Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness
Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness is an alternative rock? album? released by The Smashing Pumpkins in October 1995?, having been recorded the spring and summer of that year. It was issued in two different tracklists: the 2CD? and 2-cassette? versions of the album with 14 tracks on each media, and a 3LP? release with a rearranged tracklist and two additional tracks on the last side to give it 5 tracks per side.
CD1: Dawn to Dusk
1. Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness
Sub 3-minute instrumental piano introductory piece with a fake mellotron (?) accompaniment, giving it a slightly psychedelic? tinge. Structurally, it adds to the general "art rock?" mood of the album despite not really being reasonable to call rock.
2. Tonight, Tonight
Alternative rock adaptation of symphonic rock, building on their previous album?'s "Disarm" with more of a full-band sound. The orchestral? accompaniment leans baroque pop? in a similar way to REM?'s Automatic for the People?, while the band hews closer to jangly college rock? with an arena rock edge to its production and vocal delivery as is common to commercial alt rock of this era.
This song was a single.
3. Jellybelly
Commercial post-grunge? alternative metal? with a healthy dose of Nirvana? and noisy, grungy? psychedelic rock or stoner rock? guitars.
4. Zero
Commercial post-grunge alternative metal in a tight, power pop-informed package, with a noisy, psychedelic tinge and a glam snottiness.
This song was a single.
5. Here Is No Why
Jangly, post-grunge arena college rock with glammy, almost Britpopesque? melodic riffs and an explosive fuzzed-out chorus aligned with the grungy, acid? pseudo-shoegaze? of the previous album.
6. Bullet With Butterfly Wings
Commercial post-grunge rock with lithe, brooding post-punk or goth? college rock verses contrasted with an explosive, hard rock? or heavy metal-informed? arena rock chorus.
This song was a single.
7. To Forgive
Soft and clean, lightly psychedelic indie rock or indie pop?, though with Corgan's restrained yarl it retains something of a rootsy post-grunge adult alternative? ballad? flavour, especially as it adds organ and then strings.
8. Fuck You (An Ode to No One)
Commercial post-grunge alternative metal with an energetic sound inspired by traditional heavy metal or thrash metal?.
9. Love
Buzzy, danceable synth rock? which falls under the poppy side of '90s alternative industrial rock?, akin to a peer like Nine Inch Nails?. As an alternative dance track, it can be considered an example of breakbeat rock?.
10. Cupid de Locke
An arty, folk-tinged? form of dream pop?, with repetitive instrumentation and structure in the vein of ambient pop? combined with vocal melodies and accoutrements drawing on psychedelic pop? and chamber pop?.
11. Galapogos
Dreamy college rock with a cinematic? structure, contrasting soft and refrained playing with more active percussion and a chamber pop string accompaniment, with a big music? climax later in the track.
12. Muzzle
Essentially arena glam power pop in the vein of Jellyfish?, an American implementation of Brtitpop, but through the lens of post-grunge with echoes of Siamese Dream's fuzzed-out shoegazing.
13. Porcelina of the Vast Oceans
Psychedelic alternative rock with a structure loosely inspired by progressive rock:
- Fade-in of loose, exploratory, spaced-out? intro (first 2:15)
- Fuzzed-out classic Pumpkins grungegaze riffz (2:15-2:40)
- Highly-processed paisley? space-pop with Corgan yarl (2:40-4:02)
- Fuzzed-out classic Pumpkins grungegaze for the chorus (4:02-4:34)
- Highly-processed paisley space-pop with Corgan yarl, slowly building up (4:34-6:20)
- Fuzzed-out classic Pumpkins grungegaze for the chorus (6:20-7:27)
- Highly-processed paisley space-pop with Corgan yarl (7:27-8:02)
- Instrumental of previous with acid-rock lead guitar and progressively more spaced-out effects as it fades out (8:02-9:20)
14. Take Me Down
Spaced-out, quiet, and very gentle indie pop song written and sung by guitarist James Iha, with a slightly Americana-tinged? classic chamber pop melody and arrangement.
CD2: Twilight to Starlight
1. Where Boys Fear to Tread
Heavy, grungy alternative metal with snarling vocals and a thick, noisy guitar tone, playing repetitive and groovy syncopated riffs which sound indebted to Helmet?. There is also a tinge of stoner psychedelia, including QOTSA-esque? backing vocals.
2. Bodies
Rhythmic, riffy alternative metal with stoner influence in the guitar tones and a commercial production sound not dissimilar to their 2007 comeback album Zeitgeist.
3. Thirty-Three
Soft paisley blend of acoustic? and clean electric guitar in a stripped-down adult alternative ballad format, dipped in swirling dream-pop production.
This song was a single.
4. In the Arms of Sleep
Soft, folky indie rock with a dreamy, paisley tinge and light, propulsive percussion.
5. 1979
Moderately dance-oriented psychedelic New Wave? with thin post-punk guitar in the verse, a college rock soft/loud structure, and an insistent, jangly chorus. The most striking feature of the song is the sampled vocal fragment repeated throughout, of Corgan singing "today", psychedelic in its effected form as well as its self-referential content ("Today" being a single from the previous album).
This song was a single.
6. Tales of a Scorched Earth
Heavy, fuzzed-out alternative metal, incorporating thrashy rhythms while drawing on the dissonant tones of noise punk?, featuring distinctly distorted vocals. There's a more melodic section in the middle that's similar to their song "Hello Kitty Kat", but afterwards it slides into a very noisy guitar solo which dissolves as the aggression of the beginning returns.
7. Thru the Eyes of Ruby
Another example of psychedelic alternative rock with a structure loosely inspired by prog:
- Piano intro into guitar buildup (first 0:20)
- Pumpkins fuzz riff (0:20-0:35)
- Spaced-out dream pop verse (0:35-1:56)
- Epic Pumpkins fuzz riff chorus (1:56-3:27)
- Spaced-out dream pop verse (3:27-4:08)
- Epic Pumpkins fuzz riff chorus (4:08-4:34)
- Fuzzy spacy buildup (4:34-5:01)
- Epic Pumpkins fuzz riff chorus into brief solo (5:01-5:40)
- Spacey comedown and fadeout (5:40-6:55)
- Plaintive acoustic + clean electric outro (6:55-7:33)
8. Stumbleine
Vocals-and-guitar acoustic singer-songwriter? track; can be considered an early example of indie folk?.
9. X.Y.U.
Extended, lightly progressive and heavily rhythmic alternative metal, blending glam attitude with the sludgy tones of grunge and noise rock.