Billy Corgan 2022-11-22

November 22, 2022 – Los Angeles, CA
Live performance by Billy Corgan
Artist	Billy Corgan
Date	November 22, 2022
Venue	DTS Soundspace at KROQ
Coordinates	34°3′44″N 118°21′8″W
Location	Los Angeles, CA
Venue type	Radio studio
Capacity	200
Personnel	Billy Corgan
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Billy Corgan sits for a 20 minute interview with KROQ's Nicole Alvarez before playing a short acoustic set.

Full performance

Setlist

1. (interview)
2. "Rhinoceros" (acoustic) 
3. "We Only Come Out at Night" (acoustic) 
4. "Cyr" (acoustic) 
5. "Tonight, Tonight" (acoustic) 
6. "Beguiled" (acoustic) 

Notes

• First solo acoustic performances of "Rhinoceros", "We Only Come Out at Night" and "Beguiled"
• Augustus and Philomena Corgan are on stage for "We Only Come Out at Night", "Tonight, Tonight" and "Beguiled"

Banter

Nicole Alvarez: Hi everyone, it’s time. My name is Nicole Alvarez, but you know. We are friends now. Welcome to the KROQ DTS Sound Space, may I introduce Mr. Billy Corgan. Let’s elbow. Let’s elbow, cool. Hi Billy.
BC: Hello.
Alvarez: Thank you for coming.
BC: Oh, thank you.
Alvarez: I’m sitting here and I -– it’s weird ‘cause I know I don’t know you but it feels like I do ‘cause you have been a part of my life my entire life, and I typically don’t speak for others but I think I can speak for the whole room when I say that your body of work –- your entire body of work -– is sewn into the fabric of our lives and that’s –- it’s true. And that’s a powerful position to be in. Do you ever stop and think that there are millions of people that carry your songs around, as if they were their own, and they unlock our memories, they act as friends to us, is that something that is terrifying or humbling?
BC: Um, in the way that you ask it, yeah, absolutely, I mean...
Alvarez: Hahaha!
BC: ...um, ‘cause I, you know, everything from tattoos to people getting married to people having kids to mourning a lost loved one, and when they include your music, that’s a really tremendous honor. I think, uh, the difficulty for the band is been that, um, even despite all the success that we’ve had, we’ve always had other people try to define who we are and who we aren’t. And I think until that journey’s kind of done, we’re still kind of in the fight...
Alvarez: Okay.
BC: ...of, you know, for lack of a better way to put it, like, this is the Smashing Pumpkins, because for everything that we’ve done, there’s been twice as much energy around what we didn’t do or what we should’ve done. Um, and I think over time, especially with the new record, we’ve sort of proven that our way is the best way for us; we understand why it’s not the best way for everybody who wanted Siamese Dream 2 or whatever. But for us, that’s why we’re still going, because we trust each other in that musical language and that journey has always kinda kept us going. Um, and even when we played the Hollywood Bowl the other night -– I mean, we played a bunch of new songs, and that’s really important to us, um, to not, uh, you know -- and I think it’s very much a message of 2022 -– to not let other people define what your life is, who you are as a person, whether it’s your sexuality or your gender or who you love, don’t let other people tell you who you are: you be you. And ever since I was a little kid, I’ve heard I’m doing it wrong, you’re too weird, you know what I mean? It’s like, it’s always been part of my life. I don’t remember a time when everybody was just like, hey, you’re cool the way you are. It was always something was wrong with me and that extended into the music world. And so, I think if you gave us truth serum, we’re really really really humbled, um, particularly here in Southern California, by the love that the fans here have always shown us, always, from the very beginning, from the earliest days of the band. It touches us. Um, you know, that gig the other night that we played, I mean, it really meant a lot to us.
Alvarez: I wanna talk about that gig. So the Smashing Pumpkins, it was the last show of the tour, the Smashing Pumpkins played a stunning show at the Hollywood Bowl: 17 magical songs, including We Only Come Out at Night, which was a surprise; I’ve been running after that song my entire life. Um, and the night was perfect, like, the weather was perfect, the setlist was perfect, and one of the happiest surprises was seeing how multi-generational the crowd was. Do you have any expectations as far as what you’re gonna see when you look out when you go on stage these days or do you just, “Fuck it, I’m just gonna go and see what happens”?
BC: Well, it really depends on where we are ‘cause certain parts of America, it’s very much like, “Oh, it’s the ‘90s.” And I--
Alvarez: Yeah, hahahahaha, it’s very much not.
BC: And I get –- no, but I’m saying –- I get that, um, ‘cause for some people, that culture –- let’s call it Gen X culture –- it never had like a second act, even though obviously here in Southern California and New York and Chicago, whether it’s Blink-182 or Green Day, bands of our generation have had second and third acts. For many people in the country, they still see us as an anachronistic sort of postcard from another time. And so sometimes we walk on the stage and you’re like, “Oh, this is that crowd.”
Alvarez: Yeah, and you can feel it beforehand?
BC: Oh, you can feel it! Yeah, ‘cause you’ll play something like um...like the fourth song in our set, I believe, is Cyr, which is from our last record, the Cyr album. And I-I go off mic and I do my little disco moves and I literally look at 40-somethings like...with this...“what is happening?”
Alvarez: (laughing) “What is happening to Billy?”
BC: “What is happening?”
Alvarez: (laughing) “What is happening to Billy right now?”
BC: Like, “I’m comfortable in the Goth thing and the guitar and the weirdness, but like, you dancing and singing to a disco song is just too weird for me.”
Alvarez: But how cool is it to push people like that outside of their comfort zone, do you get any gratification out of that, ‘cause I think it’s fun.
BC: I think if you’re in music and you’re not pushing boundaries, I mean, why are you in music?
Alvarez: Exactly.
BC: It’s called the arts for a reason, you know? I once had a very powerful person in the music business, right –- actually down the road at the Chateau Marmont –- circa ‘98, say in a English accent, “You know, Billy, it’s the music business for a reason.” You know, “don’t forget it,” you know?
Alvarez: (English accent) Don’t forget it.
BC: And um, that’s cool too, you know, um, it’s what makes the world go round, but...for us, it -– there was never a map. I mean, we started as a psychedelic jam band and we morphed into a pop grunge band into a dark entity into a Goth electro band into a even darker Goth band. And every time we would do it, people would be like, what’s wrong with you, you know? And we were just like, it’s fun, it’s like, it’s a form of dress up, right?
Alvarez: Yeah.
BC: Musical identity is this form -– is as fun as dressing up; that’s why I don’t dress up for Halloween, ‘cause I’m in Halloween the other 364 days out of the year.
Alvarez: (laughing) Hahahahaha, all the time, hahahaha. You are at a point in your career where your body of work is so good and successful, it’s gold, you could easily ride that wave and just tour every once in a while. You could also ride the wave of nostalgia for the -– for the people out there that don’t wanna let the ‘90s go. But you have chosen instead -- which is very, uh, from what I know, very much like you -- is to ambitiously step into your next chapter, which brings me to Atum. When you wrote Mellon Collie, did you see the arc already that would end at Atum? Was it all planned out?
BC: No.
Alvarez: No?
BC: No. I had such a negative reaction to -– and I’m gonna say this very loosely -– fame.
Alvarez: Okay.
BC: It was so weird to me, right? Because I saw where fame for other people was this really cool thing. And I don’t need to name the names, but you know the names of our generation where it was like “I like you being weird and the way you are, that’s a good thing.” With us, it was like “Yeah, you’re famous but you’re still weird and it’s not a good thing.” So it was the double whammy of like, you know, you go to the Italian restaurant and Grandma wanted to come out of the kitchen and talk to you at 75 years old and you’re like, well, this is wild. But then there were all these other people who were like, well, you’re not this and you’re not -– you know, again, same quote, right?
Alvarez: Yeah.
BC: So Mellon Collie was my way of saying, I’m gonna hide behind this personality of Zero. And uh, when I shaved my head and I started wearing the Zero shirt, which I guess I’m still wearing...
Alvarez: Yes. Correct.
BC: ...um, it worked in this weird magical way. It allowed me to be somebody that I was but wasn’t courageous enough to be on stage and conversely, the audience seemed to gravitate towards that cartoon character. And so, I was like, oh wow, this is actually working, this is kinda cool, and so I really leaned into it and the songs on Mellon Collie were an extension of that sort of like I can be whoever I want to be today, I don’t have to be who I was yesterday or who you want me to be tomorrow. And that j –- you can see, particularly around that period, I think the band released 57 songs in two years...
Alvarez: Yes.
BC: ...I mean, we just had this massive explosion of creativity.
Alvarez: It was glorious, it was like Christmas every day.
BC: Yeah, it was really fun and um.... So, when we got around to Machina and I announced, um, quite infamously on KROQ with Tammy -– May 23rd, 2000 –- that the band was breaking up, um, you know, and you know I’m –- I’m a little sick, so I thought it was funny rike -– like, I announced the band was breaking up on KROQ, I might as well die on KROQ too...
Alvarez: Hahahahahahaha!
BC: ...which is why I’m here, I’m actually gonna die today.
Alvarez: Talk about a full circle moment and we don’t want that, we don’t want that.
BC: But um, when we got around to Machina and the band had decided internally to break up, and then the album became about “Well, is there a way we can do this in a creative way?” and hence, the costumes and the weirdness and...the band of course agreed to all this as a concept and then quickly abandoned it, so I was the only one living this weird -– and if anybody, um, cares to know, the whole concept that we had agreed to was the band had become such a caricature of ourself that we were actually going to play the caricatures of ourselves.
Alvarez: Oh wow, hahahahaha.
BC: So we were s -- if everybody thought we were bloated, insane rock stars, we were gonna be bloated, insane rock stars. And everybody agreed to it and then once we started doing interviews, the band was like “I’m doin’ that” but I was still doin’ it. So I looked really insane and they looked kinda actually more normal in –- and so...so, yeah, when the band broke up in 2000 at the end of the year, I never thought there would be a third act. But as soon as James came back to the band and I started thinking about this crazy idea I had about an artist in exile and, um, I pitched it to the band at the beginning of James coming back and everybody just kinda went, “Mmm, sounds like a lot of work.”
Alvarez: Did you know that it would bookend those two albums or was it ever -– was there ever a point where it could have been its own conceptual thing?
BC: No, it’s chapter three of this story.
Alvarez: It’s chapter three of the story.
BC: Yeah, so we go from Zero to Glass on Machina and this is Shiny. This is the third chapter of this character that I started playing around ‘94, ‘95.
Alvarez: How different is this character from Zero? Now that you’ve grown, you’ve evolved, you’ve experienced things, like, is -– has the character as well?
BC: Well, Zero believed he could change the world. By Machina, Glass realized he couldn’t change the world and it was gonna destroy him. And then, Shiny 20 years later, knows that he can’t change the world. And the story actually revolves around somebody accepting “I don’t have as much power as I think I do. Yes, I’ve made beautiful things and it’s beautiful but I’m -– I’m not that powerful. I just kinda wanna do what I wanna do.” And um, and I think there’s something beautiful about that...
Alvarez: There is.
BC: ...because, um, look, when you’re 20 and you’re on MTV every 19 seconds and stuff, I mean, it’s easy to get wacked out and think that, you know, because you talk about, I don’t know...cows or something, like everyone’s gonna listen. And there’s something beautiful about that, and it is more for youth, but I think as you get older, you start to have a deeper respect for people with different opinions, uh, different perspectives and you also start to know that, uh, uh, real -– you should at that point realize...
Alvarez: You should.
BC: ...that the world is a much more complicated place asi -- as far as it involves power and dynamics and governments and now of course we talk almost every day about censorship and Twitter and Elon and, you know, these are all subjects that are very much kind of in our face at a daily level, so I’m glad I figured out long ago that my voice is just one voice in a –- in a much more, uh, profound and big chorus. And I’m happy to be part of that chorus, it doesn’t bother me, I’m okay with it. But I also don’t walk around thinking that if I tweet something or say something, like, an army’s gonna rise up and somehow fix the world via KROQ, you know?
Alvarez: Yeah. That’s fair, that’s fair. That’s fair, that’s fair. I want you all to experience Atum Act 1 for yourself, so I’m not gonna inject my opinion other than it’s really really really good. There’s one moment on the record that surprised me -– sonically surprised me, and that’s the song Hooray, because I wasn’t expecting a celestial disco dance party, like towards the -– it’s a disco dance party and you don’t expect that from the Smashing Pumpkins. It’s my favorite song on the album as of now...
BC: Oh, thank you.
Alvarez: ...but what –- it’s just so much fun, it makes me feel good and roll the windows down kinda song and I didn’t expect that from you. Did that surprise you when you wrote it?
BC: No, because in the story –- and if anybody’s been listening to my podcast, I’ve been explaining the story for each song –- but in that particular song, these kids who are sort of in danger, they find this robot in an old amusement park –- like, think of Disneyland all run down -– and they’re able to access this robot, um, via this information that they have, so that’s the robot’s signature song.
Alvarez: Okay, it’s awesome.
BC: And I saw Electrical Main Street Parade in 1974 at Disneyland.
Alvarez: It sounds like that. Yeah.
BC: And I still have a very profound memory of watching that go by, and so if you listen to that song, that’s me doing my version of Electrical Main Street Parade.
Alvarez: It completely sounds like that, like if that parade had a soundtrack or one song that you wanted to play--
BC: Sung by a robot though.
Alvarez: Sung by a robot though, yeah, it’s Hooray. Um...I also want to talk about, there was an interview and something you said intrigued me, I think it was Guitar World where you talk about how Black Sabbath was your blueprint and you spent your whole life chasing that sounds...
BC: Yeah.
Alvarez: ...but in chasing that sound, you very much found a Smashing Pumpkins -– the Smashing Pumpkins sound -– if you play a Smashing Pumpkins song, just two seconds anywhere, people will automatically go, “That’s Smashing Pumpkins, not Smashing Pumpkins trying to be nothing.” So are you still chasing?
BC: Oh yeah.
Alvarez: Yeah? The Black Sabbath sound?
BC: Oh yeah.
Alvarez: What is it about that sound that you feel like you have not reached or accomplished or that’s so intriguing to you?
BC: Well, I think we all have those memories when we’re young when a certain thing makes us feel a certain way. And the first time I ever listened to Black Sabbath, I was eight years old. My uncle was a drummer, um, he passed away very young but he had this cool stereo and a bunch of progressive rock records like Yes and Jethro Tull, and the first record in the pile was Black Sabbath Master of Reality. And I said to my grandmother at eight, “Hey, can I play something on his stereo?” She gave me that look like "I’m gonna get in big trouble from your uncle."
Alvarez: Yeah.
BC: And I talked her into it, and basically just a little bit older than my son is right now. And um, the first song was Sweet Leaf. You know, you hear the Ozzy’s cough or whatever and then that sound comes in and I was just like, it made me feel as if I was staring into the cosmos or something.
Alvarez: Yup, yeah, I know the feeling.
BC: I don’t know how else to explain other than I felt this kind of sense of agape like “Wow, this is what god sounds like,” you know what I mean?
Alvarez: Yup, I know the feeling well.
BC: So it’s the eight-year-old version of what god sounds like but I’ve never found anything cooler.
Alvarez: That’s amazing, this –- I could talk to him for hours but I’m gonna eventually have to let him go. This has nothing to do with music, this is just like a personal curiosity and for satisfaction: If you were to put a bunch of rock stars and artists in a lineup and be like one of them likes wrestling, I would immediately take him out and be “It’s not Billy Corgan, it’s Weird Al Yankovic is the one.” And yet, you love it and I’m a wrestling baby, so I just wanted to know when you got indoctrinated into that world ‘cause I’m an André the Giant, Junkyard Dog era girl.
BC: Yes.
Alvarez: Yeah, you remember them?
BC: Of course, I mean, they both work for the NWA, which is the company that I own, since 1948, it’s a great honor, but um, I used to watch wrestling with my great-grandmother, who was in her 80s, from Belgium, barely spoke English, and my grandfather in his 60s, and so at five years old, I would watch these people scream at me through the television and it (laughing) obviously made an impression on me.
Alvarez: (laughing) Obviously.
BC: Um, I kinda look at the wrestling thing as like, um, it falls into the category of, um, there’s –- if you don’t have any reason to not live your dreams, then you should live your dreams, and so, I don’t know why one of my dreams is to work in professional wrestling, but...heh, it’s crazy, but I think the thing I’m most proud of, besides the fact that I’ve sort of brought the NWA back from the dead, is that in wrestling, most people don’t see me as Billy Corgan the musician, they just know me as Billy Corgan in wrestling. So I’ve had to earn my respect and operate in that world. And not everybody agrees with my perspective on wrestling, just like they don’t agree with my perspective on rock and roll. But that’s okay, but that’s why I always say it’s like, I just tell people like, a lot of people pull you aside in an airport and say like “What’s the magic sauce of life?” It’s just like, you gotta live your dream.
Alvarez: Yeah, that’s it. It’s as simple as that.
BC: And some of the best people I’ve ever met are like amazing nurses or amazing firemen or.... You know, I mean people who are super committed to what they believe in. That’s always humbling.
Alvarez: Yeah.
BC: And so, I don’t want to be, especially -– I have very young kids, seven and four -– I don’t want them to look at me as somebody who should’ve done something or didn’t do something, I always want them to think, “Well, Dad did what he believed in,” even if it’s insane.
Alvarez: Yeah, hahahahaha, insanity is fun.
BC: Yeah, well, I mean, it’s worked out well for me, you know?
Alvarez: So he’s basically –- he’s saying “You do you, boo” and that’s like honestly the best advice, like you do you, who cares what everybody else is thinking or saying, just live your dream.
BC: So just to interrupt, so we have a saying in our world, ‘cause I also have a teahouse: “Sorrow is the family business.”
Alvarez: (laughing) Sorrow is the family business.
BC: The Corgan family business is sorrow.
Alvarez: Before I let you go, um, I also want to say one more thing about Atum and Smashing Pumpkins now, your guitar work lately is on fucking fire. Like just Beguiled and I think it’s, um, Beyond the...?
BC: Beyond the Vale.
Alvarez: Thank you. Okay, so Beyond the Vale, like it’s just -- it’s just you sound better than ever...
BC: Oh, thank you.
Alvarez: ...it’s incredible. Um, the last thing I will say: Sunday night, I went to see Elton John’s last show at Dodger Stadium and I watched this beautiful man go through his body of work very sentimentally and whatnot and then say goodbye. Do you think that you’re at a legacy point yet where you think about what you want to leave behind or are you any close to satisfaction?
BC: All the time.
Alvarez: Okay, cool. Do you have a general idea about--
BC: Yes, I do.
Alvarez: Are you gonna share it with me?
BC: No.
(audience laughs)
Alvarez: Okay, cool. I didn’t think so, um, I just want say I hope that KROQ at the end of the day has a special place in your heart, and I think you’re cool enough, you are an institution, Billy Corgan, an institution.
BC: Oh, thank you, thank you.
Alvarez: I’m gonna give you guys the man you came to see. Again, let’s hear it for Billy Corgan.
BC: Owoo! (off mic to Alvarez as she leaves the stage) Thank you, thank you.
Rhinoceros
BC: Thank you. (Philomena and Augustus walk on stage) You coming on? Okay, I have a very special guest. Where you gonna stand? You gonna stand there? Okay. This is my daughter, Philomena Clementine. And my son, Augustus Juppiter. Are you dancing or what are you dancing? Are you gonna dance to this song? -- alright!
Philomena: (off mic) I’m gonna sing.
BC: You’re gonna sing, okay, here we go. (strums a few chords) Can you hear the guitar okay? Guitar’s okay? Okay. This is a little song from Mellon Collie called We Only Come Out at Night.
We Only Come Out at Night
(Augustus and Philomena run off stage)
BC: Thank you.
Cyr
BC: Thank you. One of the great things about being in a band is all these great mythological things pop up. Jimmy Chamberlin, the great drummer of the Smashing Pumpkins, likes to tell a story that I wrote this song in one day and we recorded it at night...which is (laughing) totally not true. It sounds good. Was more like months. But it turned out alright. (staring off stage) You wanna get in trouble or what is this? You wanna come back on stage? Alright. (Billy’s kids come back on stage) Are we gonna get some fancy dancin’? Okay, go over there. Go over there. You gonna go there? This is what we call in the Pumpkins smoke and mirrors. You focus on the kids, you won’t hear the (gestures at himself).... Ready? (to Augustus) What song you wanna hear? (Augustus doesn’t respond and Billy waves his hand in front of his face) Are you here with us? (Augustus imperceptibly shrugs) You gonna answer? (Augustus continues to stand silently, looking at Billy, who laughs quietly) It’s good to see the genetics pass through.
Tonight, Tonight
(Billy’s kids leave the stage)
BC: Thank you all for being here, honestly, thank you. Well.... Like to play a song acoustic that I’ve never played before acoustic...so you’re the test -– test audience. (Billy’s kids come back on stage) (to Augustus, who again stands still and smiling to everything Billy says) Now you haven’t busted out any fancy moves yet. I wanna see some fancy moves. Are we gonna see some fancy moves? This is my last song, come on, you gotta –- you gotta bust out here. This is usually where bribery works. What would it take to get some fancy moves? Hot Wheels? Alright, we’re gonna try this one. This is called Beguiled.
Beguiled
(BC after 1st chorus: Come on, this is your spot!)
(BC after 2nd chorus: Come on!)
BC: Thank you so much everybody, thank you.
Alvarez: Uh, this is the best dancer I’ve ever seen. Can we have a hand for her? Guys, thank you so much. What Billy doesn’t know is that I was so nervous on the way here, I thought I was gonna vomit, but luckily I didn’t throw up on him. Thank you, all we can hope is that you had a good time and that KROQ has a special place in your heart. I’m Nicole Alvarez, thank you, get home safe. Thank you, Billy!