Billy Corgan
Most commonly known as Billy Corgan, is an American vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter best known for his work in the alternative rock band The Smashing Pumpkins.
The simplest way that I can understand therapy is that we're born a certain way, we're taught to be something different, and we spend our whole lives trying to unravel it and ultimately align ourselves with who we really are. Life, experiences, traumas -- whatever -- they all add up to make you some altered version of what you are. So there's this battle that goes on between what you are and what you become, and it's been very important for me to unravel what I was taught to be or what I became. and to draw a direct parallel to music -- the closer I get back to being who I really am, the stronger the music gets, because I think what talent I do have is connected to that person, it's not a manipulative process, it's intuitive. You can learn about chords and guitars, but there's a piece of you that makes it individual, and it's been a slow process for me to become whatever it is that I'm supposed to be.
The Pumpkins love rock-and-roll, we absolutely love it, but we also think it's a flatulent, ego-serving kiddie playground. You can have your cake and eat it too.
Some people want to express...apathy with noise and brutality...It's the want to transcend all that, to find some deeper essence in life that drives me.
Everyone has a misguided perception of my brain. When people ask me questions about being sad, or thinking sad, or wanting to be sad, or do I listen to sad songs, it makes me think that I must be sad.
I don't necessarily believe that the sting of failure is a bad thing. It gives you a certain amount of freedom to just say fuck it!
For a 6-foot-3 guy with no hair and a whiny voice, I've done all right.
When I watch a puppet show, I'm not watching the puppets -- I'm trying to see who's pulling the strings.
...What people miss about (Marilyn) Manson is that he is just reflecting, he's an artist, people want to focus that energy on him, but it's not really him, it's really about you. So for every guy sitting there with a beer and a .45 in his belt, Manson is just speaking to that end of society. He's speaking as an artist. He's not speaking as himself, and that's where people get really lost with Manson.
If I had spent fourteen months in a small room with Jesus, I'd want to fist fight with him.
In the beginning, I just viewed them as a cute teen band riding the grunge wave, then they seemed to 'go away' for awhile, so when I heard that they were 'all grown up,' I didn't think much of it ... but when I came across what they were doing, I was struck by the brilliance of it, and the honesty in it, and realized how wrong I'd been. ... Silverchair's mature work evokes for me the best of highly melodic, emotional music with a true understanding of rock grandeur...those are rare forces, not very often put together.
Life is everything and nothing all at once.
If practice makes perfect and nobody's perfect then why practice?
When you move artistically, the natural inclination is to denounce everything that's gone before.
Music's pretty cool and I'm glad to be a part of it. Sometimes when you reach for the stars, you end up in the fucking shit. I don't believe in God. I don't believe in America. I don't believe in rock-and-roll. I believe in me.
...Instead of taking the 'I'm cool, I hope you adore me' path (with my music), I chose the path of how to connect. I think that's the reason a lot of people feel a deeper connection with our band than other bands, and I also feel that's why people polarize on us. If you don't get it, it seems preposterous; if you do get it, it's really heavy -- it has a weight to it.
My earliest memory is of feeling different. My parents told me that I wasn't like other children.
This is not a reaction against a negative world. It's a response to a negative world.
I think the original, 'They're the next Jane's Addiction' things that people said about us in the beginning have been pretty much wiped out.
Been there, done that, seen it, heard it, pissed on it.
It's about the girlfriend who left me last year. I tried to put all my anger in those words, even though I'm just as much to blame for the break-up. 'Soma' is based on the idea that a love relationship is almost the same as opium: it slowly puts you to sleep, it soothes you, and gives you the illusion of sureness and security. Very deceivable.