Pinkpop 2007 review found on MySpace

[Andrea]

Hi people, as promised to many friends around here’s my review on the Pinkpop gig of the Smashing Pumpkins. To put it briefly: awesome. They rock! Based on the setlist let me tell you what happened.

(Note: At some point, somewhere inbetween the Arctic Monkeys and Linkin Park we bumped into a French fan that also went to the Paris gig, and he already promised a show that rocked! And he was true…)

A few hundred hardcore fans (young and old) gathered at the entrance to 1 of the 2 snakepits in front of the stage. Between Linkin Park and the Pumpkins was about 1 and a quarter of an hour to get the best view just in front of the stage. I was inbetween them with my gal Shannen, and in the pressure to get in I lost her for a few seconds, but luckily she was safe after all… And there we found ourselves just a few meters from the stage on the left side. The loooong waiting could begin…

-Intro
A few minutes before 21:00 the music started and the crowd started to cheer. When the band (Jeff first, though he hide himself quickly first hahaha) entered the stage, 1,000’s of people were shouting, clapping and whistling.

-Today
-Bullet with butterfly wings
Great songs to set the mood, and get the full attention of the crowd. Lot’s were singing along.

-United States
-Bleeding the orchid
Here the crowd was kinda silent again, because nobody knew these new songs. However, the attention was never lost, because it are beautiful tracks of the new album Zeitgeist.

-Tonight, tonight
Another oldie well received.

-Tarantula
Here Billy Corgan properly introduced Zeitgeist, the new album. The crowd turned really wild…

-Starz
Another new song from the new album, just as catchy as Tarantula.

-Zero
How happy can you make the people… A classic tune, and everybody was jumping, shouting, screaming!.

-Glass & the ghost children
The more introspective part of the show, and it turned out lots of people still knew this song and were singing along too.

-For god & country
-Thirty three
-To Sheila
The acoustic part.

-Stand inside your love
Just my humble opinion of course, but I was never so much into this song. This version with the new band was just awesome however.

-Cherub Rock
-1979
-Disarm
A few more oldies to bring the crowd back in the mood again.

-Untitled
This song struck me by surprise too, just like SIYL. We all know the videosingle version of Untitled, but the live version is great. I would like to call this another live classic from now on!

(break)
Few minutes break around 22:15, and few people starting to leave already. How wrong can you be… Because the most awesome part was still to come…

-Gossamer
At 22:20 around the band returned and it’s hard to describe what happened to me. I can only describe it as \"I went into a trance, and this music brought tears in my eyes\". Gossamer is a 20-25 minutes piece of psychedelic epic rockmusic, that will stand the times, I’m sure. Only for this song every Pumpkins gig in the near future is worthwhile to visit. Not from this earth, really. Listen to it to understand, to feel, what I mean! At the end of it Billy put his still roaring guitar to the stagefloor, walked to the front and greeted the audience while the rest of the band left the stage. Then he walked back, unplugged his guitar, all went silent, crowd was amazed, they cheered 1 more time, and that was the epic end of it all at 22:45… Just awesome!

During the whole concert every now and then I couldn’t help thinking a bit and wonder around in my mind. Is this band still relevant? Will this band stay around a bit longer as Zwan or Billy’s soloband? To answer this for myself I looked around a few times to the other fans, and to the band members itself. Billy was not interacting much with the fans, maybe he was a bit nervous? But he was very friendly with Jeff a few times, and on the big screens aside the stage, where close-ups of the bandmembers were projected, I could see a very happy smile on Ginger’s face a few times when Billy was in a rocking mood. Jimmy was hardly visible however, but he and Billy have proven throughout the years to be very close friends and soulmates. To me it looked like a very solid base for the near future, and I shouldn’t forget this was only their 4th (!!!) performance together. And the Gossamer performance was already way better as the Paris version, so they are growing rapidly I guess. And what about \"relevance\" when Billy and his mates are a class on their own? You love them or you hate them, it’s a bit hard to be inbetween. And I just love them, both the old Pumpkins of 1988-2000 and the new Pumpkins of 2007. They are rocking faster and harder as before, the sound is new and fresh, the new tracks are absolutely Pumpkins in a \"Billy\"-ish way (not Zwan-ish, that’s ridiculous and besides the truth), Ginger is just great and makes you forget all other bass players of the old Pumpkins, Jeff has to grow a bit more maybe to get rid of that James Iha stigma, but he has the warmth and friendship of Billy already.

Anyway, I was very happy to be there and I enjoyed it very very very much. To all friends that are going to see them sooner or later in Europe or oversea: you won’t be sorry. They rock, and they will move your world once more. Really!

[Author]

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