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"The world is a vampire" strange words in deed,
yet it is those exact words that open up the track
Butterfly with Bullet Wings, which of course is
the lead single from one of alternative rock's
biggest albums Melancholy and the Infinite
Sadness. The band behind such strange
goings-on are without doubt one of the biggest
things to come out of Chicago since they built
the freeway: The Smashing Pumpkins. I'm radio
journalist Max Kosanavich (?) And, throughout
this audio documentary you will hear from
promoters, DJs, music journalists, and of course
the band themselves, on how three Illinois
natives: Billy Corgan, James Iha, and D'arcy
Wretzky have become, arguably, the biggest
band in the world. William Patrick Corgan was
born in Chicago on March the 17th, 1967, the
son of a professional guitarist. After his parents
divorced, Billy and his younger brother spent
their time living between relatives in the Chicago
area. Although this unsettling period would
provide our angst-ridden punk with plenty of
material, Billy's earlier musical loves were 70's
album rock bands Iike Black Sabbath, and
especially Cheap Trick Cheap Trick? Well Cheap
Trick is gonna play with us at this, uh, the free
show at the Riviera. And, Cheap Trick was like
my favorite band when I was you know 14 to 20
you know. I mean I still love them but I mean it's,
they're definitely attached to my young
consciousness as far as like one of the greatest
bands I've ever heard. They're completely
fabulous. All those first 3 or 4 records,
unbelievable. And I really think it's a shame that
a lot of people don't know about them
as a band, because you know they've had such
a major influence on a lot of the successful
bands of this particular generation. Especially
Nirvana, especially Smashing Pumpkins, Hole.
You know Cheap Trick is such a major influence
and yet you know people end up talking about all
these other bands like Big Black that had
absolutely no influence. So, you know, I find it kind of
ironic you know. This is good, Cheap
Trick, and I'm glad you mention that Cheap Trick
is one of the bands that I point to because there
are people like Steve Albini, whose band Big
Black was, would point to Cheap Trick even and
say "Cheap Trick were really cool." Yeah, even
he pointed to Cheap Trick. Yeah, and now here's
the thing, back then you could be a commercial
band and have cred, okay, and then there was
this thing developed where if you're punk you
couldn't sell records or want to sell records. And
then there was just this rock and roll
special on TV a couple weeks ago, and during
the- Did you see that? The punk episode?
It was very well done. And this is what they said
during the punk episode: "We did the disco
version of "We did the disco version of Heart of
Glass so we could sell records." The Ramones
said "We did pop songs because we wanted to
sell records." The Talking Heads said "We
covered the Al Green song to sell records." Sex
Pistols said "We were outrageous to sell
records." I mean, and I don't know where this
punk-thing came of not selling records,
'cause it's certainly didn't happen during the
punk era. Well it's certainly not coming from us.
Yeah, and you definitely hark back to that, along
with some other Chicago bands to where you
have very little patience for that, you don't see
anything wrong with keeping your artistic
integrity, but also being commercial. I mean, if
anybody can understand this formula, if you're
looking at the mainstream of music culture and
going "you know this Mariah Carey music really
disgusts me, and I wish it wasn't on the radio,"
the best way to get that off the radio is to be on
the radio. The best way, you know, to outdo all
that dumb music that gets played all the time is
to push it out of the way. And that's what
Nirvana's done, that's what Pearl Jam's done,
and that's what we've done to a certain extent,
and Urge and Veruca Salt, and everybody else.
It's you know, when we were 12 years old Cheap
Trick was like the lone thing on the radio that was cool,
I mean it was like the one shining light.
And we're lucky now that there's a- it's a different
environment and we can have success in that
environment. But what people fail to understand
is, if you want to change things, you have to
change them from within. If you want to stand
outside and throw stones, you're really not
gonna do anything because the music industry
is based on money. And the only way you can
change the music industry is to make money.
That's what everybody responds to. It's just like
when you see a movie and you notice how
there's ten movies just like Pulp Fiction that have
come out, that's how it works. And now you see
all these bands that are just like Nirvana like
Bush and Better than Ezra. I mean, those were
never issues with us 'cause we always just
worked on songs and playing out and stuff, but
you know. I don't know, people like- it's like being
in high school or something where people start
calling you names, and start saying things
behind your back, and it really doesn't have
anything to do with anything. For some reason
people attack who their closest to, both politically
and socially for some reason. It's an interesting
thing because, and this is kinda what we're
trying to do, 'Cause you know, certainly Urge
also. Is trying to take Chicago in specific and try
to form a solid musical community by which
there'll be a more positive environment for these
other bands to exist in. And I think that's
certainly begun to happen. There's certainly a
much more positive music culture going on. And
I'm proud to be a part of that, as opposed to be a
part of this stupid negativity where you try to put
people down because, you know, they're getting
this gig and you're not, you know. Okay, well said
At 18, Corgan had a 9 month sojourn in the
Florida sun, and even formed his first band The
Marked. Unfortunately, he soon tired of palm
trees, and returned back home to Chicago
looking for new soulmates. He quickly found
James Iha, whose musical influences, unlike
Billy's, stemmed from the British invasion of the
early 80's through the enigmatic sounds of The
Smiths. Although different, the two clearly saw
enough in one another to attempt a musical
collaboration, and became a duo in July 1988,
with James playing guitar, they utilized the drum
machine to give their efforts more depth. One
evening, after the two left Chicago's Avalon Club
after seeing a Dan Reed Network gig, they had a
chance meeting with D'arcy Wretzky, who
informed them she played bass. D'arcy was
certainly no shrinking violet, and intrigued with
her fearless demeanor, Billy asked her to join the
band. Thankfully for our story, D'arcy agreed.
Still with the drum machine in toe, the band
played their first ever gig at the Avalon Club in
Shortly afterwords, a young jazz drummer,
called Jimmy Chamberlain, who had a brief stint
with a swing band called JP and the Cats, came
on board. Our trio had become a quartet, and
The Smashing Pumpkins were in business.
Unlike a lot of bands though, the Pumpkins were
not a group of long time friends who decided to
form a band. Moreover, they were a group of
individuals who had somehow gyrated towards
one another. This, in turn, lent their early music a
wonderfully raw and discordant energy.
Remarkably, by only their fourth gig they were
opening for the excellent Jane's Addiction.
Although it sounded like an easy beginning, Billy
and D'Arcy assure us it was anything but. It's
actually pretty simple, just- No it's not, it's really
hard. No no no no, it's philosophically. See this is
why we're in a band together. It's actually
philosophically pretty simple. Pisces Taurus,
Pisces Taurus. Yeah right, exactly. Um, ok, the
best thing I can say is, the things that we did that
were right were- we never deviated from what
we did, we just played Smashing Pumpkin's
music, and believe me, there were plenty of
people who told me we were way behind the
times, way ahead of the times, copying trends,
and we- Everything you could imagine someone
could say that's negative about music was said
about us in the first 2 to 4 years, and
occasionally still said about us. Second of all,
we've invested every bit of money we've made in
playing shows, and we played quite a lot of
shows that we put on ourselves or booked
around town, we put everything back into making
demo tapes, and learning how to record, and
working on songs. And we spent every available
moment that we could working on the band. And
that paid dividends because you know by the
time that people finally started to come and see
us, we had progressed to a point where we were
capable of making our own records and writing
our own songs to the point where Gish was, you
know, only two years after Smashing Pumpkins
started and it was a pretty sophisticated album
because we'd made that much progression in
two years. Beyond that, I mean, you just got to
totally follow your heart. I mean, people told us
to change the name, people told me to get rid of
band members, people told me I shouldn't be
singing. I mean, everything you could imagine
that was negative was said, including from
parents, friends, everything. And all I did was
believe in myself and eventually in the band as
an entity, and that's always served us really well.
Billy, you met James, you guys started the band
together- James and yourself. Where did you
meet? Um, he was actually playing with this kind
of deathrocker guy when (?) then we started this,
originally it was like a deathrock kinda band, it
was- and James wouldn't, me and Lenny were
kind of deathrocky and James was into The
Smiths, and James wouldn't follow the deathrock
plan. And then when we went metal, James still
wouldn't follow the metal plan, he still wanted to
look like the guy in The Smiths and it took about
two years before James would grow his hair
long. Now you can't get him to cut it. The band
very quickly managed to establish themselves
on the Chicago music scene, and with the
musical emphasis on (?) shifting away from the
mainstream to the alternative, the Pumpkins
found themselves achieving a lot of local
publicity. When the band were ready to record,
they sought out the help from then unknown
producer Butch Vig, who was working out of
college town Madison in Wisconsin. Not for the
last time in our story, Billy found himself bearing
the brunt of most of the songwriting, playing, and
recording. And, it was mostly through his diligent
efforts that the band's first single, I Am One, was
released on the local Limited Potential label in
early 1991. Then in March, Seattle's famous Sub
Pop label came into the picture, and released
the band's second single, the beautifully titled
Tristesa La Dolly Vita. By now, every A&R man
worth his salt was chasing the band like
bloodhounds. Virgin Records picked up the smell
and signed them to their independence
subsidiary Caroline. With Butch Vig's promotion,
The Smashing Pumpkins released their debut
album, Gish, in May 1991 which sold a very
healthy 400,000 copies. This is made even more
remarkable as the album was actually released
at the same time as another Butch Vig
production called Nevermind by a band called
Nirvana. I wonder what happened to them? With
the grunge sound now exploding all across the
states Caroline seemed unsure how to promote
the band. Were they loud hippies or quiet
grungesters? Perplexed, they appeared happy to
see the band's fortune taken over by another
Virgin subsidiary, Hut. Hut clearly knew a good
thing when they saw it, and in August of 1991
simultaneously re-released Gish and a new
single, Siva. The grunge-chique that Nirvana had
spearheaded was now clearly a major
commercial force, and The Pumpkins were
beginning to become noticed by more and more
radio stations. I spoke to Lisa Rex, who is
musical director at San Bernardino's alternative
rock station KCXX about when she first became
aware of the band. I remember the first time I
heard The Smashing Pumpkins. I was working
my very first job in radio and it was in the
Midwest in Columbus, Ohio. And now The
Pumpkins, of course being from Chicago, had a
really great grassroots support, even back in
1991 Smashing Pumpkins already had a great
fan base working in the college radio world-
which was really the main outlet for alternative
music back in the early 90's and late 80's. I think
something very telling about The Smashing
Pumpkins, and something that will lend to the
longevity of the band is that they've always had
that grassroots support. They had a really great,
strong fan base before they were ever the big
band, and really their own work and their own
relentless touring schedule and their own just
sheer productivity has really set them up for
success in the future. The band then toured
extensively. Including an opening slot for the
Red Hot Chili Peppers. They also managed to
make a trip to Britain. Then after doing a number
of sell out shows in London, laid down some
tracks for the legendary British DJ, John Peel.
Also around this time, the band managed to get
included on the soundtrack to the former Rolling
Stones writer, Cameron Crowe's, film Singles-
which starred Matt Dillon. With the film set in
Seattle during the height of grunge's popularity,
the soundtrack, which also included songs from
such notables as Soundgarden and Pearl Jam,
became immensely popular, and it gave The
Pumpkins some much needed exposure within
America. Mind you, Billy Corgan, an Illinois
native, was not overly impressed with now
continuously being associated with the Seattle
sound. And certainly I think the greatest thing is
that we've always just been ourselves. You
know, certainly, you know there was a really
weird time for us when after Gish came out and
you know Nirvana became so famous,
seemingly overnight, and there were all these
people questioning why we weren't that kind of
band and why didn't we write three minute
songs. And, I'm really proud that we didn't like
suddenly change our course and try to follow,
you know, the grunge revolution into the sea,
you know. We stuck to our guns and and and I
think that's why people respect us, because we
haven't jumped on that ship, and now we're
surrounded by 8,000 imitators and you know, it's
just a crazy world. But at that time it would've
been really easy to do that because certainly
there were bands from America that we would
go to Europe and there would be the words
"from Seattle" would be bigger than the actual
band. I mean, people were selling where they
were from and what label they were on and what
movement they were part of more so than what
they were selling themselves. And, people would
assume that we were from Seattle and we would
have to say "no." And they would say "oh you're
a grunge band," and we would have to say "to,
we're not we're not." It's like, this went on 1,000
times for years and I'm really proud that we've
just been ourselves, and at the end of the day if
we didn't sell another record, we'd be happy
because we rocked and we certainly had a good
time. We did it our way. Do you think the Seattle
rumor had anything to do with the Sub Pop
single? The Afghan Whigs ran into the same
thing. I remember thinking- I'm sure that was
part of- Yeah I mean- The entirety- I mean that
didn't help, but um it was- It's hard to kind of put
it all into words, but it was amazing. Like we'd go
to Europe, and everybody was so enamoured
with this part of the world. And to not be from
here was kind of like, oh we're not really
interested in you. You know it was really a weird
thing. People used it to their advantage probably.
Trust me, certain, those people know who they
are. Unfortunately though, now with major
success beckoning, all was not well in The
Pumpkin's camp. Billy Corgan was utterly
depressed, and showing real signs of emotional
collapse. By his own admission at the time, he
hated himself and the band. And, after coming
off their lengthy tour, relationships between the
group were rapidly disintegrating. James Iha and
D'Arcy, who had been a couple for some time,
broke up. And, Chamberlain's way of dealing
with the pressure was to nose-dive into an orgy
of drugs and alcohol. Inadvertently though, this
internal strife would play a major part in the
rebirth of the band, and the inspiration for a lot of
Billy's material for the second album. But where
does most of that inspiration come from?
Sometimes I think "oh I've got the best idea" and
I write it down, and then I go back later and it's
so terrible, I think "what the hell am I thinking?"
You know, and then other times it's like I totally
have to stick a crowbar in my gut and out comes
really good stuff. So, lord knows how I write
these songs, I have no idea. I heard an interview
with you once, Billy, where you were talking
about not all the lyrics of your music necessarily
may have to do with true life things, but it all
comes from different experiences that you've
kind of mixed up and made seem a little bit more
obscure. Yeah, well there's certainly an
emotional truth, you know, to them all, you know.
Not that I've lived every moment of those
because I don't have time to live. So if I had time
to live, I would write about that, so. I don't think
you want to hear about- I'm in another hotel
room, things are real sad, and the phone's not
ringing. We have no life, hey, and then the
comes in you know. I don't think you
really want to hear about that, so we just sing
about what our lives could be like. What they
used to be like. Yeah, or what they used to be
like. Once again, Butch Vig was recruited to
co-produce, and the band, once again, entered
the studio. It was to be a tempestuous few
months as tempers began to fray, whether it was
Billy's pressure for perfection, or the others' lack
of commitment to the group, the cause remains
unclear, but with tracks continuously left
unfinished, a frustrated Corgan started to spend
long hours in the studio, playing reputedly all the
guitar and bass parts. A quarter of a million
dollars later, Siamese Dream emerged, recorded
in Atlanta, Georgia, and mixed at Canoga Park
in California, the album had a huge sound, owed
mostly to the over dubbing on the guitars, as
many as 20 on one riff. Siamese Dream hit the
streets running in September, 1993. It contained
three major singles: the hard hitting, Cherub
Rock; and the subtle pop-style of the excellent
Today and Disarm. All three singles gained
major MTV rotation week after week. Contrast,
brutal honesty, and friction have always been the
band's strongest points, the lack of distinction
between night and day. Rolling Stone Magazine
at the time went even so far as to say "What
looks really dysfunctional is a meshing of the
dysfunctions to make it functional." You see,
even the reviews were getting strange. Keen to
promote the album, the band set off on a major
US tour, taking time during the summer to
co-headline the ever popular LollaPalooza tour
with the Beastie Boys. Ten years from now,
twenty years from now, thirty years from now,
there's a whole people now with a bunch of
bands, some of them are famous, and some of
them aren't, well one thing they'll be able to say
is "well I was on LollaPalooza, you know, I got to
go on this traveling thing with all these other
people." And, is that an overly romanticized
thing, or do you actually, did you take something
away from that? Are you proud for having been
on it? Was it a fun experience? Um, I think it
was, it was like good and bad. I mean, I don't
know, it was a lot of shows, and there's there
was a lot of hype attached to the bill like that,
and I don't know, people imagine all the bands
like bonding and shooting up backstage, or
whatever, but it, I mean, generally speaking
there were a lot of um critics about the year we
were on. I mean, we thought it was a really good
bill, a lot of different bands, a lot of different
styles. It was a terrific bill, Alice in Chains and
Primus and all those ridiculous things that have
been on before. I mean, it's really hard to like
marry commerce and art, but I mean, we always
thought it was like pretty good bill and the
second stage was good. And, there were a lot of
things that were worked out. Like with the
second stage, which wasn't happening in
previous years, but I don't know, I think a lot of,
these hipper and dao critics, you know, they just
didn't see it for what it really was you know,
which was, you know, an open air festival, and
there were good bands playing. You know, there
was this attached cynicism to it just because it's,
you know, this big entity now. My my my- I was
certainly proud that we were the headliner that
that particular year. But, what really saddened
me was the conservative attitudes not only from
a lot of the audiences, but from a lot of the
bands. I think the commerce part of it has
become such a major influence that bands really
are afraid to be themselves, and everybody kind
of turned down their circus acts for LollaPalooza.
To make sure everyone had their hands waving
up in the air, and it saddened me because, I, in a
lot of ways it influenced this record because, to
be concise, not that LollaPalooza was the
beginning of the end, but for my personal
feelings about it, I saw it as some kind of symbol
that, okay, this is the end of alternative music
right here, this is where we're headed down into
nowhere. When when we've so far walked away
from what this is about, which is shocking,
moving, exciting, down to, you know, where do
we put the MTV hit, you know. And other- that
really saddened me, you know, that really
saddened me. Other bands were doing that your
year? Absolutely. Wow, anyone you want to
name? No, see I don't like to get into the whole
name thing because now they have something
petty. You know, people are gonna think I hate
Pearl Jam, you know I don't hate Pearl Jam, I
love Pearl Jam, but you know what I mean? It
seems to make it personal, and I'm not making it
personal, but it's just like, there are there are
truths that we believe because we come from a
different, we come from a different angle, you
know? We have a really long relationship with
trying to put the fans first with our records, with
our tours, with everything. So, it makes us sick
when people are taking advantage of the fans
under other auspices. And that's what I'm saying
about LollaPalooza, is it's not LollaPalooza's
fault, but it's unfortunate that a lot of the
audience take those bands for granted, a lot of
bands take the audience for granted, and we've
lost... we so quickly forget that 5 years ago we
were all playing to, what, 500 people. Now it's
like oh 30,000 people boo hoo, boredom
boredom you know? Was it that way in
LollaPalooza this year? Did you guys hear? Did
you go to any shows? Didn't go, but certainly this
year was not as good economically because
they only had 27 days instead of 43.
LollaPalooza, as an entity, is a business, and I
think this year is conservative- bookings and all
of that was certainly trying to make sure there's
a LollaPalooza five years from now. I think if they
try to do another big tour and it falls flat on its
face there'd be no LollaPalooza, so I think
they're thinking ahead, I don't think it's as simple
as trying to play it close to the artistic vest, but
that's just my cranky pissant view. And your
LollaPalooza was financially successful, wasn't
it? It was actually the most successful
LollaPalooza ever. And could you have gotten
more money if you had gone out and toured, just
toured by yourself? Yes, see that's why it pisses
us off when people try to insinuate that we did
something like that only for the money, you know
we could've, we could've made more money on
our own, but we really wanted to be part of that, I
mean because it's a rare opportunity, it's a rare
moment. And that's what I'm saying, to anybody
who cares, we've been in a great time, you
know. We get so quickly used to the good music
that's come out that we forget how bad music
can actually be. And I think, I think, I think that
you know if everyone can remember, you know,
that there are still really good, valid bands
playing, and not to confuse that with all the other
crap that's out there now. To distinguish between
what's real, and what's imitation. It's difficult, it's
difficult because major media, you know,
whether it be a particular radio station, or a
magazine, is putting imitation bands on the same
level as the bands that helped make this
happen. And we were certainly one of the bands
that helped make this happen, so it's difficult to
compete with a band that is basically imitating-
you know we used to compete with Nirvana, that
was good, that was real, that was like viscerally
good. Now we compete with like imitation
Nirvana, there's nothing good in that. And it's
sad, it's really sad. The tour continued well into
1994, and by the time The Smashing Pumpkins
hit the UK, in February of that year, the band
were firing on all cylinders. British promoter,
Andy Copping, remembers them well. The first
time I got familiar with them, is I remember them
being popular with the student market over here
and then in the early 90's I remember them
touring Britain and playing a lot of the student
venues, and you know, they were like three quid
a ticket, really cheap tickets to get in. They were
a relatively new band, obviously American, but
not big enough to pull massive crowds. They
played like the Reading Festival, I can't even
remember the year, I guess it would've been '91,
'92? Um and they did receive quite critical
acclaim by the press. People at Reading, at the
festival, thought they were really really cool. And
then they went out on a tour of Britain. Um things
started to really move for them, particularly in
this country, around the Siamese Dream album.
Obviously the track Cherub Rock being one of
the bigger tracks off of it. And I remember I did a
show with them at Nottingham Rock City, um
which sold out like really quickly, it was like one
of the hottest, biggest of the year. Um, the
support of the band was like The Verve, which
obviously now moved on to bigger and better
things, so from uh a punter's view point you
know, The Smashing Pumpkins and The Verve,
in the early part of their career, on the same bill,
in a small, intimate venue was um, was really
something special. I remember before the gig,
sort of chatting with the band as such, and they
were very typically, should I say, got that Seattle
like attitude, very laid back, uh and a bit sort of
druggie vibe. I would assume that's something to
get them through the hours on the road, and
what have you. But, just very pleasant, very
humble people. I remember having a long
conversation with Jimmy Chamberlain, the
drummer at the time, he's since been sacked,
but uh his involvement with, allegedly, drug
culture and he actually stood out as like not
really fitting in with the rest of them. He was
more of your archetypal rock and roll star, he'd
be stalking about, he'd drive around on his
Harley, um in Chicago you know, LA. And, one of
his best friends was Tommy Lee from Motley
Crue and he would go you know go out with
Tommy and Pamela Anderson and it was really
strange to hear somebody in The Smashing
Pumpkins talking like somebody from The Guns
'n Roses I guess. He was a really nice guy, and
I'm certainly not doing him down, and he was
great conversation, and he was telling stories
about his love for the Smashing Pumpkins,
adored being in the band. And I guess it's
unfortunate the way things turned out, you know
he's not part of the band anymore. But, I do
remember the show being really really special. It
was one of those gigs that maybe you're not too
familiar with the music, but you could just feel
that they had got a special something when they
um performed on stage. The crowd was totally
transfixed, and great songs delivered by a great
band. To keep their fans content, the band
released their million-selling b-side collection,
Pisces Iscariot in October 1994. Ending the year
on a high, the band were ready to start recording
their new album. But nobody was quite ready for
what Billy had in mind, a double album, over two
hours long. One side entitled Dawn to Dusk and
the other Twilight to Starlight. The album in
question, Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness,
was undoubtedly their most ambitious project to
date. Billy was, clearly, never going to do
anything by halves. The industry however, was
not entirely convinced. Virgin Record's Brian
Smith explains- I must say, it really did come as
a big shock when we first heard that the much
awaited new album was gonna be a double.
Previously, of course, all double albums had only
sold a fraction of a normal single album, and we
really feared for the overall sales of the new
release. But then, they had always been sort of
slightly eccentric, The Pumpkins. But, obviously,
in the music business that's not really a bad
thing most of the time. I have to admit, we were
really apprehensive about this, however in the
end the bloody thing exceeded over 7 million
copies, so. Which I think makes it the biggest
selling double album that Virgin have ever done.
I think Billy Corgan is gonna be the key to the
success of this band in the future. His creative
juices just never seem to end. If you look at his
most recent endeavors, just in the past few
years, I mean they put out the double CD,
Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness, this
becomes the best selling double CD of all time.
Now this is quite an accomplishment to a band
that was really introduced to the world during
their headlining days of LollaPalooza, just the
year before. Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness
really gave the previous fan base everything
they needed from The Smashing Pumpkins, a lot
of their really old sounding tunes as well as their
branching out into some classical sounding
music, and some really experimental things that I
think worked really well to broaden the fan base.
Now when I first heard they were putting on a
double CD, I remember being very excited. I was
in a record store, buying something else, and the
woman behind the counter was telling me there
was a double CD due to come out in just a few
months. I remember taking that enthusiasm back
to the radio station I was working at at the time,
and I think in the music business there was a lot
of skepticism about it. I think a lot of people
thought that this was too big of an endeavour for
The Smashing Pumpkins- but obviously if you
have the best selling double album of all time,
the sales records proved everybody wrong.
People have been writing about what this album
is. Oh my god it's a double album, woah it's a
double album. It obviously takes an incredible
feat to put something like this together, was this
intended to be a double album at first, or was it
just so much material that started coming out
that you felt you had enough stuff to put this out?
Um we always intended it to be a double album
from the very beginning. We set out to do it and
boy we did it. Did it good. Yes you did, let me
ask you this though. After saying it, "oh this is
gonna be a double album," was there ever a
point of self-doubting, wondering "am I ever
gonna pull this off?" or did you feel confident, or
did it actually give you inspiration to actually get
it done, the internal pressure? Um, no I think we
took to the challenge of it. We, when we started,
we've been a band for about six years, and
we've been through lots of different changes,
permutations. And, I think we needed something
to get our blood going. And, I doubted it a couple
times, and I think it's kind of a crazy idea to
begin with, and I think you almost have to go
through some of those doubts to come out the
other side and really kinda go with it. Because
it's obviously not a good quote-unquote career
move. You know, a lot of people didn't think it
wasn't such a good idea, and there was a lot of
resistance there to what, you know, the pricing
and different things like that so, you know.
Whatever, it exists, and it's not going to go away,
so we're happy about that. So James, Billy
comes up to you and says "I wanna do a double
album," what was your reaction? Um. That's
pretty much what it was, stunned. Yeah, we were
shocked and stunned. No, I think we had a
general, sort of, meeting about it, and um, before
we started the album, and uh I don't know. You
know, everyone was- we started out sort of
casually practicing, and I think the more and
more songs that we started going through, that
started coming together, it was, everyone, it was
sort of a momentum where it wasn't- I don't
know, we never really talked about it being a
double album. I mean, we just kept going
through more and more songs. It wasn't like "oh
here we are today, we're going to do a double
album so let's keep that in mind," it was never
like a self conscious thing like that. Ten months
of studio seclusion were about to pay off. The
album sold more than 7 million copies, the
record for a double album. Opening and closing
with the lonely strings of a piano, the 26 songs
explored every imaginable music terrain. Billy
was on a roll. And even the choice of Flood over
Butch Vig as producer, was an inspired one. Um
I was wondering why you guys picked Flood to
produce Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness
instead of Butch Vig? Well, Flood producing
Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness has a better
ring to it than Butch Vig producing Melancholy
and the Infinite Sadness. No, but seriously, um,
Flood because of the bands that he'd worked
with like U2 and Depeche Mode, we felt could
better do this crazy album. It's really that simple.
Now, when I had heard that Flood was working
on the record, I was thinking "wow there's going
to be a big sound difference on this record," and
I think people were treated to that. In fact, I
remember seeing a quote, and I'm not sure if it
actually came out of your mouth or not Billy,
about what was being created here was
comparable to The Wall of the 90's. Oh that was
me shooting my mouth off before we actually
recorded the album, so. But, uh, in terms of
sound, I mean, 1979 is such a far cry from
anything you guys have done in the past, uh.
Was working with Flood an intentional thing
because you knew you were gonna go in that
direction? Um, it was kind of a guess, I don't,
you know. 1979 was probably the most, or in
fact, was the last song I wrote for the album, so.
Doesn't it always work like that? It's kinda weird
that way, yeah. The first single, Butterfly with
Bullet Wings, was a full on assault with Billy
wearing his now customary Zero shirt in the
video, spitting out his anger and emotions
through the lyrics of the song, feelings that were
understood the world over. Acclaimed British DJ
and promoter, JJ Fowler (?)- Smashing
Pumpkins walked in, what's one thing you think,
the first thing that comes to mind is phenomenal.
A band that came out of the Chicago scene that
was building and building, but managed to come
to a peak at the same time as the entire Seattle
sound. A band, whose album Gish came out
right at the same time as Nirvana's Nevermind
hit the streets, which was really really unfair for
them, but they rode it, they toured, they stuck
behind it, radio got behind it. And then, the
second album came out, which has Today,
Cherub Rock, and absolute classics in their own-
in their own area of alternative rock. Um, and
then we got, of course, the release of
Melancholy, which was a double album that was
very very long and everybody said was going to
prove to be the death of the band, but songs like
Zero and of course Butterfly with Bullet Wings
just hit the floor in the clubs and everybody just
loved the new sound, the way the band was
progressing. Flood had brought out the best ever
in their alternative rock cross-over sound. A little
bit laid back, some of the album, but there again,
what can you expect from Billy who's a bit of a
strange character at the best of times? Uh, as I
said, then Tonight, Tonight of course won, or got
huge praise from MTV. And of course, America
was embracing the band in such a way that it
was just unbelievable, and here in the UK they
toured and played at festivals, and were going
down an absolute storm. And of course they're
now going to work on the Batman and Robin
soundtrack with the end is the beginning of the
end an apt title if there ever was one, because I
feel like they're gonna move into a totally new
era here, an entire new chapter of The Pumpkins
life is about to open. And, it's not only gonna be
interesting, but it's gonna be absolutely fantastic
and uh I for one, can't wait. I was reading some
letters in response to your article in last months
CMJ Magazine, which this guy says pretty much
to stop whining because you make so much
money about your troubled past, and I didn't
really agree with that letter, but how do you feel
about that? That's a pretty typical like Rush
Limbaugh response to what we have to say, I
think if anybody's really read what we've said,
we've never really whined. We whined about
each other, you know? That's a different thing.
But, uh, we've never whined about the success
we've had, we've never whined about fans, all
we've said is like, we just want people to be as
honest as they expect us to be. And we have
people who come to concerts that don't really
care about The Smashing Pumpkins, so why
should we pretend otherwise. I mean, I think
that, I think we owe it to the people who like our
music to be absolutely honest and have great
integrity and if that seems like whining
sometimes, that's just because people can't bear
to hear the truth. The fact of the matter is, we're
all, pretty much everyone I talk to, is in basic
agreement that alternative music is no longer
really alternative, that moshing has ceased being
a spontaneous activity, there's a lot of things
about alternative culture that have passed on to
the mainstream. So, we can call a spade a
spade and and and. Move on. And try to move
on, and make for better music, and better things,
and and and try to create better relationships
between bands and fans, or we can continue the
raw tradition of we're different from we are and
you're not as cool as we are, and if that's the
kind of bands you want to listen to, more power
to you, but the bands that I wanted to listen to
are bands that I could relate to and that's always
been our position. And people, a lot of people
don't like that. They want their rock stars to be
untouchable. And, where we come from, where
we stand for, it's never been what we're about.
Billy, I remember hearing a quote that you had
mentioned about moshing, and about how the,
all it is these days is getting in a pit. You're
moshing for the wrong reasons, how do the
Pumpkins feel? It's over-intellectualizing it, but.
Okay, alright. You're sick of moshing. No, we
were playing in 1990 when people would go nuts
because they'd never heard music like this
before. They were really moved, not like it was
the cool thing to do. It's really disgusting to us
when we're playing one of our slow, beautiful
songs- Disarm would be a good example-
Moshing, you know, they're like body surfing, it's
like they're not even paying attention, they're
not. They've seen it on MTV and that's what they
want to be. We shouldn't, you know, beat a dead
horse, but basically we've just tried to say "hey, if
we're rockin you, the, and if you're moved, that's
cool. But, certainly when you play a slow song
and people are doing whatever it is they think
they're doing, I mean. I- Let's start a new dance.
The pogo is a good one, the pogo. Back in the
Devo days. I mean, but you know, I mean, I
wouldn't, we don't wanna be, we don't wanna be
the voice of the anti-moshing contingency, you
know what I mean? I mean we don't really care
that much. But, you know, it's just one of a
hundred honest statements that we've made that
someone takes umbrage with because they think
we're trying to tell people what to do. It's just,
you know, it's, I've always respected people in
bands. I mean R.E.M was a great example of a
band that always spoke some kind of truths
about rock and roll. And, we feel a certain kind of
responsibility to speak that kind of truth. People
don't want to hear that truth, that's fine, there's
plenty of bands that don't like you, trust me.
They don't really care about you, they're self
serving bands, they only care about what they're
doing. And, if they want to stare at their shoes
and play music that's cool. The release of further
singles Zero; Tonight, Tonight; and one of the
best songs of the year in my opinion, 1979,
brought in a multitude of critical acclaim. And the
band made off with all of the year's awards for
MTV all the way across to Rolling Stone.
However, all of these fabulous achievements
would be tainted by tragedy. On May the 12th,
1996 at a gig in Dublin, a 17 year old girl was
fatally injured and scores of others were hurt in
an unruly mosh pit. Then, two months later, the
bands touring keyboardist, Jonathan Melvoin,
died from a heroin overdose in his room at
Regency Crest Hotel, Jimmy Chamberlain was
with him. Although Chamberlain was cleared of
all charges relating to the death of Melvoin, he
was sacked by the band. I have to admire the
guts of the band to kick out Jimmy Chamberlain.
They were on tour at the time, Jimmy
Chamberlain had been dealing with a heroin
addiction for some time, and I think that the
decision by The Smashing Pumpkins to kick him
out of the band was really a good message to
send to the kids. You know what, hey, we are not
gonna put up with this behavior in a band
member. And, we'll go back to a drum machine
like we used in the old days, which is exactly
what they did. You'll look at other bands who've
made different decisions, like The Stone Temple
Pilots, the other members of the band just went
on to form a new band, never really condemning
the acts of the person who was responsible
really for the break up of the band, because of
their drug addiction. In the face of adversity,
Corgan was unable to sit still, recruiting fellow
Chicagoan Matt Walker from Filter on drums and
The Frogs keyboardist Dennis Fllemion, the
band not only produced music for the Mel
Gibson film Ransom, but also released a five CD
Boxset called The Aeroplane Flies, which
contained Melancholy singles, b-sides, and even
some cool covers from Blondie, The Cure, and
even The Cars. In 1997 there is no break for the
infatigable Billy Corgan, as he enters his 30's,
the chip on his shoulder is undeniably fading.
But the spirit and the energy that is the core of
The Smashing Pumpkins, is still as evident as
ever. Never stereotypical or frightened to explore
new musical boundaries, the electronica-tinged
hard-hitting, The End is the Beginning is the End
for the Batman soundtrack is the perfect
example of Corgan's vision, and compelling
intensity, but where will they go from here?
KCXX's Lisa Rex has some thoughts. Besides
working on the double CD, they've done some
great soundtrack work as well, working on the
Batman soundtrack which is a great song The
End is the Beginning is the End, a wonderful
song for a horrible movie. Really elevating that.
And they worked on the soundtrack for Lost
Highway as well. It seems amazing to me, Billy
Corgan's energy never seem to end, he's also
doing some producing. I just got the latest Ric
Ocasek album, former lead singer of The Cars,
he co-produces, he plays guitar, he sings back
up on that. Obviously, taking that love of
producing to a whole new level. And, I think
that's where we're really gonna see Billy's
energies in the future. I think the band really
views themselves as pioneers in the music
business. Back in 1996, Billy Corgan was at the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction, and it was
his job to induct Pink Floyd and give them their
award. He said something along the lines of "the
70's was a decade filled with awful music and
most of it was created by the people in this
room," of course speaking to the people at the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction. I think that
speaks to the fact that Billy really looks within
himself for inspiration and into the modern day
music rather than drawing it from the past. I think
the shear productivity of Billy Corgan and the
band is really gonna catapult The Smashing
Pumpkins into probably one of the most prolific
and memorable bands of the 1990's. Who knows
what lies in store for the Smashing Pumpkins
from here on out. Whatever it is, the spirit of rock
and roll, punk, and all the other magical
ingredients that have made The Pumpkins,
arguably the biggest band of the world present
will keep us all captivated. Wherever The
Pumpkins are headed, it is certain to be
different, even weird at times, but always
exciting. And, I was wondering, is it like cool, or
flattering, to be in a room full of people who are
totally obsessed with you, or is it scary? Um, well
the first question I would ask you is- why? And
the second question I'd ask is- don't you have
something better to do? And the third question I
would ask is- thanks and what? That's not a
question. No, it's, I mean, honestly, to be serious
for a moment, I mean we worked at this for so
long, that you get to a point where you really
appreciate people coming to see you, and
people coming and being interested because it's
been a long road. I mean this doesn't happen
overnight, so. It'd be worse if we weren't in a
room full of people who liked us. Exactly. That
would suck. That would be a lot worse. That's so
cool that you guys have that attitude though,
because a lot of people, I think, when they reach
the size of the size that The Pumpkins are at this
point, kind of almost feel, not like a negative
feeling towards their fans, but sort of an
anti-publicity, sort of wanna be away from the
fans. Yeah, I mean. You can't always deal with it.
You can't always deal with being mobbed or
something, but generally we're not. I mean, I
always feel like our fans relate to us on a sort of
different level than other bands, much more like
they feel like they relate to us and so they're
respectful. Yeah I got a note from a girl the other
day that says "you don't know how hard it is to
actually be a Smashing Pumpkins fan," meaning
like she gets a lot of crap from other people
about it, so. We certainly feel like we have a
different affinity with people who like our band
because they can definitely understand where
we're coming from.