Jacket: Vintage
Skirt, top, hat: Forever 21
Bag: Mango MNG
Unicorn necklace: ASOS
Boots: Doctor Marten
It was hard to dress "1995" without being too on the nose (1995 was a special year for me as you'll read below), but I thought Doc boots, tights, floral skirt, a beanie, a unicorn necklace, a big bag and a "Singles"-esque leather jacket was pretty good. I actually went shopping in this outfit and didn't get as many weird looks as I thought I would. Screw the 80's, the 90's is where it's at!
BTW I used to have these Doc Martens back in the day and wearing them now I just never want to take them off. They have to be the MOST comfortable shoes in the world. I swear to God, I could sleep in these things! I'm even wearing them at work as I type this, though I admit they aren't exactly office appropriate!
On to my inspiration for this outfit, The Smashing Pumpkins:
Let's take a trip on the "WayBack Machine" shall we?
The year is 1995. For my birthday I would receive a CD that would change my life (musically).
It was the new double disc from The Smashing Pumpkins, Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness.
This CD rocked my world. The music was hard and edgy, beautiful and melodic and unlike anything I had ever heard before. I was a bit late in the game with SP as they already had 3 CDs out before this one but I quickly snapped those up and became immersed with the Pumpkins.
Soon I had their posters on my walls, I watched their movie Vieuphoria at least once a week (it was awesome), recorded all of their music videos on Much Music, was buying all the bootlegs I could find (I even made my mom take me to this record store in Hemet...California...because they had bootlegs. Granted we were in Palm Springs at the time so it wasn't a huge journey, but still...) and was a harcore "Pumpkinhead."
My three good friends at the time were also just as obsessed as I was which was nice (though pity anyone else who had to hang out with us at the time).
Anyway, one of good friends Kelli and I decided to go on a pilgramage to see them in concert. They weren't coming up to Vancouver but they were playing at The Moore Theatre in Seattle.
Somehow I managed to convince me mom to drive us the 2.5 hours down the Seattle (we were only 14 or 15 at the time) so we could go to the concert and also have us stay at the swanky Four Seasons Hotel - I had deduced that when the Pumpkins tour that the only stay at the Four Seasons Hotel. I'm not sure how I figured that out in a year where the internet was barely up and running but I did.
The minute we arrived in Seattle, the excitement began.
As we were coming into the hotel, we passed by a woman with black hair and a very tall guy with cap. I didn't really notice them but as we entered the hotel, the doorman leaned in and whispered "You just missed a rock star."
Kelli and I were immediately like "whaaaa?" and screeching as only 14-year old groupies can screech. We looked behind us to see the tall guy and the woman disappear around the corner.
Though we didn't see his face, and though he had a toque covering his bald head, there was no mistaking the walk and figure of the 6'4" Billy Corgan. The woman though we had no idea, it wasn't the bassist Darcy. But at least this confirmed that we were staying at the right place!
After checking in and calming down, we had to go walking through the streets of downtown Seattle to the Moore Theatre to line up for tickets. The Moore is an amazing place, very small and they only sell tickets in most cases on the day of the show. No Ticketmaster here, you have to be there and line up.
So my mom, Kelli and I are walking around and we want to start lining up even though it's only about 2PM. My mom thinks it's a bad idea to have two 14-year old girls waiting for hours on the streets of Seattle, so we stop at a street corner to have a little argument.
So I'm yelling at my mom and she's yelling at me and Kelli meanwhile is whispering "Shut up, shut up, shut up."
And I turn to her, "WHAT? You shut up!"
Just as Billy Corgan and a black-haired Courtney Love walk by.
Like, literally, they walked around us and our argument.
So I freeze and I am like "OH MY GOD" because to my teenage self, he IS God.
And I slowly turn to look at him walk past.
And he turns around to look and me and LAUGHS.
That's right. Billy Corgan LAUGHED at me. Best moment of my life haha.
So after that very surreal experience - the fact that we saw him twice already that day, that he was with Courtney Love (tidbit here - she was the singer for Faith No More for a few months before Mike Patton showed up) and that he laughed at my childish temper tantrum - we then went and lined up for our tickets. I guess my mother felt safe knowing Billy Corgan was wandering around the city. Maybe he'd look after us.
Anyway, we lined up only for a few hours and got the tickets without a hitch.
Here it is:
Even the ticket was cool!
We went back to the hotel for dinner and then got back to the theatre two hours before they went on stage, knowing we wanted the best spots in the concert.
The Moore Theatre is TINY y'all, so it was good that we did this. We ended up being exactly at the very front, pressed up against the barricade, the only thing between us and the stage.
Fun fact - The Moore Theatre is featured on Pearl Jam's Evenflow video where Eddie Vedder hangs from the balcony. Someone would later do this during the Smashing Pumpkins concert and he actually dropped on the crowd below. Luckily no one was hurt.
They started off their set playing it acoustic, all of them sitting on stools on stage in their pajamas - awesome. The second part of the set was them rocking out, Billy in his Zero shirt and it was just moshing pandamonium. The barricade was pressed up so hard into my stomach that I was in pain for most of the concert but I didn't care one bit.
After the show we went back to the hotel and promptly waited in the lobby for our beloved band members to return. Even though the hotel staff had their eye on us - we kept telling them we were waiting for our mom. Anyway, we were staying there!
We saw Darcy walk past and we wanted to after her but we were too chickenshit. So we continued to wait, way late, in the lobby chairs. All the while we kept hearing this strangely familiar "huh huh huh" laugh coming from the hotel bar around the corner. I say "familiar" because we had watched their Vieuphoria video enough times to know what the band sounded like in humourus situations.
Then, we saw the culprit: amazing drummer Jimmy Chamberlain, walking towards the elevator. Well we were not going to let this opportunity pass.
We ran up to him with our pen and our picture to autograph. The guy was very drunk but very nice and signed it despite missing his elevator.
"Can I keep this?" he asked, holding up our pen.
"OK!" we squealed. No idea why he wanted the pen, though later on we would find out that Mr. Chamberlain was hardcore into drugs (if you'll remember their keyboardist later died when they both went on a binge)so who knows.
Mr. Chamberlain disappeared in the elevator with our pen and we were left with a snazzy autograph and the best day we both had ever had.
I stopped listening to new SP stuff once Darcy left the band and they had a revolving door of bassists but in late 2007 the band (which still had Jimmy and Billy) came to Vancouver to promote Zeitgeist.
I'm proud to say the concert was still amazing all these years later and I was happy to hear so many of my favourite songs off of Siamese Dream.
I'll leave you here with two of my favourite songs, Cherub Rock( TURN THIS SHIT UP!)
And the dreamy, sad and very early 90's Rhinoceros (love Darcy's blue tights!):
And that's the story of how I became a Smashing Pumpkins groupie one year.
Mike Patton, you better watch out - I'm coming for you next!
PS have you entered the contest to win a snazzy Forever 21 dress? Scroll below or click here :)
PPS OH YEAH! I finished the novel. 85,382 words, 300+ pages of crap completed at 2AM. But it's done! I've officially written a book, and in less than 6 weeks! :)
