I'm truly saddened to report that with Billy Corgan's new release as the Smashing
Pumpkins, all my deepest fears have been realized. True, the song writing was on the wall after the last Pumpkins record, Machina. A record that found the Pumpkins' versatile and varied dexterity buried beneath a relatively unimaginative slab of darker, meaner mechanical dreck. They say it's always darkest before the dawn, but if anything, Zeitgeist proves that it must be darkest just before the light is snuffed out altogether.

It's unfortunate but true that the uninspired bombast and dumbed down sludge of Zeitgeist, makes Machina seem like Siamese Dream. The opening track "Doomsday Clock"
is the only track that might pass for a dim flicker of light at the beginning of this thick, dank, ink-black tunnel. "Seven Shades of Black" certainly sums up this misbegotten train"smash." It's all bark and no bite with lyrics as trite as a deodorant ad.

And no amount of deodorant could mask the stink of "United States." This is Corgan's political message song, and if the song taught me anything it's that, although it's too late for me, it's certainly not too late to warn the rest of you off. By all means give this bleak and embarrassing Pumpkins forgery a wide berth.

What the hell is going on with all the mid life crisis stars out there releasing cds under the names of bands that really no longer exist? As for the Pumpkins don't be fooled - go listen to Siamese Dream and forget about this nightmare geist.