The Smashing Pumpkins - Aghori Mhori Mei

Heavy, swirling and unapologetically big, Aghori Mhori Mei finds The Smashing Pumpkins plugging back into the roar of their nineties peak on a lean, ten-track 2024 album.

Billy Corgan wrote and produced the record with help from Howard Willing, and the core trio of Corgan, James Iha and Jimmy Chamberlin carries it without longtime guitarist Jeff Schroeder, who left in 2023. Arriving after the sprawling rock opera Atum, it is a deliberately direct statement, and Corgan openly framed it as a return to the Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie version of the band.

That intent is clear from the opening minutes. "Edin" and "Pentagrams" both stretch past six minutes, stacking walls of fuzz guitar over Chamberlin's thunderous, jazz-trained drumming. Lead single "Sighommi" is a compact, riff-led burst, and "Who Goes There" followed it as the album's second single. Black Sabbath and Dio loom large over the heavier moments, and occasional synths and orchestral touches add colour without softening the blow.

Andrew Scheps mixed most of the album, keeping the low end weighty and the guitars wide, which suits a record this committed to volume.

For fans who first fell for the Pumpkins through cranked-up headphones, this LP feels like a welcome and very loud homecoming.