Concertwire.com

Following last summer’s legendary nine-night stand at the Orange Peel, the Smashing Pumpkins return to the Southeast for one night only at the Tennessee Theatre! Zeitgeist’the sixth Smashing Pumpkins album and first since 2000--doesn’t just capture the spirit of our times, as the title might suggest. Even more impressively, Zeitgeist is a heartfelt, ambitious and deeply felt piece of work that vividly recaptures the spirit of this great and influential rock band. The release of Zeitgeist represents a powerful rebirth and reaffirmation of the Smashing Pumpkins by two of its key members, main singer-songwriter and guitarist Billy Corgan and drummer Jimmy Chamberlin. This second coming of the Pumpkins is also one of those rare examples of actual truth in 21st Century Advertising. Two years ago-- on the release date of his first solo album--Corgan made headlines around the alternative rock universe by taking out ads in his hometown papers the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times, an open letter publicly declaring his desire and intention to try “renewing and reviving” the Smashing Pumpkins. “I want my band back,” he wrote, “and my songs, and my dreams.” More than two years later--much of it spent working closely together first in Scottsdale, Arizona and later in Los Angeles--Corgan and Chamberlin have managed to make good and then some on every line of Corgan’s declaration of non-independence. Right from the thrilling yet apocalyptic opening notes of “Doomsday Clock” to the final resounding chords of “Pomp And Circumstances,” Zeitgeist is quite clearly the sound of a rock group that has been emphatically renewed and revived and is now ready to embrace and further its musical legacy. As the record shows, the Smashing Pumpkins have created one of the most acclaimed bodies of work in music history. Formed in Chicago in 1988, they released Gish, their influential (and platinum) debut in 1991, which was followed by more platinum and multi-platinum albums including the nine-times platinum Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness and the four-times platinum Siamese Dream. The pivotal group’s many hits include “Disarm,” “Today,” “Cherub Rock,” “1979,” “Tonight, Tonight” and “Bullet With Butterfly Wings”--songs that defined the alternative music era and continue to resonate on modern rock radio, influencing a whole new generation.