You know Siamese Dream? That Smashing Pumpkins record? Well, I don't wanna date myself too bad here, but as a teenager, that album totally changed my life. Maybe even started my life, in a way. I was probably 13 or 14, sitting in my bedroom -- far, far away from my parents downstairs -- with hands clamped to my temples, hair pressed up out of whack and eyes bugged out, just absolutely losing it to the vaguely threatening alien atmosphere of that sexy, desperate sound. What in the world, I wondered, could a "Silverf***" be? Well, obviously they went on to make a lot of great music, but honestly, I lost touch with the Pumpkins after Siamese Dream. Always hoped they'd do a follow-up, but it never came.
Silversun Pickups -- the shimmeringly smoggy Los Angeles emoters featured this week on "The Leak" -- definitely have their own sound. Somehow their latest record, Swoon, manages to be hazy and lazier than Siamese Dream, while still sounding more urgent and aggressive. But there are definitely still major echoes of early Smashing Pumpkins in lead singer Brian Aubert's reedy, pleading tenor. And there are definitely points where Swoon sounds more Siamese than Mellon Collie ever did. In fact, can we make that an official indie rock adjective? It describes the sound of Swoon -- streaming in full on MTV.com'sThe Leak, right now, as promised -- better than anything else I can come up with. More than hazy or fuzzy or shimmering or wild, Swoon sounds siamese.
+ Listen to every track of Silversun Pickups' Swoon. You'll see.