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Chicago's most successful band of the nineties called it quits on 12 December 2000 at the Metro club. Four-plus hours of pure magic from the Smashing Pumpkins brought an end to a career of bliss. Pretty soon after returning home from this show, I realized the impact of the split-up. Every
time I played their records or a live recording, the typical feeling of excitement ran through my veins and heart. A feeling that had never left me from 1994 on. Looking back, I knew that music would take me well into the future. But there was no real future anymore for the Smashing Pumpkins.
Apart from a very low profile show as an opening act the next year, Billy Corgan and Jimmy Chamberlin kept quiet musically. But within a year after the last Pumpkins show, a new band emerged. Zwan was the name. The band not only features the aforementioned Smashing Pumpkins ex-members, but also Matt Sweeney and David Pajo. First up were four west coast shows in California late November, and a handful of shows in the midwest halfway in December. This year things are taken up more seriously, with a line of shows that even lead to a three-night stand at the Double Door club in Billy's hometown of
Chicago.
Zwan opted for an underground approach at first. Yeah, right! With these guys in the band, there's no way you can expect the band to grow slowly with such extensive press attention. Also, the venues sold out, almost solely to former Pumpkins fans. So much for the low profile underground attitude. With the first studio release being on the forthcoming soundtrack for the Jonas Akerlund movie Spun, it's obvious the initial idea is nowhere to be found anymore. So stop trying and flirting with the concept. Just like the Smashing Pumpkins, Zwan appears to have the ambition to be big, and there's nothing wrong with that. And there is no way around it, with such a star-studded lineup, now including (yet again) a female bass player: Paz (formerly of A Perfect Circle).
How then to deal with Zwan's music? With half of its personnel being ex-Smashing Pumpkins, I cannot help but look back and forth between the two.
Sure, Zwan deserves to be taken only for its own output. But the links are too obvious. If Zwan had made a new style of music — and they still could (look at Sparta, Pedro the Lion, or Mars Volta, for example!) — comparing the two would make no sense.
Zwan, however, tries to continue the line initiated by Smashing Pumpkins.
Chrysanthemum, from the November shows, is a nice rock jam; nothing too special, but good rock 'n' roll, a little bit Pumpkins-style. Such a feeling continued throughout the shows in California. Most tracks, however, lack the specific attitude and indescribable touch the Smashing Pumpkins had, rendering Zwan's songs pretty standard, lame, and stale. Basically, most of the material is still too sketchy here. There is some beauty to be found though. El Sol is a true highlight, as is the emotional Beatles cover Don't Let Me Down. Amazing too is And So I Died Of A Broken Heart. But all in all the rock sucks, is very one dimensional and simple. Worked-up jams with lyrics. Nothing more, nothing less. And nothing Zwan would have ever been noticed for without Jimmy and Billy in the band. Even moreso, every other band would have been rightfully discarded for playing a failed attempt at Pumpkinrock.
Then some gossip emerged about Zwan being a concept band, playing different styles
of music, ranging from death metal to ambient, and rock to acoustics. Well, the acoustic gigs followed in December.
Again the hype sold out the small venues, and our underground (how cool!) band played extra early
shows on both dates. How about that?
It has to be said, Zwan's main composer Billy Corgan still is a prolific writer. For these shows quite a bunch of new songs were added to the set lists — songs the band barely had time to rehearse, in a few cases. The best songs from the California shows are the quiet ones, and with those acoustic settings, the performance turned out a lot better. The sweet touch of melody has not completely left Billy Corgan. Freedom is a great song, with a nice flow and guitar solo. Up-tempo work, like Candy Came Calling and the horribly infantile, gospel sing-along God's Gonna Set This World On Fire, might be meant to show the fun element of the band, but musically it is rubbish. For Your Love is a superb song, period. The Spy Tra La is quite okay too, a powerful acoustic groover. The highlight on those set lists is yet another Spanish-tinged track called El-A-Noy, a tribute to the home state. Well, while there is more quality material in these concerts, most of the stuff is still way below par. So-called funny parts completely ruin the whole thing: Consider the absolute low point, the closing Chicks Just Get In The Way.
Now it was a wait until April when Zwan played a mini tour of seven dates (three venues). Would that, then, reveal yet another sound? Nope, more or less back to California, it proved to be. Okay, Zwan sounds rocking and grooving, but I have never heard Corgan so shallow. Plain rock, some flash solos, no magical mystery! It is all too simple. Jam rocker Dust My Broom is all right. For Your Love: still a killer. And for the rest: All Day And All Night by The Kinks is a crazy, spot-on, rocking cover in the best Pumpkins tradition. What's left is filler. Sounding more powerful than during the West Coast shows, Zwan is miles away from the league of new music making. Same old. Same old.
Maybe Corgan and his fellows just wanna have fun and not worry too much about the quality of the material. But from the main man of Smashing Pumpkins, innovation and a drive for the best can be expected. New things in rock do emerge. With Zwan, this is not to be found. Zwan is an American hype; the music oftentimes sucks, sometimes it really rocks. From all the live shows, you might pull six songs to make a decent EP. That's all. And that's a bloody shame for these former greats of alternative music.
http://www.kindamuzik.net/achtergrond/zwan/zwan/1679/
Meer Zwan op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/zwan
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