“I will bang this drum to my dying day,” sings Billy Corgan on The Smashing Pumpkins’ latest album,Monuments To An Elegy. WithMonumentsmarking the band’s ninth studio album, released years after the departure of all the other original members, few would doubt Corgan’s persistence by this point in time.
Like many of the Pumpkins’ more recent ventures, none of the songs on Monuments pack quite the same punch as their ’90s favourites. The opening number, ‘Tiberius’, comes close, with its grinding guitars and drums. ‘One And All’, another guitar-heavy track, is also memorable, as is the final song, ‘Anti-Hero’. Unfortunately, a large majority of the tracks on the album are fairly repetitive and easily forgotten. Corgan’s lyrics are far less poetic these days and generally just feature a couple of main lines sung over and over.
A new Smashing Pumpkins album in 2014 may seem irrelevant and redundant to many fans, with many giving up hope for this band years ago.
Monuments does offer a couple of decent tracks, but regardless of what fans, critics, fellow band members or anyone else thinks, Corgan will continue to beat this drum for as long as he deems fit.
3/5.
Monuments To An Elegyis out now through BMG/Cooking Vinyl.
