Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness is the third studio album by the Smashing Pumpkins, released on October 23, 1995, in the United Kingdom and a day later in the United States on Virgin Records. Produced by frontman Billy Corgan with Flood and Alan Moulder, the 28 track album was released as a two disc CD and triple LP. It features a wide array of musical styles.
Propelled by its lead single Bullet with Butterfly Wings, the album debuted at number one on the US Billboard 200 with first week sales of 246,500 units. It remains the band’s only album to top the Billboard 200. It spawned five more singles 1979, Zero, Tonight, Tonight, the promotional Muzzle and Thirty-Three over the course of 1996, and was certified diamond by the RIAA, equivalent to more than 10 million units sold.
Lauded by critics for its ambition and scope, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness earned the band seven Grammy Award nominations in 1997, including Album of the Year and Record of the Year (1979), as well as nine MTV Music Video Awards nominations, eight of which were for Tonight, Tonight, including Video of the Year.
The songs became hits on mainstream rock and modern rock stations, and Bullet with Butterfly Wings, 1979, Tonight, Tonigh and Thirty-Three became the band’s first Top 40 hits, crossing over to pop radio stations.
Recording sessions saw a wealth of productivity: dozens of fully completed songs were cut from the album and would surface on later releases.
A box set released in November 1996 titled The Aeroplane Flies High compiled the promotional singles from the album and featured approximately 30 fully completed songs from the Mellon Collie sessions that had not made the final cut for the album (including one track, Pastichio Medley, which contained more than 70 short snippets of songs in various states of completion).
Both Mellon Collie and The Aeroplane Flies High later saw reissues that included even more tracks from the sessions.
Tracklist:
Disc One (Dawn to Dusk)
- Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (Instrumental)
- Tonight, Tonight
- Jellybelly
- Zero
- Here Is No Why
- Bullet with Butterfly Wings
- To Forgive
- Fuck You (An Ode to No One)
- Love
- Cupid de Locke
- Galapogos
- Muzzle
- Porcelina of the Vast Oceans
- Take Me Down
Disc Two (Twilight to Starlight)
- Where Boys Fear to Tread
- Bodies
- Thirty-Three
- In the Arms of Sleep
- 1979
- Tales of a Scorched Earth
- Thru the Eyes of Ruby
- Stumbleine
- X.Y.U.
- We Only Come Out at Night
- Beautiful
- Lily (My One and Only)
- By Starlight
- Farewell and Goodnight
The Smashing Pumpkins
Jimmy Chamberlin: drums, vocals on “Farewell and Goodnight”
Billy Corgan: lead vocals, lead and rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards, autoharp, production, mixing, string arrangement on “Tonight, Tonight”, art direction and design
James Iha: rhythm and lead guitar; vocals, mixing, and additional production on “Take Me Down” and “Farewell and Goodnight”
D’arcy Wretzky: bass guitar, vocals on “Beautiful” and “Farewell and Goodnight”
Additional musicians
Chicago Symphony Orchestra: orchestra in “Tonight, Tonight”
Greg Leisz: pedal and lap steel guitar on “Take Me Down”
Technical
Roger Carpenter: technical assistance
John Craig: illustration
Flood: production, mixer
Andrea Giacobbe: photograph
Barry Goldberg: additional vocal recording, mixing assistance
Adam Green: technical assistance
Dave Kresl: string recording assistance
Tim “Gooch” Lougee: technical assistance
Guitar Dave Mannet: technical assistance
Jeff Moleski: technical assistance
Alan Moulder: production, mixer
Frank Olinsky: art direction and design
Claudine Pontier: recording assistance
Audrey Riley: string arrangement on “Tonight, Tonight”
Chris Shepard: recording
Russ Spice: technical assistance
Howie Weinberg: mastering
Bob Ludwig: mastering (2012 remaster)
