TheFutureEmbrace

This is album is awesome. You will not be disappointed. Every song is superb!! Go on buy it!! What your ears were designed for!!

This is the only Solo album so far from smashing pumpkins main man Billy Corgan..I guess you could argue that is maybe not wholly the case as some of his 'group' works have essentially been solo recordings given Billy's sometimes tendency to record the additional parts himself however this doesn't sound like a pumpkins album. Yes we have Billy's vocal but musically it's less Guitar driven and very much Billy's Synth album. It features guest spots from Robert Smith and Emilie Autumn and is steeped in a post punk feel..stylistically it's nearest the pumpkins 'adore' album though in truth....this CD has it's own character separate from his prior band and ZWAN. I have waited a while to buy this as I had the feeling I would be underwhelmed..however no such worries this stands aside from his other bits but is no weaker for that.

Brilliant CD

yesterday i received my copy of the future embrace in the post, straight from amazon. Then after that i placed it into my cd player and as the first track begun to play i realised that this LP was not going to be doom and gloom as i presumed it would be after hearing his first solo single walking shade, with the imagery of that video and the melancholics of the lyrics i thought the rest of the LP was going to be like Adore, but might i warn most of you who do buy this, this is not melancholic, it reminds me lyrically of Ville Vallos lyrics (HIM) combined with the atmospherics of all the early Joy Division and New Order LPs. If Billy Corgan was happy in 1997 when he recorded Adore that LP would have sounded like this. Another good thing i might point out is that it is evident that Billy Corgan works better on his own than with the other Pumpkins, and that age has perfected his thoughts regards to writing, for the first time all the songs are catchy, they are all around 3 minutes and for once in his life he has not made a rambling record that dosent go on for 14 minutes, not only that but hes now able to cut his album lenght down from the usual 75 minutes to only 45 on this. I might add this LP does not have a lot of guitars, it is bombarded with drum machines and synths, but the passion in his songs have gotten better, and this LP will make his credibility stronger, so i order you to go out and buy a copy of this now.

TheFutureEmbrace sounds like former Smashing Pumpkin Billy Corgan has stumbled upon an old Victorian time machine, travelled back to England 1982 to soak up the goth, pop and new romantic movements, before travelling back to Berlin, circa '77, to jam with Kraftwerk and the Thin White Duke. Either that or he's decided that he had so much fun producing Adore in 1998 that he's decided to do it all over again... only this time, under his own name. TheFutureEmbrace is an album that sounds like the Pumpkins as they moved towards the goth/electronic phase of their career, but at the same time, is an album that also sounds like a Depeche Mode covers band in need of a serious direction!!! Corgan clearly loves the British new-wave movement, drafting in the cold dissonant synths of the Mode, the bleak and fragmented lyrics of Station to Station/Heroes era Bowie, the cold delivery of Ian Curtis, and the fuzzy guitars and the air of overblown melodrama favoured by The Cure. The fact that any semblance of the Pumpkins (in any of their previous guises) manages to permeate this clouded melting pot of references and ideas is a surprise in itself... though, whether or not this is considered be a good or a bad thing will be completely down to the individual. If you walk into TheFutureEmbrace expecting Siamese Dream or Mellon Collie style stadium rock you will only be disappointed. This is like Adore/Machina, only with even more electronic doodling and less of the trademark Corgan guitar... instead, we have all manner of icy and angular style keyboards, electronic drum beats, programmed samples and treated-guitars (to the point where they no longer sound like guitars) forming the backbone of the album; over which, Corgan chants vague and repetitive lyrical snatches in the most robotic-like delivery possible!! Musically the album is fine... Corgan seems to favour the idea of atmosphere rather than pop sophistication, to some extent creating an album that is even more languid and meandering than the underrated Adore, and again, shows that Corgan has been reading the "how to create the perfect new-wave dreamscape" handbook, whilst simultaneously fanning through his stacks of early six-form poetry. Certainly the album is well produced, but surely this is expected from the team behind the epic and still surprisingly fascinating Mellon Collie album?, with Corgan and Co. managing to get the subtle symbiosis between the cool digital instruments and the fuzzy analogue blips just right, creating in the process, an album that is bright, vibrant and futuristic (in the best possible sense) but also cold, dated and decidedly retro (in a maddeningly self-conscious sense!!). I respect the fact that Corgan is attempting something different, attacking a personal concept and applying it to a style of music that he is (mostly) unfamiliar with. But much of the album is dull, and if I'm being completely honest, many of the songs and lyrics left me completely cold. On the first listen, none of the songs really stood out. The same thing could be said of the second listen, with only the pretentiously re-titled Tolovesomebody standing out from the crowd (which is unsurprising really, given that it's a Bee Gee's cover, and not a Corgan original!!). On further inspection, the second track Mina Loy (M.O.H.) stands out as one of Corgan's best compositions ever. The Camera Eye isn't bad either, bubbling along on a processed guitar ripple replete with analogue distortions and synthetic blips and bleeps (in fact, on further listening, it's a potential classic). At least half of the album could probably be thought of as pop music from the future. In fact, Corgan could probably make a pretty good living scoring science-fiction films, creating strange alien pop music to play in the background of high-tech scenarios. The other half of the album, however, just sounds like poor synth-pop knock-offs with navel-gazing lyrics. To call these songs bad would probably be a little unfair... but certainly they lack any real depth or interest, and instead, tend to come across as nothing more than a self-conscious pastiche. A100 is one of the album's weaker points, trekking across ground already covered by Adore more than half a decade earlier, ripping off synth lines from Depeche Mode's Violator album and generally reminding me of that awful budget dance track 'I Like the Way You Move' by the Bodyrockers (or whatever they were called?). Along with the opening track, All Things Change, as well as Sorrows (In Blue) and Pretty, Pretty Star this makes up the downside of the album, with too many songs that either sound the same, sound like other artists, or worse, sound like self-parody. Dia sounds like a New Order song... in fact, it sounds exactly like the New Order song that Corgan collaborated on (Turn My Way from 2001's Get Ready), but despite this, it's enjoyable enough, if hardly revolutionary. Now (And Then) is another fine song, drawing more obviously on the sound of the Pumpkins - particularly some of the lullaby rock songs from Mellon Collie and Adore - with Corgan's warm and reassuring words resonating over the minimal electronic backing track. On the whole, TheFutureEmbrace remains a bold and interesting attempt by Corgan to push his musical pallet forwards into new and previously unexplored directions... it's not entirely successful, with a few songs ending up dead in the water, but on the whole, it works, and a number of the songs do grow on you with time. Certainly not a masterpiece by any measure, but a definite grower, with enough musical high points to endear it to the heart's of anyone with more than a passing interest in synth-pop/electro-pop, or Corgan's career in general.

Wer Machina II liebt, wird dieses Album lieben, da es ähnlich in diese Richtung geht. Jedes Lied scheint im nachhinein elektronisch noch veredelt zu sein - also NICHT wie bei Zwan. Ich persönlich war sher enttäuscht von Zwan - umso erfreulicher fand ich das Konzert von Billy in Köln zu diesem Album. Wie gesagt - wer die Pumpkins in ihrer rein elektronischen Form liebte, wird "The Futute Embrace" ebenfalls lieben.

Since the breakup of the Smashing Pumpkins and then the formation and the subsiquential breakup of Zwan I have been awaiting to hear this album. Billy Corgan has always been a progressive artist. Just take a listen to all the Pumpkins other albums, each one has its own unique sound and feel while maintaining the signiture sound of the Pumpkins. Zwan on the other hand was a guitar laden mastery of echoing sound with religious heartfelt lyrics thrown into that sound. So what does THE FUTURE EMBRACE sound like...about what a pumpkins/corgan fan would expect none of the above. Corgan continues to push the limits of music and pulls at the strings of artistic comformity in everyway. The only pumpkins album that sounds anywhere quite like this was adore and thats only because of the electronic sound, cross adore with zwans album "mary star of the sea" and throw in some hopeful, sorrowful, and personal lyrics, dash some of the guitars out and cross it with more electronics and you have the sound of The Future Embrace. I'll go out on a limb here and say there are NO HIT SONGS on this album. It's not a mainstream album, the sound is too rough and unpolished for radio play. Walking Shade is the catchiest song, followed by tracks 2 and 3. The other songs are great works of art and will take quite a few listens before they conform to your mind. I really didnt "GET" this album on first listen but ive now listed to it quite a few times and im liking it more now, but that is the way with most great artists, they take a few listens. Is the future embrace revolutionary? no but it is a remarkable peice of work that true pumpkins/corgan fans will grow to enjoy.

une découverte en un sable où le vent à fait nuage un esprit éclairant la lumière du ciel un vrai sable de l'océan

Era necesario escuchar este primer disco de Billy Corgan para entender a los Smashing Pumpkins y para valorar, además, sus nuevos registros en solitario

This album is really beautiful. It is unique to his other albums and it is a shame he never continued with this style of music. I would recommend this to someone who like the album Adore by the Smashing Pumpkins or someone who likes new wave/electronic sound. This isn't a rock album.