Pitchfork

This is the second Christmas that the Smashing Pumpkins have dragged out their leftovers and repackaged them to look wonderful under any fan's tree-- a niche gift equivalent to The Beer Drinker's Bible, The Soprano Family Cookbook or The Big Fucking Book of 'Vettes. I remember the time Santa brought me The Aeroplane Flies High, a mixed bag of a- and b-sides lovingly packaged in a cool black-and-white spiral box with a dinky plastic handle. It was so neat! And they've hooked me again, with nothing more than the first official release of some cobbled-together live material from 1994: Earphoria, the soundtrack to the reissued VHS, Vieuphoria (now, of course, on DVD).

Vieuphoria came out in '94, one year after the multi-platinum Siamese Dream made the band an international household name. As grunge detonated across airwaves, and we began to see early signs of emulation as every possible "next Nirvana" was flung into heavy rotation, the Smashing Pumpkins became one of the only alternative rock bands that could claim to have their own unique "look": the near-narcoleptic James Iha on guitar, blonde, heavily face-powdered bassist D'Arcy, and midwestern everyguy Jimmy Chamberlin on drums, all serving the complete domination of psychedelic Billy, an album-rocker-at-heart decorated with skin-tight, grotesque-patterned shirts boasting earthtone rainbows, paisley brigades, and countless other designs adorned only by acid-trippers and Florida from "Good Times".

Acting as a kind of victory lap/souvenir, Vieuphoria is packed with cheaply produced interludes and home videos-- hilariously indulgent stuff, like a clip of D'Arcy having tea with her stuffed animals. But the main attraction is the live footage from concerts and television broadcasts, featuring material from Gish, Siamese Dream, and the Lull EP. (The video predates their bloated sub-masterpiece Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness.) Vieuphoria was released on home video, but Earphoria was just a limited-pressing promotional CD sent to record stores. Repeatedly bootlegged and often auctioned at ridiculous prices, it now finally sees wide release.

Earphoria runs through several hits from Siamese Dream, with some major reinterpretations. "Disarm" loses the acoustic strumming and bells that made it the most overplayed single of '93; the more interesting and brutal version here has lurching guitars and drums, and Corgan wrenches the vocals out with pliers. The disc also includes two unplugged tracks: the simple performance of "Mayonaise" is refreshing after the syrupy-sweet excess of the original, but more surprising, the band's grunge-anthem, "Cherub Rock", sounds lean and invigorated with acoustic guitars and Chamberlin's fast brushwork.

Even playing it straight, Corgan and Iha had to convert the thick, enveloping sound of the album into two keyed-up guitars. The results are more manic, like the fast and urgent "Quiet", and a triumphant recording of "Today" played for a hometown crowd in Chicago. But it's the older, Gish-era "I Am One" and "Slunk" that become wiry spasms of power chords: these are easily the album's highlights and some of the nastiest rock the Pumpkins turned out.

On the other hand, the on-stage frenzy diminishes two of their headphone classics. The original versions of "Geek U.S.A." and "Silverfuck" had bold transitions, molten slowdowns and giant, prog rock-like crescendos. In concert, "Geek U.S.A." loses much of its subtlety: they all but blow through the quiet parts. The extended thirteen-minute "Silverfuck" starts strong, and the dead-quiet "bang bang you're dead/ Hole in your head" verse (admittedly one of the worst moments on the otherwise still-fantastic Siamese Dream) provokes a gruesome little singalong with the audience. Ah, those wacky slackers. But Corgan hams it up by singing a few lines of "Over the Rainbow"-- either because of licensing or good taste, that part is cut from the DVD-- and then tacks on a short jam that only merits a shrug as a home listening experience. You can't see that Iha's playing his guitar with a toy laser pistol, and you can't watch as Corgan sheepishly smashes his guitar and rips up the drum kit. Not that all this excuses anything.

Earphoria also tacks on twenty minutes of ephemera and interlude music from the movie. "Why Am I So Tired?" is a fifteen-minute casual studio jam originally played over the end credits; "Pulseczar" is a buzzing fragment of psychedelia, and there are a few electronic curiosities, like the e-bow guitar snippet "Sinfony", or the blossoming "yeah yeah yeah yeah's" on "French Movie Theme". This, of course, is just garnish around the live tracks, but like I said, this is a fan release and nothing's too trivial. Hey, did you know that "Bugg Superstar" is about James Iha's dog?

A few great live tracks aside, I wouldn't recommend this to a new or casual Pumpkins listener. For fans, the only suggestion I'd make is that if you spend as much time near a TV as you do with your stereo, just skip this disc and get Vieuphoria (you already burned this from Napster in '99, anyway). Dig the early concert clips with Corgan's hippie hair and Chamberlin's sweaty-ass mullet! Laugh at the thinly veiled hostility that wracks the band! The crew even caught the entire ten minutes that Iha and D'Arcy spent in the studio for Siamese Dream! And the between-song interviews are total gravy-- for example, Billy Corgan on fame: "People are always like, 'What's it like to be famous?' And when I think of 'famous,' I think of people who, like, kill people." Rock on, Corgan! Stick that in your stocking!