MACHINA/THE MACHINES OF GOD

'''Machina/The Machines of God''' is The Smashing Pumpkins' fifth studio album, released on February 29, 2000. It is a concept album, albeit very loosely.
''Machina'' was the band's final official LP release prior to their first breakup in 2000. A sequel album - ''Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music'' - was released independently via the internet.
As with ''Adore'', ''Machina'' represented a drastic image and sound change for the band. Nonetheless, ''Machina'', like its predecessor, failed to reconnect the Pumpkins with chart-topping success. However, the band's tours in support of ''Machina'', entitled ''Resume the Pose'' and ''The Sacred + Profane'', were far more successful than the ''Adore'' tour, as fans responded to the return of drummer Jimmy Chamberlin and setlists that included far more of the Pumpkins' back catalog.

Contents

The Arising! Tour

Recording

Album

''Machina'' as a concept album

Glass and the Machines of God: the animated web series

Artwork

Response

Track listing

International releases

Outtakes

Personnel

Chart positions

Album

Singles

References

External links

The Arising! Tour

In April 1999, only months after ending the promotion of ''Adore'', the Pumpkins embarked on an eight date tour of small clubs across the United States. This tour marked several changes - the return of Jimmy Chamberlin, a new logo (no logos were used on ''Adore''), and the band's return to playing material from throughout their career, not to mention a return to a less experimental rock arrangement.

Recording

Shortly after the brief Arising! tour, the band entered the studio to work on a new album as a four-piece. The recording of ''Machina'' was unusually secretive compared to the documentaries that were filmed for ''Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness'' and ''Adore''. Much like ''Mellon Collie'', the songs were first tracked acoustically at Sadlands in late 1998 and completed at Pumpkinland and the Chicago Recording Company from November 1998 to October 1999 with Howard Willing, Bjorn Thorsrud and Flood. D'arcy Wretzky left the band towards the end of recording. The band has maintained that she performs on almost the entire album. The exception, however, is the song "Age of Innocence" which was recorded at the Village Recorder in November 1999 without D'arcy.

Album

Fans were surprised when the ''Machina'' tracklist was released with only five tracks from ''The Arising!'' featuring (it was later discovered that "The Imploding Voice" was a reworking of "Virex"). Corgan also mentioned in an interview that all but three of the songs were re-written, and were added to a huge list of forty that had been written for the album. After the dissolution of the band, the remaining tracks were released on ''Machina II'' and Corgan revealed that it was originally his intention to release a second album, purposely leaving those tracks behind.
Many of the songs on the album refer to love and relationships (both romantic and otherwise) ending, most of them obvious references to the band themselves. Frontman and songwriter Billy Corgan has asserted that ''Machina'' was always intended to be the band's final album, and was the reason for recruiting Jimmy Chamberlin back into the band. Corgan has also said it was meant to be a double album (with ''Machina II'' being the second disc) but that idea was not approved by Virgin Records as they didn't want to release a risky double album after the disappointing sales of ''Adore''.
"Stand Inside Your Love" was released on January 21 2000 as a commercially available single. "The Everlasting Gaze", however, was released at the last minute as the album's first radio single in December 1999. Director Jonas Åkerlund shot videos for "The Everlasting Gaze" and album's last single "Try, Try, Try" which was released on September 11 2000. The video for the latter single brought some controversy for its explicit violence and drug use. It was widely rumoured that "I of the Mourning" would be released as a commercial single, which could be hinted by band's performance of the song on The Late Show with David Letterman, but it was released only as a promotional single.

''Machina'' as a concept album

Although ''Machina'' is much more story-based than previous releases, which have sometimes hinted at concepts, it is not a story album in the vein of ''Tommy'' or ''The Wall'', but is much more open to interpretation. Corgan stated in VH-1 Storytellers that many of the songs are written from the perspective of the band as the press and public viewed them, rather than Corgan himself. In this vein, songs such as "Heavy Metal Machine" are seen as parodies and homage to their influences and public perception. Nonetheless, it is a concept album, with its story expanded upon greatly in other media - online notes, written segments in both ''Machina'' album liner notes, and a "Glass and the Machines of God" animated series.

Glass and the Machines of God: the animated web series

In June of 2001, a few members of the Smashing Pumpkins Message Board were sent mysterious video clips that pointed to a website called Black Wings Over the World. Thus began the "June Mystery". The first website held clues to find two other websites, also hiding the username/password for one site - The Paracell Corporation. Black Wings also hid another site's address, Smash The System. Over the next two months more clues were dropped on the message board and more sites were found and codes cracked. Finally, all this frenzy of mystery and excitement climaxed with the announcement that Glass and The Machines of God was a web based animated series. Some fans were disappointed, hoping it was a signal that the band was reuniting. Others were excited since the series would be interactive, to a degree, and everyone had the chance, via Sony's Screenblast, to create their own characters and remixes for the series.
The animated series, Glass and the Machines of God, has since been "put on the shelf" indefinitely. Various rumors attribute the end of the project as lack of interest from Corgan and/or fans, to rumors that Sony's Screenblast (which was to host GATMOG and other series) lost funding when the last two installments of the Matrix trilogy began eating up their budgets.
There were three episodes leaked on the internet in 2003. There has been debate over whether these were early "drafts" or final cuts. The first two episodes contain no credits, where the third episode shows credits at the beginning.
In the first episode, Zero hears the Voice in the Radio and contacts his old friend and manager, Ruby. Their conversation is intercepted and patched through to the head of the Paracell Corp, Mr. Valentine - who has had a history with Zero.
Episode two shows Zero's transformation into Glass while visiting Ruby and the subsequent negotiations to get The Machines of God their first gig.
In the third episode we see how Glass affects the audience with his message of revolution.
There was also debate about whether or not background characters were in fact the Ghost Children created by the fans. However, one character - Maya, the Paracell psychic - is known to be a character created by a fan.

Artwork

The booklet artwork loosely tells the album's story through a series of plates featuring medieval-style paintings and text presented in a printing press font created by Vasily Kafanov. The artwork references the subjects of alchemy, chemistry, metallurgy, physics, medicine, astrology, semiotics, mysticism, spiritualism, and art. "I Of The Mourning" is the only release from the album that did not include cover art by Vasily Kafanov. The album was nominated for a 2001 Grammy for Best Recording Package.

Response

''Machina'' is generally considered to be among The Smashing Pumpkins' least successful releases. Entering the U.S. charts at #3, the album quickly slid down the charts, barely going gold. As of May 2005, U.S. sales stood at 582,000 units . This ranks it as the lowest-selling of the five official album releases. The album is frequently criticized by some for its length, concept, and "wall of sound" production, while others contend that ''Machina'' brought together the rock sensibilities of early-'90s albums with the atmospherics and lyrical maturity of 1998's ''Adore''. Reviews were mixed -Brent DiCrescenzo of Pitchfork Media heavily criticized the album's production style and mainstream rock sound,^[1] while Jim DeRogatis of the Chicago Sun-Times called the album "an exceedingly impressive and hard-driving record."DeRogatis, Jim. "Smashing Pumpkins Reclaiming Rock Glory." Chicago Sun-Times: 29 February 2000.

Track listing

All tracks written by Billy Corgan.
# "The Everlasting Gaze" – 4:00
# "Raindrops + Sunshowers" – 4:39
# "Stand Inside Your Love" – 4:14
# "I of the Mourning" – 4:37
# "The Sacred and Profane" – 4:22
# "Try, Try, Try" – 5:09
# "Heavy Metal Machine" – 5:52
# "This Time" – 4:43
# "The Imploding Voice" – 4:24
# "Glass and the Ghost Children" – 9:56
# "Wound" – 3:58
# "The Crying Tree of Mercury" – 3:43
# "With Every Light" – 3:56
# "Blue Skies Bring Tears" – 5:45
# "Age of Innocence" – 3:55

International releases

Some releases—namely, European and Asian Hut Records versions, and all vinyl editions—have an added track, "Speed Kills" inserted between "The Crying Tree of Mercury" and "Age of Innocence". This version of "Speed Kills" is not the ''Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music'' version. On the vinyl editions, this song is the full version that appears on the "Stand Inside Your Love" single. On the imports, the song is edited to a cut nearly two minutes shorter than the original.
A Japan promo version has an extended version of "The Sacred and Profane" with two bars of electronic drum beat in the beginning of the song, and a slightly different mix of "Age of Innocence".

Outtakes

A number of songs were recorded in some form or another during the ''Machina'' sessions but did not make either ''Machina/The Machines of God'' or ''Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music''.

★ "Disco King" (An early version of "The Everlasting Gaze" featuring what would become part of the song "Lucky 13" on ''Machina II''.)

★ "Death Boogie"

★ "Autumn" (Instrumental. Not to be confused with the 1994 demo "Autumn Nocturne.")

★ "Drain" (Acoustic demo with guitar similar to stand inside your love, mentions james iha at one point)

★ "Here I Am"

★ "Laugh"

★ "Lover"

★ "Dick or Peter"

Personnel

★ Billy Corgan – vocals, guitar, bass on "Age of Innocence", producer, art direction, mixing

★ James Iha – guitar

★ D'arcy – bass

★ Jimmy Chamberlin – drums

★ Mike Garson – piano on "Glass and the Ghost Children"

★ Flood – producer, mixing

★ Alan Moulder – mixing

★ Bjorn Thorsrud – recording, mixing, digital editing, compilation, additional programming

★ Mike Zainer – mixing assistant

★ Bill Douglass – mixing assistant

★ Jef Moll – mixing assistant

★ Erin Piepergerdes – mixing assistant

★ Andrew Nicholls – mixing assistant

★ Howard C. Willing – recorder, mixing

★ Howie Weinberg – mastering

★ Tim "Gooch" Lougee – technical assistance

★ Scott Schimpff – technical assistance

★ Tommy Lipnick – technical assistance

★ Yelena Yemchuk – art direction

★ Greg Sylvester – art direction

★ Thomas Wolfe – art direction

★ Vasily Kafanov – paintings, etchings

Chart positions

Album

Year	Chart	Position
2000	Top Canadian Albums	2
2000	Australian Album Chart[2]	2
2000	The Billboard 200	3
2000	Top Internet Albums	3
2000	New Zealand Album Chart[3]	4
2000	UK Albums	7

Singles

Year	Single	Chart	Position
2000	"The Everlasting Gaze"	Modern Rock Tracks	4
2000	"The Everlasting Gaze"	Mainstream Rock Tracks	14
2000	"Stand Inside Your Love"	Modern Rock Tracks	2
2000	"Stand Inside Your Love"	Mainstream Rock Tracks	11
2000	"Stand Inside Your Love"	UK Singles Chart	23
2000	"Stand Inside Your Love"	Australian Singles Chart	32
2000	"Try, Try, Try"	UK Singles Chart	73

References

1. MACHINA/The Machines of God DiCrescenzo, Brent
2. Chartifacts - Week Commencing: 23 July 2007
3. Chartbitz: Wednesday, July 18 2007

External links

★ SPFC.org: Contains archived copies of the ''Machina'' stories

★ Video: Billy Corgan discusses the story of ''Machina'', Part I

★ Video: Billy Corgan discusses the story of ''Machina'', Part II