Smashing Pumpkins "Siamese Dream" [1993]

Archly stale and sonically disinfected so as to make this unmistakably the work of an asshole control freak, Smashing Pumpkins is really just the Billy Corgan show; too bad -- he really could have used some good guitar playing. And good singing. And good songwriting. Legions of overdubbed guitars display equally the mania of Corgan's mental disorder and his inability to play anything worthwhile with just one instrument. Capitalizing on the era of noise pollution known as the grunge movement of the 90s, Corgan routinely betrays his true ambition to be an arena crotch-rocker. Vocally, he inexplicably alternates from baby-voiced sour whine to paint-peeling caterwaul. Even worse, he's so got nothing to say you can even hear the guys from Oasis complaining that "Siamese Dream" makes no sense. This extreme combination of crap ideas and worse execution demonstrates only that in the grunge era you could be the biggest power-hungry dweeb in history and still sell CDs as long as you play loud enough. So much for Generation X deserving a better place in history.