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| Allmusic |
![Smashing Pumpkins - Teargarden By Kaleidyscope: Vol. 1 [EP] review](http://www.sweetslyrics.com/poze/Teargarden By Kaleidyscope.jpg) Love it or hate it — and more than a few fans planted camp in the latter territory — there’s no arguing that Smashing Pumpkins’ 2007 comeback Zeitgeist emphasized Billy Corgan’s heavy side at the expense of his internal goth geek, a de facto apology decade of arty detours culminating in his synth-laden solo debut Future Embrace. Thing is, most fans that held true during this time in the Zwan wilderness liked those indulgences (or at least came to expect them), so having the Pumpkins reduced to punishingly long guitar solos was disarming. In an act of over-corrective steering reminiscent of the left turn toward the thick, roiling Zeitgeist, Corgan responded to the criticisms of Zeitgeist by launching the absurdly ambitious Teargarden by Kaleidyscope project — a conceptual 44-song suite to be doled out two songs at a time over the course of several years, initially available as free downloads, then gathered together as four-song EPs every few months. Based on the first of these, it’s apparent that Corgan has brought back the mysticism without sacrificing the six-string: the hardest moment, “Astral Planes” may carry some of his signature fuzztones, but it’s not a hard wall of distortion, it fits nicely with the slow, hazy crawl of “A Song for a Son,” the almost soft-rock-funk groove of “Widow Wake My Mind,” and the sprightly psychedelic pulse of “A Stitch in Time,” which does reflect Corgan’s unexpected dalliance with veterans from the Electric Prunes and Strawberry Alarm Clock. None of these songs have the concise punch of a single, but that’s surely intentional: they’re not designed as hooky statements of intent, they’re dreamy teasers for what promises to be Corgan’s most varied set of music since the days of Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness, whose title is quite deliberately echoed in the very name of Teargarden by Kaleidyscope....full text |
| Latimesblogs |
| Stone Temple Pilots never earned the respect showered upon fellow grunge-era acts such as Pearl Jam and Nirvana. But thanks to a deep understanding of rock-radio principles (and to frontman Scott Weiland's bad-boy tabloid appeal), they did earn something arguably more valuable: money. Nearly a decade after the band's last studio disc, STP's hits remain staples on stations like L.A.'s KROQ-FM, and a reunion tour in 2008 drew huge crowds at venues including the Hollywood Bowl. That commercial instinct is still in evidence throughout “Stone Temple Pilots,” which sounds like it could've come out mere months after 2001's “Shangri-La Dee Da.” In fact, given the legal, professional and medical turmoil Weiland has experienced over the years since the band's original breakup, it's surprising to hear how upbeat most of these dozen tracks sound. “First Kiss on Mars” shimmers with glittery glam-rock guitars, while “Between the Lines” layers the singer's familiar sneer over a peppy pop-metal groove. In the latter tune Weiland references his troubles with heroin, but does it in a way that's almost cheery: “You always were my favorite drug,” he sings, “even when we used to take drugs.”...full text |
| Leisureblogs |
| By this point, Billy Corgan has so polarized his fan base that it’s impossible to discuss his music without phrases like “ego run amok” and “raging control freak” getting in the way. But though he now remains the sole remaining original member of the band he founded in Chicago in the late ‘80s, Corgan is a long way from phoning it in as a recording artist. Last year he announced plans to record a 44-song album, which he would unveil a song at a time on the Internet. Each group of four songs would be repackaged as a physical EP, of which “Teargarden by Kaleidyscope 1: Songs for a Sailor” (Rocket Science) is the first. This is the first batch of recordings Corgan has done since longtime drummer Jimmy Chamberlin left the band in early 2009. He was the one true foil in Corgan’s career, a musician capable of ferocity and nuance in equal measure, and a large enough personality to impact how Corgan shaped the music. The musicians surrounding Corgan are now all relatively anonymous; their role seems largely to color the arrangements in what are essentially fleshed-out Corgan solo tracks. Without Chamberlin’s freight train roaring behind him, the hurtling “Astral Planes” never quite achieves liftoff. And one can only imagine how Chamberlin might’ve combusted the six-minute “Song for a Son,” which sounds like a promising sketch for a “Stairway to Heaven”-style epic....full text |
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