Which of the following is your favourite album?

1991 was the year I seriously got into indie rock. There are at least 65 releases (almost all are albums) of that year in my discotheque. Before starting the poll I was pretty sure to choose My Blood Valentine's noise pop classic Loveless as my fave. On Friday I relistened to it and there were exactly two tracks which stood the test of time: When You Sleep and the closer Soon. The rest was totally forgettable badly aged hoover in reverse gear experimentalism. Groundbreaking in 1991 but sucking big time in retrospect today. The next contender for number one were The Field Mice. I was rather close to go for their version of very personal romantic indie pop with gorgeous melodies and grooves but their album from 1991 Coastal (all songs being on their later sampler Where'd You learn to Kiss That Way which featured in the poll) has some tracks with drum-machine (that's a definite no-no concerning the music I appreciate) in it and is not as consistent as the album I finally chose:

The Smashing Pumpkins (and Butch Vig's as a producer) debut Gish. An album of an almost frightening intensity and coherence which somehow got both overshadowed by Butch Vig's next slicker production, i.e. Nirvana's Nevermind and the subsequent releases of the Pumpkins. Of which only the double album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness was noteworthy.

Gish is the only heavy metal album which ever did anything for me. If it is a heavy metal album. It is a very eclectic work also integrating psychedelics, goth and some of the most mesmerising drumming I have ever heard. Jimmy Chamberlin, the oldest member of the band (born 1964) who arrived latest and got kicked out later for his heroine addiction came from jazz. Corgan's father was a jazz guitarist. Maybe these jazz roots make the difference. I really don't know. All I know is that this album is extremely varied and timeless.

The coherence is two fold. There is a coherence of the album (an unmatched flow of indispensable songs) and a coherence of the band. The interplay of shaman drums, lead playing bass and distorting guitars is absolutely somnambulistic. Everything is extremely tight and fluid at the same time. Even Corgan's voice which can grate fits in perfectly.

I used to listen to this album on headphones after a night out. Going on a mind trip after the real life trip. Impossible to put into words like most of these kind of trips. Maybe the lyrics of Crush can give an idea of this experience:

Refreshing like a hot hyper-sweet peppermint tea served from a Moroccan tin tea kettle in the sahara.

The taster is Rhinoceros (lyrics) which starts slowly but soon turns into a guitar feedback drenched orgy.

Here is the overview of the series 40 years, 40 albums of which part XI was this post.