A couple weeks ago I found myself on Fremont Street in Downtown Las Vegas walking from my hotel room to The D, the casino that has my favorite cheap-o time killing game, a slot-horse racing machine called Sigma Derby. On my walk over I strolled smack dab through the middle of a free Marcy Playground, Toadies, Smash Mouth triple bill (I had plastic ponies to bet on, so I missed the Steve Harwell-less Smash Mouth).

Some people might think a free outdoor concert in a tourist trap while the sun is out is sad. I bet Billy Corgan, if pressed (ever so gently) would say it’s below him. But I’ll be damned if the bands I saw there weren’t having a good time. You could tell they were into it, the audience remembered their songs, and I bet they got paid pretty well. Shit, I had fun and I know one Marcy Playground song I don’t particularly like it.

While the retrospective headline for 90s alt rock is “dour and angry” it’s easy to forget that some of the best radio bands were fun. The Beastie Boys were fun for example, and “Intergalactic” might be their most fun single from their entire career.

It’s going to be hard to top that from a band on the dour and angry end of the 90s spectrum, Smashing Pumpkins. Especially from a song I bet you’ve never heard, or even heard of.

So if you clicked this article to see which song is better, “Intergalactic” by the Beastie Boys or “Intergalactic” by The Smashing Pumpkins, I’ve kept you waiting long enough, it is the Beastie Boys song called “Intergalactic”.

But rather than pit these songs against each other, I was looking forward to writing this as a way of catching up with what I’ve always considered the yin and yang of 90s arena acts, and see how their legacies and more importantly songs hold up. The Beastie Boys “Intergalactic” sounds just as fun as it did back in ‘98. Their “everyone says the last word of the bar” style hasn’t really aged poorly mostly because it never became a trend and remained distinctly them.

Even if you’re not into their playful style, the thing that always allowed the Beastie Boys to be goofy as hell without being a joke is the fact they’re operating on another level musically. “Intergalactic” features a haunted house organ chord progression in the background that transitions into a jazz riff on upright bass, there’s robot voices, (tasteful) record scratching, ironically tense strings. None of it could support a pop song on its own, but “Intergalactic” is as catchy as they come and one of their biggest hits. Another classic Brunswick Stew from the B Boys (I’m gonna start using “Brunswick Stew” instead of “Gumbo” as a music/food metaphor, because it sounds like it could be the name of a Beastie Boys B-side).

Now for the dark side of the coin, The Smashing Pumpkins. They don’t get the kind of credit the Beastie Boys do for genre mixing, but when trying to describe their style I ended up with a decently diverse list. While the Beasties mash up more fun styles like funk, punk, rap, hair metal and dance music the Pumpkins work in the realm of more traditionally ultra-serious genres like prog, goth, industrial, and regular old no-hair metal.

If you had no idea The Smashing Pumpkins had a song called “Intergalactic” I can’t blame you. Maybe, like me, you were a fan in their 90s heyday that lapsed after their breakup and never picked them back up. If so, it’s totally understandable, Billy Corgan isn’t the easiest rock star to love. Since their peak around Mellon Collie & The Infinite Sadness Corgan has kicked out every other band member at some point, guested on cranky old man radio shows like InfoWars and Joe Rogan’s podcast where he’s talked about his libertarian politics, and most recently been in a messy public feud with former Pumpkins bassist D’Arcy Wretzky.

He’s also released a bunch of music. And while I could probably spend pages dissecting the bloated concept-album rock that pours out of Billy Corgan’s mind like a slow moving vein of thick soft serve from a malfunctioning machine, I absolutely won’t. I’m just going to pull off a tall lopsided cone in the form of the nine minute long “Intergalactic” and see how it goes.

OK, so first of all it’s nine minutes long, but I don’t think that kind of indulgence is inherently bad. Indulgence is good, and I want artists to go as far as they feel necessary. I like progressive rock from time to time, I’ve been through a jam band phase, and I really like a lot of Smashing Pumpkins songs, even the long ones! And in fairness to reviewing this song I listened to the entire album it’s from, the two hour 18 minute long ATUM: A Rock Opera in Three Acts (yes, it says all that on the cover).

It’s not bad! Which, unfortunately, might be the worst review of a two hour 18 minute long rock opera in three parts. I’m sure the creator of a two hour 18 minute long rock opera in three parts is going for a strong reaction, and a dismissive “not bad” has to be unsatisfying. But unfortunately that’s the review!

To sum up the album and more specifically the song “Intergalactic” I’ll paraphrase something I heard Mark Mothersbaugh say about disco (that I respectfully disagree with) “I like the sounds but I don’t love the songs.”

The Pumpkins “Intergalactic” starts with a driving spooky synth line that could have been on the last John Carpenter record. Billy starts singing in his signature wispy whine, mellowed with age and supported by a little studio cleanup. Some strummed guitar chords come in to release the tension followed by some drums to build it up again. Kinda sounds like Muse or maybe late period Queens of the Stone Age, but unfortunately virgin-y-er.

The song keeps going for like 5 more minutes and I’m losing interest. Which is fine. I’m not sure what reaction someone is hoping for when they write a sprawling prog rock song, but in my head I imagine it’s to stare at your stereo speaker just nodding a bit. Or maybe to talk a little during the quiet parts about what kind of gear they’re using or what Billy singing about “Zero” is referencing. This song didn’t hold me tight enough for those reactions, unfortunately.

When we go back and look at the songs from these two bands, I think both of their prime periods hold up really well. I just don’t see myself jumping back on the Pumpkins ride for the new stuff now that I’m a much different person (I like disco now!). And looking at legacy, one is clearly the fan fave and the other has lost some luster, and I can’t help but think that’s coming from the abundance of seriousness that constantly rotates around The Smashing Pumpkins. Since the band that told us “the world is a vampire,” it seems the gloomy vibes haven’t dissipated after about 30 years.

And that’s too bad because, while I know they headline amphitheaters these days, they could have probably toned down all the ego trips and been happy hanging out in Vegas with the Toadies, who seemed pretty chill.

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