10 Even More Perfect 1990s Rock Albums With No Bad Songs

by Andrew Pollard

1. Melon Collie And The Infinite Sadness - Smashing Pumpkins

Way before the Smashing Pumpkins became a bloated parody of themselves, October 1995 saw the rockers deliver a wildly ambitious, adventurous record of monumental proportions.

Consisting of 28 songs, spread across two CDs (or three vinyl records), amassing a total of two hours, one minute and 44 seconds, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness is one of the great rock achievements of the '90s. With a first disc titled Dawn to Dusk and a second disc labelled Twilight to Starlight, the Pumpkins manage to cover so many angles of rock across this record.

There's beastly belters like Bullet with Butterfly Wings, Zero, and F**k You (An Ode to No One). There's delightful soft rock ballads like Thirty-Three, 1979, and Tonight, Tonight. And then there's beautiful, emotional, stripped back numbers like the opening title track, Stumbleine, and Billy Corgan's ode to his deceased mother, Lily (My One and Only).

Corgan, D'arcy Wretzky, James Iha and Jimmy Chamberlin had been great before Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, and they'd be great again after Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, but this 1995 spectacle was the Smashing Pumpkins at the absolute peak of their powers.

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Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer and Presenter, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund and Eli Roth to Kevin Smith and the Russo Brothers, to Kevin Conroy and Frank Miller, to Bret Hart and Sting, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, and Brian Flynn, to many, many more. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is a long-standing season ticket holder and an FSA Award-winner for his time co-hosting the Fearless in Devotion podcast.