…but with more angst. i know that there's a lot of cheese in the catalog but i am here for it, 100 percent.
https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/6Ey2WSxdl172lbb2nBNCjT"
HEY! i’m having a record blog donations day (9/25/21), but im still poor so :
