July and October 2016 – Shangri La Studios

July and October 2016 – Shangri La Studios
Studio session of Billy Corgan
Artist	Billy Corgan
Album	Ogilala
From	July 2016
To	October 2016
Location	Shangri La Studios
Producer(s)	Rick Rubin, Billy Corgan
Engineer(s)	Dana Nielsen, Jason Lader

The July and October 2016 Shangri La Studios were the recording sessions for Billy Corgan's second solo album Ogilala. Largely written on Corgan's first trip touring America in early 2016, producer Rick Rubin urged Corgan to record a stripped-down, acoustically-based album. Basic tracking sessions were held in July with overdubs in October.

“ I started writing songs for me, only for me. I was travelling around America and realised there was still a lot to write about, there were still people hurting, it made me think: ‘Get off your pity party and get back to work’. ” — Billy Corgan, inews interview, October 2017

Tracks recorded

• "Aeronaut"
• "Amarinthe"
• "Antietam"
• "Archer"
• "Half-Life of an Autodidact"
• "The Long Goodbye"
• "Mandarynne"
• "Processional"
• "Shiloh"
• "The Spaniards"
• "Zowie"
• Approximately 4 other songs

Equipment

An early 60's Guild Texan acoustic ("probably the loudest acoustic" Corgan has) was the primary guitar used for recording. He also used a 60's Gibson Tortoise on at least one song.

Background

Ogilala studio

Corgan has said he went into the studio ready to make his final record. "Have you ever had the fantasy where you were going to write a suicide note?" he asked i News. "The letter people would read after you die, where you say all the things you wouldn’t have the courage to say? It felt a little like that. Siamese Dream was the only other record that had that same level of confession: something needs to die, something needs to live, something needs to be let go of, something needs to prosper."

The sessions followed the autumn 2014 sessions for the abandoned Day For Night album. Corgan felt disgusted with the material, save for a few songs. He had decided against writing anymore records for The Smashing Pumpkins. After writing a new set of songs destined as a solo effort, Rubin expressed interest in the project and soon Corgan was in his Malibu, California studio. "[Rubin] told me he liked the feeling of the demos that I sent him, so he just wanted to start there and see where it led us. He didn’t have a destination in mind ... he wanted to let the record make itself", Corgan told Drowned In Sound.

Corgan left much of the process to Rubin's direction. "I loved it," says Corgan. "He makes really wonderful decisions and after a while, once I started to understand his vision, which he doesn’t necessarily articulate, it comes out more in his decision making, then I was able to get behind that and push it to something that felt very personal."

Return of James Iha

The song "Processional" marks the first time since The Smashing Pumpkins' break-up in 2000 that Corgan has collaborated with the band's former guitarist James Iha. Regarding the experience, Corgan had to say:

“ He came to visit me when I was demoing some of the songs, just to hang out, and because he was sitting there I thought, well, fuck, I’m going to play some of them to him and get some feedback. He was very encouraging, and that encounter stuck with me, so when the record was almost done, and as Rick was saying that it was my last chance to add anything else, I sent James the whole album and told him to pick whatever he wanted, so that it’d be about what he was attracted to. He picked ‘Processional’ and one other song that didn’t make the album. I love the work he did, it’s so cool. ” — Billy Corgan, Drowned In Sound, October 24, 2017

Corgan said Iha was likely the individual "most responsible for me being more interested in acoustic music", and that asking him to perform on the record was a way of paying tribute to his influence.