Smashing Pumpkins: Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music (5/11/2024)

Smashing Pumpkins: Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music [Constantinople, 2000] It feels a bit arbitrary to try and make a point about a 92-minute, 25-song Smashing Pumpkins album when a) it is not their longest album, b) an album half an hour longer with three more songs was much for successful than this, and c) in the end, it is hardly the most ambitious thing they've done. Hardly. So where do we start with Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music, the Pumpkins' last album before their 2000 breakup and subsequent 2005 reunion?

First, some context. After releasing their 1998 album Adore, which divided fans and sold poorly, Billy Corgan wanted to put out an epic concept album. Virgin Records, their label, no-ed this, considering that the last thing they should do was divide the fanbase further with some sort of convoluted rock-opera malarkey. So, in February 2000, we have MACHINA/The Machines of God, which contains 15 of the songs from the project re-ordered. Sales were even worse, and the singles have since been forgotten. The album itself was a mixed bag; you had masterpieces like "Wound," "Stand Inside Your Love," and "Age of Innocence," which can comfortably fit alongside the band's best work, alongside disasters like "Heavy Metal Machine," reworked here to slightly better effect, and "Glass and The Ghost Children." So, when Billy wanted to release the other 25 songs from the concept, the label said no. Billy then gets annoyed and self-releases said album. Certain fans receive limited-edition vinyl copies, and downloads are put up online by these people.

Machina II, like its predecessor, remains mixed. But if you can get through all 92 minutes, it is a rewarding and even fun album by a band known for hating each other. It starts off with the energetic hardcore punk of "Glass' Theme," and the pummeling funk-rock of "Cash Car Star," which quickly slides into "Dross," something that could have fit alongside their 2010s reunion efforts well enough. It quickly enters ballad territory with the noisy "Real Love," James Iha's beautiful "Go," the jangling "Innosense," and "Let Me Give The World To You," an Adore outtake that showcases Billy Corgan's ability to write great pop songs alongside shoegaze-y guitar workouts. The rest of the "album" section of Machina II builds off of this; aside from the psychotic industrial hardcore of "White Spyder," the rest of the first disc is made up of these ballads. "In My Body" is a logical continuation of Siamese Dream's "Soma," and "Here's To The Atom Bomb" recalls Corgan's wistful acoustic pop on "Whir" and "Bye June."

However, after the first 14 songs which make up the LP section of Machina II, we have 11 tracks from 3 EPs, which function as the album's odds-and-sods. "Slow Dawn" sounds like a Gish outtake, and "Vanity" jams with the abandon of Crazy Horse. This part of the album has the most filler, however; "Lucky 13" and the demo versions of "Glass' Theme" and "Cash Car Star" are throwaways, but when the songs do work, they work well: who would've thought that the metal cover of James Brown's "Soul Power" would work? The rest is an almagam of their experiments of the years. "Speed Kills" is a standard Pumpkins power ballad, and the solo piano version of "If There Is A God" reflects the chillier moments on Adore.

In the end, Machina II has no significance to anyone who doesn't love the band, but if you're willing to invest in it, it's a fulfilling and entertaining mess. After its more cynical and grating predecessor, Machina II sounds like a band that's in love with the music it's making. It's possibly the most interesting album from a band that has devoted themselves to this sort of sloppy sprawl.  And the best part about it: it's free. [9.4/10]