Smashing Pumpkins: "Today" (Hut)

This wholly breathtaking song raises one important question which, even after forty-five consecutive, rapt listens, still flummoxes me. Namely, is it possible for someone with Billy Corgan's penchant for psychosis to mean it when he coos guilelessly that "Today is the greatest day I've ever known"? I mean, don't people who disembowel squirrels for fun have good days too?

James Iha's gorgeous, chiming guitar signature coupled with Corgan's goofy-grin delivery swings it towards sincerity while the low, rumbling, meticulously layered wall of noise (courtesy of Butch Vig) plus our Billy's bitter assertion that "I wanted more than life could ever grant me" plus the knowledge that the Smashies are too goddamn ornery to inflict any well-adjustedness on their public all combine to hint that maybe there's a smidgen of irony floating about. Either way, it's a gleefully unhinged masterpiece and SOTF by more miles than A. Reynolds has copies of Il Principe.