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I Did 13-something Years Of Talking To Wrestlers And Promoters About Why They Did Certain Things And Why They Booked Matches A Certain Way And What They Were Thinking And Whether They Were Satisfied With The Draw. And I Got A Lot Of Insight In The Business.

-Billy Corgan

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I Did 13-something Years

Billy Corgan

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I Did 13-something Years Of Talking To Wrestlers And Promoters About Why They Did Certain Things And Why They Booked Matches A Certain Way And What They Were Thinking And Whether They Were Satisfied With The Draw. And I Got A Lot Of Insight In The Business.

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More From Billy Corgan

Smashing Pumpkins Has Never Been A Band About Hit Songs.

Now The Expectation Is That, Once The Public Decides That The Artist Is Gentrified, The Public Demands That The Artist Stop Growing. And [the Public] Actually Puts All Their Energy Into Reasserting Or Re-establishing What The Artist Has Long Ago Left Behind. Because That's What They Want. The Source Of Creativity, The Gift That's Been Given, Be Damned.

It Seems To Me That References To Bands Like Black Sabbath And Led Zeppelin Meant More To Me A Year Ago And All Those Old Things Are Totally Losing Importance.

I Think Long And Hard About What It Is I'm Actually Trying To Do, And Then I Kind Of Have To Narrow My Focus Into That. If I Don't, I'm Too All Over The Place.

I Think It Would Be Very Interesting To See That Many People Would Probably Be Okay With Paying More For Services And Goods That They Felt Were More Holistically [generated]. Which Means The Death Of The Old System Which Rewarded People For Taking Advantage Of One Another.

The Title Of A Song Is Like The Wrapping On A Present.

We've Turned Into A Whining Society.

I Really Think It's A White, Bourgeois Idea To Pretend That You Don't Have Influences. It Seems To Be The Obsession Strictly Of White People In College.

You Could Have A Zillion Facebook Followers. Those People Don't Buy Records. It's About A Hundred To One...record Companies, They Don't Have Any Money So They See Social Media As The Free Marketing...so,...'billy, Light Yourself On Fire And Stand Upside Down, And That'll Market The Record'. I've Spent A Lot Of Time Thinking About This. I Don't Think People By Records Because Of Anything That Happens On Facebook. They Buy Records Cause They're Friends Say 'i Bought This Record And I Love It'.

You Know Americans Are Obsessed With Life And Death And Rebirth, That's The American Cycle. You Know, Awakening, Tragic, Horrible Death And Then Phoenix Rising From The Ashes. That's The American Story, Again And Again.

If You Don't Fit Into This Kind Of Like Gossipy, Trendy, Web-hit Thingy, You're Relegated To Sort Of Second-class Celebrity Status.

I'm An Experimental Artist In A Field That Doesn't Celebrate Experimentation. It Celebrates Self-destruction, Which I Guess You Could Say Is A Creative Endeavor.

The Deeper I Get Into My Life As A Musician, I'm Discovering That It Becomes Less And Less About Other People, And More About What I Want To Do. And That's A Good Place To Be.

I Never Wanted To Leave The Smashing Pumpkins. That Was Never The Plan.

And The World So Hard To Understand Is The World You Can't Live Without.

That's The Age That People Are Exploited, Exploitable, And They're Easily Manipulated. The Problem With Me Is, You Can't Manipulate Me Anymore. I've Seen It, I Know It, I've Been There. And That's Partially Why, Particularly In America, You See Issues With Artists As They Get Older. And They Like To Keep It A Young Man's Game. Because That's How They Can Fudge Around With The Rules.

I'm Passionate About Creating New Systems That Are More Holistic To Humankind. What Do I Mean By That? I Mean, Create New Systems Of Business So That People With Ethics Both Exploit Their Goods And Their Gifts While Not Exploiting The Earth, Exploiting One Another.

As Far As A Theoretical Point Of View For My Generation, I'm Probably The Most Successful Theoretician. I Mean, Double Albums And Concepts And Dresses And Major Disasters And Wonderful Successes And Yet You Don't See The Critical Review Of My Work. Why? Because It's All Focused On The Persona. Billy Corgan. But I Get To Sort Of Jump In And Be Billy Corgan. But Then I Get To Sort Of Jump Back Out And Be Like, Sensitive Man In The Corner.

If There Was A Simple Ethic For The Band, It Was That We Want To Be Able To Do Whatever We Want To Do.

I Use Music As Some Kind Of Weird Salvation To Get Away From Life

Radiohead And Our Lady Peace Are Doing The Seven Layers Of Guitar, And I Kind Of Jumped On That Before Anyone Else Did.

That Was A Terrible Super Bowl, I Have To Say. I Mean You Got The Big Peyton Manning Walk Off Into The Sunset Win, But What A Shnoozo.

I Look At Other Members Of My Generation Who Have Basically Done One Thing, And One Thing Well, And Have Been Handsomely Rewarded For It.

Well, We Have Brought Certain Things Upon Ourselves. I've Certainly Brought Things Upon Us With My Mouth.

I Lay A Lot Of Blame At The Feet Of Dusty Baker For Not Being More Strict About Fundamentals, Which I Think Would Give The Team A Stronger Day-to-day Identity.

In A Weird Kind Of Way, Music Has Afforded Me An Idealism And Perfectionism That I Could Never Attain As 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.

Say You Write A Song About A Chandelier, And The Chandelier Gives Off Light. And The Light Is The Color Red And Red Reminds You Of The Color Your Not Supposed To Wear Around A Bull. So You Name The Song 'cow.'

The Things I'm Guided To Do Are Really Strange To Me.

This Is Not A Reaction Against A Negative World. It's A Response To A Negative World.

At Some Point, You Protest Too Much They Think You're Guilty Just Because You're Protesting.

The Point Is To Let The Music Be Itself. If It Doesn't Mean Anything To You, Then It's Bullsh*t.

I Had Concussions As A Kid Playing Football And Basketball, And Know What It Feels Like And To Have Someone Say 'just Rub Some Dirt On It, And Get Back In There.'

As A Citizen Of The Great City Of Chicago, I Find It Impossible To Root Against The White Sox. The White Sox Organization Has Been Much More Consistent, In My Lifetime At Least, At Putting A Winning Ballclub On The Field.

I'm Prepared To Spend The Rest Of My Life Playing Clubs, If That Means I'm Playing Music That I Believe In.

Today Is The Greatest Day I've Ever Known Can't Live For Tomorrow, Tomorrow's Much Too Long.

I Was Raised A Christian, But I Wouldn't Call Myself A Christian Now. I Think When I Was Younger It Was Easier To Focus On The Negative, Nihilist Vision... This Is Sort Of Picking Up On The Other Half Of The Body, Which Is God And White Light.

All I Can Go On Is My Own Value System.

People Always Called The Cure Gloomy, But Listening To The Cure Made Me Happy. There Was Something About The Gloominess That Gave Me Comfort, And I Think We're The Same Way.

Most Of My Arguments With Musicians Through The Years Have Had More To Do With Their Attitude About Music, Or Their Attitude About Their Own Lives, Or Their Personal Responsibility. Music Has Never Really Been The Big Centerpiece Of The Fight.

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.

In My Corgan Brain, I've Decided It's Almost As Simple As 'all You Need Is Love.' Almost.

There's Something Going On Right Now In America, Where The American Spirit Or Character Is Reasserting Itself Around Liberty. I Think It's An Important Time, And I'm Trying To Document That As An Artist. If I Just Filter What I Read Through The Media, If I Just Go Through What I Read Through The Media, I'm Not Really In Touch With The World I Grew Up In. I Know There's A Gap There, I Talk To My Relatives, I Talk To People I Meet Traveling Around, And Their Mind Is On Something Completely Different.

I'm Irish And I Was Born On St. Patrick's Day. I'm Lucky Sevens.

I'm Like The Fugitive, Running From The One-armed Indie-rock Community!

I'm By Nature Kind Of A Glum Person, But I'm Not A Sad Pathetic

I Was Brought Up Roman Catholic. I'm Not Even Baptized.

Being Overly Identified With [a Certain Period Of Time] Becomes A Noose Around Your Neck, And People Don't Want You To Grow Up, They Don't Want You To Change, They Don't Want You To Evolve.

I'm Viewed As This Weird, Crippled Character. But You Got To Take Your Lumps.

Been There, Done That, Seen It, Heard It, Pissed On It.

Been There Done That

I Always Thought Kurt Cobain Was The Perfect Embodiment Of The Great Alternative Guitar Player.

Usually The Intention Of The Artistic Effect Is Too Sophisticated For Most People To Understand, Sort Of Like A Joke That They Don't Get So They Don't Think It's Funny.

I Usually Wake Up Far After Breakfast. That's As Much As You're Going To Find Out About My Dietary Requirements Other Than Marijuana And Vodka.

Your Basic Person Wants To Talk About Material Culture, Internet Culture. I Think About God, Cats, Nature.

Where Is This Great Love For Rock And Roll That Existed For 50 Or 60 Years?

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.

More Than Any Audience In The World, Americans Will Cross Their Arms, Stare At You And Say, 'ok, Whaddya Got?' - No Matter How Many Times You've Proven It To Them.

I'll Come In With A String Of Riffs And Direct The Musical Ideas. But You Still Need A Band And Their Input To Make The Ideas Come Alive. You Can't Underestimate Band Chemistry.

I've Rarely Done Anything That's Overtly Self-destructive Without Consciously Knowing What I'm Doing. And Then Of Course, The Astute Journalist Jumps Forward And Says, "why Are You Being Calculated?" Calculated Seems To Assume A Sinister Intent. My Intent Is Always For Artistic Effect.

Jesus Teaches Us To Forgive And I've Got To Trust Him On That One.

That's The Great Thing About Rock N' Roll: The Myth Is Ultimately More Important Than The Reality. And That's What You Learn - You Just Learn To Go With The Mythology.

Everybody Likes To Run Around On Their Phones, Including Me, But We Don't Always Want To Hear Who's Sweating Somewhere In Some Non-air-conditioned Factory To Create Those Things So That They Can Keep The Prices Down.

Beware Of Those Angels With Their Wings Glued On.

These Days You're Not Just Competing With The Tedium, You're Competing With The Cellphone.

For A 6-foot-3 Guy With No Hair And A Whiny Voice, I've Done All Right.

Everybody Can Close Their Eyes, Picture A Dream House Or A Perfect Place [where] They'd Like To Have A Picnic. But Actually Creating It - How Do You Create Something From Nothing? Anyone Who's Creative Understands That That's The Magic, That's The Alchemy.

We Love Cats More Than We Love Women [with Marilyn Manson].

Everything About Life Makes Me Lonely.

I Don't Like That The Government Is Going To Manipulate The Information To Try To Convince Me That What I'm Eating Is Not What I'm Really Eating. If People Choose To Eat Cardboard Because It's Ten Cents Cheaper, Then Let Them. That's At The Root Of Freedom. But In The Reverse, I'd Like To Know If What I'm Eating Or Consuming Or Buying Is Somehow Hurting Or Exploiting Someone In Another Part Of The Planet.

I Did 13-something Years Of Talking To Wrestlers And Promoters About Why They Did Certain Things And Why They Booked Matches A Certain Way And What They Were Thinking And Whether They Were Satisfied With The Draw. And I Got A Lot Of Insight In The Business.

Personally, I Think Jesus Would Like Better Bands.

You Give Me A @#$%& Kazoo And I'll Write You A Good Song.

Music Is 99% Of My Life. But I Know I Need A Break. Besides, If You Give People Too Much, They Start To Not Want It. We Need To Restrain Ourselves.

If I Have Resistance To Something, It Means There's Something Wrong. The Resistance To Me Is A Sign Of Fear.

I Don't Have To Play By These Rules Or Do These Things... I Can Actually Have My Own Kind Of Version.

Well, I'm Known As A Guitar-rock Guy, You Know? You're Not Supposed To Play With Synthesizers. This Is Not In The Rulebook.

We Had A Wonderful Time With This Kind Of Grunge Awareness, Where Suddenly Rock Was Cool Again. People Wanted To Head Loud Guitars. It Was A Great Time, And I'm Glad We Were There. But The Gimmick Part Has Worn Off.

For Someone Who's Had The Level Of Success I've Had, There's Been Very Little Critical Review Of My Work, Which Is Pretty Fascinating.

Critical Spirit

I Feel Completely Free To Do Whatever I Want And How I Want To Do It. I Feel Unburdened By My Past.

You Have To Keep Adapting To The Times. If You Kind Of Go With It, It Can Kind Of Fun.

I've Become A Guy Who's Like A Complaining, Whining Neurotic.

I Rummage Around In Artistic Things From The Past. If You Don't Understand The Context, They Wouldn't Make Any Sense. I Rummage Around In Conceptual Ideas Of The Future, But If You Don't Know The Source Of The Thinking, [it] Wouldn't Make Any Sense.

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.

My Pat Line About The Cubs And Payroll Is That The Amount Of Merchandise The Cubs Would Sell Off A World Series Championship Would More Than Cover For A Big Payroll.

The Desire To Hit A Big Home Run Is Dominating The Music Business.

Rock & Roll Is Not About What You Play, It's About How You Play It.

I'm Not Interested In Pop Art.

My Father Was A Guitar Player, And I Was Raised With A Super High Standard Of What Good Guitar Playing Was.

I'd Reached A Point Where There Was A Direct Conflict Between What I Was Trying To Be And Who I Really Was.

When I've Tried To Reinvent The Wheel, I Get Bashed For Not Doing The Familiar Things.

Familiar Things

My Step-mom Would Tell Me That She Would Get Complaints From Adults That I Stared Too Much At Them.

I Believe That If The Tribune Company Ever Tries To Close Down Wrigley Field That You Will Have A Protest From Every Corner Of The Globe.

The Closer I Get Back To Being Who I Really Am, The Stronger The Music Gets.

The Mythology In Rock N' Roll Is That I'm A Bit Of A Loose Cannon. Yet I've Produced More Music Than Anybody In My Generation. So How Much Of A Loose Cannon Am I? But The General Public Believes That I'm A Loose Cannon, So Let Them Believe It. I'm Not Going To Correct Them.

I Do Not Trust Those Who Make The Vaccines, Or The Apparatus Behind It All To Push It On Us Thru Fear.

Twenty-eight To 31 Is The Tough Period. You Have To Be Really Careful Because It's So Cataclysmic, So Life-altering. People Do Really Dramatic Things Like Get Married, Or They'll Get Divorced. Your Chances Of Committing Suicide Go Way Up. It's Basically Psychic Death. You See The Signs Of It Around 27, And You're Still On The Out-end Of It Around 31. Everyone I've Talked To Who's Gone Through That And Come Out The Other Side Walks Out Of It Like, "my Life Is Great".

People Try To Make A Big Deal, Like I Don't Want To Play My Old Songs. That's Not It. I Don't Want To Play My Old Songs If That's My Only Option. That's A Different Thing.

When You Move Artistically, The Natural Inclination Is To Denounce Everything That's Gone Before.

I'm A Pisces, And Pisces Have This Weird Inability To Be Completely Spontaneous. We're Too Conscious Of Our Actions. I've Always Been Way Too Sensible For My Own Good.

We Don't Make Music For People To Take Drugs To, We Make Music For People To Live Their Life.

Fur Is A Contentious Issue. Meat Is A Contentious Issue. Gmos Are A Contentious Issue. I Think This Whole Thing Going On About Whether Or Not Products Should Be Labeled If They Have Gmos In Them - I, As A Consumer, Would Like To Know If I'm Eating Gmo Food. If I Choose To Buy It Then It's My Choice.

The Music Business - And I Guess You Could Say Any Artistic Endeavor - Usually Rewards Those Who Are On The Leading Edge Of Where Everything Is Going, But You Can't Be Too Far.

If You've Sold Over A Million Records, You Are Not Punk Rock, You Are Milking The System For Everything That It's Worth.

There's A Lot Of Days Where You Feel Forgotten.

About Six Months Ago, I Listened To Siamese Dream. That Was The First Time I'd Ever Really Heard My Own Album, Because I Had Separated From The Experience Of Making The Record. And It Really Moved Me. It Made Me Cry, It's So Beautiful.

I've Thought Many Times, 'i Can't Write This,' But On My Own Little Planet I Found The Courage To Write It Because It Was True. I Put Aside Fear Of Father Being Angry With Me. It's Hard Though; The World Pales In Comparison With The Stature Of A Parent. In Some Small-consolation Way, My Parents Feel I'm Helping People By Giving Them Something To Identify With. They Feel Proud In A Sort Of Reverse Way. My Mom's Proud Of The Fact That Lots Of Kids Look Up To Me.

In Our Lives In A Lot Of Ways It's All About Fake. You've Got People Wanting Things For Fake Reasons.

I Never Seemed To Fit In. But It Made Me Try To Strive For Things Ten Times Harder.

To Re-embrace What I Once Loved About Music Has Been A Warming Process For Me, Because It's A Good, Earned Feeling Now.

I Think God Is The Most Unexplored Territory In Rock And Roll Music.

I'm Definitely Responsible For Coming In With Some Basic Chord Changes, Or Ideas. Everybody In The Band Looks To Me To Come Up With The Basic Seed, So It's Not Very Productive To Come In With Nothing.

Don't Judge Yourself By Someone Else's Standards. You Will Always Lose

In The Beginning, Though, I Have To Admit That I Did Have A Chip On My Shoulder. I Did Want To Prove Everyone Wrong. But After I Went Through The Process And Came Out The Other Side, It Wasn't About Anyone Else.

What Most People Do Is Try To Find A Comfortable Persona That They're In Alignment With And The Public Likes And Appreciates Them For.

I Mean, I'm Certainly Not A 'teaophyte,' Or Whatever The Word Would Be.

Not Let The Child Run The Circus, Just Have That Child Be The Source Of The Creative Voice.

If I Had Spent Fourteen Months In A Small Room With Jesus, I'd Want To Fist Fight With Him.

The Great Thing About Rock N' Roll Is, If You Want To Fight - Like, Fight The System, Fight The Man, Fight The Government, Fight The People In Front Of You - It's Don Quixote All Over Again. You're Really Chasing Windmills.

What Bothers Me Is When Music Becomes Entertainment. Of Course, Music Is Supposed To Be Entertaining, But Go Back To Any Period Of Time - Music Had A Cultural Significance On Different Levels, Whether It Was Folk Music, It Was The News Of The Village, Or It Had To Do With The Rites Of Passage.

I Don't Know If God Would Agree With Me, But Believing In God Is Kind Of Unimportant When Compared To Believing In Yourself. Because If You Go With The Idea That God Gave You A Mind And An Ability To Judge Things, Then He Would Want You To Believe In Yourself And Not Worry About Believing In Him. By Believing In Yourself You Will Come To The Conclusion That Will Point To Something.

Indie World Won't Have Me, And Mainstream World Treats Me Like An Alien, But Here I Am Still Floating Between These Two Worlds.

People Think I Take Some Sort Of Masochistic Pleasure Out Of Putting Out Music That's Gonna Be Unpopular.

My Version, Of Course, Is Not This Flag-waving, Let's All Get On The Jesus Train And Ride Out Of Hell. I'm Not That Kind Of Guy. It's An Embrace That Life Is Good, Worth Living And Yeah, It's Not Easy, But There Are More Pluses Than Minuses.

The Funny Thing About Me That Most People Never Really Understand Is That, At Heart, I'm Really A Jock.

In My Particular Instance, I Came From A Family That Didn't Have Anything. Everything I Earned In Life I Made. Myself. With Songs That I Wrote.

You Can Only Be This High-powered Mojo Rock Band For So Long, Then You Just Can't Look People In The Eye. So, We've Projected Our Own Demise.

There's Nothing More Satisfying Than Going To A Market And Meeting The Person Who Picked The Strawberries, Or It's Their Farm That The Strawberries Came From, And Giving Them A Fair Value In Exchange For What They're Giving You.

I've Had A Lot Of Things Rendered As Not Being Effective Or As Some Indication Of My Lack Of Sanity, Only To Be Praised Ten, Fifteen, Twenty Years Later For What I Did Once In This Overt Consciousness.

Stay In School. Lie To Your Teachers, But Stay In School.

I've Been Too Productive For Too Long, And Despite What Anybody Wants To Strip Away From Me, I Am Influential. I Am.

As Long As You Have Faith, You're Willing To Try To Take Another Chance. God Wants You To Amble Toward The Right Spot On The Horizon. The Idea Is That You're Willing To Get Up And Keep Moving Toward That Light.

I Reached A Point In My Life Where I Felt Like I Was Living Through Some Old Character.

It's A Simple Formula For Me Now, I Don't Play Any Song I Don't Want To Play.

If The Next Record Is No Better Than Gish, Then We've Failed.

I Didn't Find Jesus. He's Been There The Whole Time.

I Mean There's Certainly A Lot Of Progressive Rock And Metal That Exists At The Underground Level, Which Has Its Own Vitality, As It Should. But It Seems To Have Lost Its Ability To Really Charge Up The Hill.

We Weren't Like Mates Who Decided To Form A Band. The Other Three Met Me Because They Were Interested In Being In The Band That I Was Starting.

I Created A Paradigm By Which I Could Succeed, And Up Until Recently It Was The Only Way I Could Do It. I Could Not Take The Brunt Of Standing In The Light Of My Own Work. There Was A Faustian Bargain I Could Not Make. I Could Have You Mock Me For Wearing Funny Clothes That I Could Deal With. But I Couldn't Deal With Actually Standing In The Light Of My Own Musical Power. That's The Difference Now. It's Like, Okay, No More Of That, You're Done.

The Weird Nihilism That Permeates Mellon Collie Is Extremely Relevant To What's Going On Right Now. So Many Kids Are Intelligent And Articulate, But They Don't Know What To Do With Themselves.

We Are The Most Beloved And Hated Band In The World.

I've Always Been Spiritual But I've Never Had A Proper Context, And It Took Me Awhile To Find The Proper Context. It's Hard To Realize You Can Have Any Kind Of Relationship With God You Want...and So I Now Have A Punk Rock Relationship With God.

As A 28 Year Old Who's Lived Long Enough To Know The Difference, I Know Now That The Feelings I Felt An 16 Were Not Necessarily Correct. But However Overly Dramatic, The Desperation And Hopelessness I Felt At 16 Was My Reality.

When You Present People With Things From The Heart And From The Soul, They Make Better Choices: They Make Better Choices About Their Bodies, They Make Better Choices About Their Partners, They Make Better Choices About The Environment.

The Difficulty, If You're In The World - And This Is For Anybody - Is The Eventual Disappointment That Comes With Having To Meet Other Versions Of Reality. Imposed Systems That Ask You To Compromise Or Sacrifice Things Which You Consider Holy Or Sacred.

Destruction Is A True Sign Of Devotion. As I Always Tell My Girlfriend When She Threatens To Kill Me. 'you Should Kill Me And It Would Tell Me That You Love Me.

If You Don't Have Some Sort Of Belief System By Which To Center Your Life, It's Hard Sometimes To Understand Why You Would Put Up With Your Family.

We're Both Cat Lovers [with Marilyn Manson].

One Thing I've Learned To Appreciate As I've Gotten A Little Older Is Direct Forms Of Communication.

I Hate How In Magazine Pictures, They Always Stick Me Somewhere In The Back. It Means They Don't Think I'm The Cute One.

My View Of The World Is Always Tempered By The Fact That There Are People Who Are Less Fortunate Than I Am.

I Get More Out Of Life Just Being Myself, By Just Being A Human Being. Not By Being A Rock Star, Not By Being Whatever. Sometimes I Act Like A Jerk, But I Think People Respect Me For Being Myself. That's The Ultimate Thing About The Smashing Pumpkins.

Life Is Everything And Nothing All At Once.

I Started Thinking That If Post Modernism Is About People Opening Up All Their Skeletons, I'm Going The Other Way. I Don't Want Anyone Knowing Anything About Me Anymore.

Even If You Don't Believe In God, Exploring Fully The Idea Of A God Or Gods Should Pose No Threat To You.

Saturn Return Is Just The Return Of Your Planets To Their Original Position.

Calm, Open Debate, And Logical Thought Drive Strength To Its Maximum Effectiveness.

I Think The Days Of Working With Producers In The Conventional Sense Are Over For Me.

I'm From A Lower Middle Class Background; All My Family Were Immigrants.

If You're Really Going To Uncover Something As An Artist, You're Going To Come Into Access With Parts Of Your Personality And Your Psyche That Are Really Uncomfortable To Face: Your Own Ambition, Your Own Greed, Your Own Avarice, Your Own Jealousies, And Anything That Would Get In The Way Of The Purity Of Your Own Artistic Voice.

Everybody I'm Working With Now Is A Friend. And I Would Be Very, Very Remiss To Work With Anybody In The Future Who Has Not Shown Me Who They Really Are.

There Is Something Mighty Suspicious About Declaring An Emergency For Something That Has Yet To Show Itself To Be A Grand Pandemic.

That's The Real Endeavor: To Try To Create That Direct Conduit From The Pure Consciousness Of Your Creative Voice To The Person Who's A Craftsman Who Can Go Into The World And Consistently Deliver New Things Worth Paying Attention To.

Most People Don't Know That Wrestling Came Out Of The Circus.

I Didn't Grow Up With My Mother, And So Losing Her For Real Was Like, Some Sort Of Latent Childhood, Some Sort Of Unresolved Issue. When She Left For Real, It Was Sort Of Like, I Was Done.

I Want To Make Great Songs.

In My Case I Don't Mind Playing A Character That Irritates People Or Makes People Question My Sanity.

The Reason I Don't Play Any Of The Old Songs Is Because I Really Honor My Old Band, And I Think That Those Songs Are Best Served Within The Context Of That Band.

Rock In The Mainstream Culture Has Lost A Lot Of Its Mojo.

Mainstream Culture

I Was Part Of A Generation That Changed The World - And It Was Taken Over By Poseurs.

I Was Trying To Be This Person Who Is Cool, Eternally Rocking.

Rock And Roll Is Still Asking People Like Me To Live Up To The Old Guard's Concept Of What Success Is But It Doesn't Mean Anything.

The Ideology Of The Smashing Pumpkins Was Ultimately More Valuable Than The Music Of The Smashing Pumpkins. That's What Critics Can't Put Their Finger On.

As A Healthy Person, My Breakfasts Are Very Bland And Boring. Think Kind Of A White Pasty Gruel. Or There Can Be An Occasional Banana Over The Top.

Most Great Records Really Start With The Drums.

Injuries Are Nothing To Be Ashamed About.

You Will Never See The Four Original Pumpkins On Stage Ever Again, Unless It's A Hall Of Fame Thing. But You Would Never See A Tour. There's So Much Damage, There's No Way.

Being In A Rock Band Is Just An Excuse Not To Get A Job

Thinking About The Future And Thinking About The Past Is Really Only A Way Of Ignoring The Present.

We Need To Get Back To A Level Of Social Responsibility That We Haven't Seen For A Long Time.

Gish Was The Best Representation Of Where We Were At The Time.

The Smashing Pumpkins Was Never Meant To Be A Small Band. It Was Going To Either Be A Big Band, Or A No Band.

People Always Seemed To Pay Attention To Us. I Have No Idea Why -- There Was Just A Presence Between The Four People Or Something.

You Have To Be Willing To Deal With The Ups And Downs Of The Music, The Ups And Downs Of The Audience.

Do I Belong In The Conversation About The Best Artists In The World? My Answer Is Yes, I Do.

I Have A Musical Ancestry As Much As I Have A Family Ancestry. Honoring Those Ancestors Gives You Access To A Greater Source Of Appreciation And Information Than You Would Have If You Were Just Going On Your Own Ego System.

I Went To See A Shaman. He Put His Hands On Me, And I Cried Like A Baby For An Hour.

When Alternative Music - Which Is Supposed To Be The Standard-bearer Of Where White Rock Is Headed - Becomes Either Too Cute Or Too Manufactured, That's Just Really Not Good.

Despite All My Rage I Am Still Just A Rat In The Cage.

Somewhere Between The Intellectual Idea Of Why We're Attracted To Certain Things And The Pragmatic Reality Is Some Form Of Ever-evolving Truth.

In 1992, With The Weight Of A Perceived World On Our Shoulders, We Disappeared Into A Parking Garage To Write The Songs That Would Change The Course Of Our Lives Forever. 'siamese Dream' Represents All Of Our Dreams Coming True, While The Dreams Of A Happy Band Fell Apart.

Billy [corgan] And I Used To Spend Quite A Lot Of Time Together In Los Angeles, When I First Moved There.

My Earliest Memory Is Of Feeling Different. My Parents Told Me That I Wasn't Like Other Children.

I Dont Think We're The Type Of Band People Look At And Say, 'i Want To Grow Up To Be Just Like That'. We're Like A Train Wreck.

Heavy Metal Is A Universal Energy -- It's The Sound Of A Volcano. It's Rock, It's Earth Shattering. Somewhere In Our Primal Being We Understand.

To Be Able To Put Your Arms Around 24 Years Of Music, It's Really Fun.

There's A Difference Between Being A Poseur And Being Someone Who's So Emotionally Challenged They're Kind Of Just Doing Their Best To Show You What They've Got.

Like Any Form Of Death, At Some Point You Just Have To Get Up And Say Yeah I'll Take It, Whatever's Gonna Happen Is Gonna Happen And Sorta Chop Your Head Off. It's Easy To Avoid All That...there's Always Another Moment, Another Girl, Another High, Another Drug, There's Always Something To Distract You.

I Don't Think '90s Music Was As Significant As '60s Music In Terms Of Changing The World, But It Was Significant, And I Think It Was Similarly Disillusioning When You Realize The Mainstream Just Views It As Like A Curiosity.

I Think Rock & Roll Has Prepared Me For A Lot Of Flexibility.

I've Always Believed That We Could Reach Past Genre -- We Didn't Ride The Grunge Coat-tails; We've Always Been On Our Terms.

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