"The Future Embrace" by Billy Corgan - A Review

This album is almost impossible for me to review impartially. I've been a Smashing Pumpkins fan since high school and their music has, generally speaking, been the soundtrack to my life. "The Future Embrace" is the first "solo" album from Billy Corgan, the main songwriter, and voice behind the Smashing Pumpkins. If you're going in expecting to hear Siamese Dream II, you will be greatly disappointed. Mr. Corgan has created a "vibe" album that holds up much better as individual pieces than a whole. He's created a tribute album to all the bands that he himself is a fan of without covering one song of any particular band, (minus the Bee Gees cover of "To Love Somebody" with Robert Smith of the Cure on backing vocals. It's barely recognizable in the hands or Corgan). This record is an ode to Joy Division, The Cure, Depeche Mode, and pretty much any other "shoegazer" band you can think of. Many people have said that this record doesn't have any guitar in it (one of the major guitar magazines turned down an interview with him after hearing it as a matter of fact), but this really is a misinformed opinion. If you truly listen, this has some of his most interesting work as a guitarist in years. Not from the standpoint of how many notes he can fit in a solo, rather what kind of sounds he's coaxing from it and where it takes the song. At any rate, this is a record that works at some points and doesn't at others. What works: Many of the up tempo and mid-tempo numbers are among some of the best songs he's written, Mina Loy and thecameraeye among them. What doesn't work is when he slows the tempo down, an example being the plodding "I'm Ready" and "Now (And Then)". This is one of those records that has some good songs, but a couple of real clunkers and opinion will be divided among the Corgan faithful which are which. Among the not so faithful, or the casual fan, this album won't do much for them. The most polarizing figure in music only continues to divide the believers and the non-believers with a head scratching debut. 3

1 = Don't purchase in the $1.00 bin at your used record store. Avoid like a plague.
2 = Only if you're desperate for new music. You need it like a hole in the head.
3 = An okay buy, probably just download the tracks you want from I-Tunes.
4 = Buy new the next time you're out and about. A fully satisfying record.
5 = Masterpiece, run and buy today!