The Smashing Pumpkins

Presentation The Smashing Pumpkins A young teenage boy was watching MTV and thought this all sucks. He wanted to change music and started to make music. This boy was Billy Corgan. The son of a jazz guitarist, Billy Corgan grew up in a Chicago suburb, leaving home at the age of 19 to move to Florida with his Goth metal band, the Marked. After the band failed down South, he returned to Chicago around 1988, where he began working at a used-record store. At the shop he met James Iha, and the two began performing and recording songs with a drum machine. They had there first live-performance at a local Polish bar. Billy went to a concert and got into an argument with D'Arcy Wretzky at a club show. She told him that she played bass, the two became friends and she joined the group as their bass player. Billy thought The Smashing Pumpkins was a funny name for a band and somehow they stuck with it. The owner of a local club liked them and booked them to open for Jane's Addiction. Before this concert, the band hired Jimmy Chamberlain, a former jazz musician, as their full-time drummer. There first album called Gish came out in 1991, the album was not a huge success and sold about 700,000 copies. At that time Billy was depressed used drugs and was suicidal. The band was a mess and Billy tried to organise it. He forced himself out of his depression and became anti-drugs. And he put al of his energy into their new album which is less depressing then there first one, it’s called Siamese Dream and was released in 1994. A year later they released a double album, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. This album was a big success, the album sold over 7 million copies world wide. They got on tour and every where their concerts where completely sold out. During the tour the drummer Jimmy and there touring keyboard player, Jonathan, had a few drugs overdoses, the pumpkins kicked Jimmy out of the band. He begged for a second choice and they gave it to him. After a while there was another overdose and Jonathan died. This was it Jimmy had to leave. Billy said Jimmy would never be a band-member again. They released another box set, The Aeroplane Flies High. After the Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness period they decide to get a new drummer. They used this to their advantage. They went back to the drum machine to change their sound more towards the electronic side. They released their new sounding album Adore, it was not a success. Many people missed their hard rocking guitar riffs. But according to Billy guitar rock was dead and electronic music was the future. After the smashing pumpkins started to work on new material the unexpected happened. Jimmy Chamberlain was back in the band. They stayed with there electronic/futuristic sound but added some of there old guitary sound to it. They released the album Machina: The machines of god. D’arcy (bass) left the band, reasons unknown. It could’ve had something to do with James (Guitar), who she dated for a while. Melissa Aufdumar of the band Hole took her place. Her time with the Smashing Pumpkins was very short. Because on May 23, 2000, Billy Corgan announced that the Smashing Pumpkins were finished. He said that he felt that they had done all as a band. He thought the time was right. I would like to end my presentation with a quote of Billy Corgan out of one of his many interviews after the brake-up. "I'm sure that there were other bands that had much more fun than we did, but of course they sucked." ~Billy Corgan 2000