Smashing Pumpkins Look Back in Wonder

But at the last Metro show, ticket holders received a free CD that showed just how far the Pumpkins had come in those years: a recording of the quartet's first Metro gig, in 1988. The seven songs are rickety Cure-style indie rock with teasing hints of the double-guitar howl that would bloom on the Pumpkins' 1991 debut album, Gish. Within six months of that Metro date, the band had dumped that material, and Corgan had written all-new songs. By the mid-Nineties, the Pumpkins were the most consistent hitmakers of the alternative-rock explosion. Their December 2nd set list was packed with the evidence: "I Am One," "Today," "Disarm," "Cherub Rock," "Bullet With Butterfly Wings," "1979."

Corgan's ambition "was a phenomenal thing," says Metro owner Joe Shanahan, who booked that '88 show and was an early supporter of the Pumpkins. "Billy took flak from a lot of locals, because it looked like he was ego-driven. But he wanted something better for his band. He wanted to take it to the mountain."

William Corgan, fifty-three, can attest to that, saying, "From sixteen years old up, Billy knew exactly what he wanted to do, how he was going to do it." William points out that Billy, an honor-roll student in high school, chose not to go to college even though his grandmother left him a small inheritance for tuition when she died. Billy used the money to finance the Pumpkins' first single, a version of "I Am One" issued on the Limited Potential label in 1989.

"We had fights about it," William admits. He now feels nothing but pride. "Billy is very hard to deal with. But he expects that level of excellence in others. If you're not prepared to deal with that, there are going to be problems."

The Pumpkins' individual futures are up in the air. Chamberlin, an auto-racing enthusiast, has received an offer to race at the Sebring Grand Prix in Florida this year. But he has no plans to leap right back into rock drumming. Iha is opening a recording studio in New York with members of the bands Ivy and Fountains of Wayne. "I'll probably do another solo album," he says. His first, Let It Come Down, was released in 1998. "But I don't feel the need to hit the careerist high road right now."

Corgan insists he will take some time off: "I envision myself laying in a bed and not having to get up." But he has already met with record labels about a solo deal and talks of working in a musical language different from that of the Pumpkins. He also expresses little remorse for the passing of alternative rock. "My mourning of that era is over," he says. "Pick up the pieces and let's make something new."

Still, he could not resist one more fond goodbye to his first golden era. One night last year, before a European tour, Corgan wrote his final Pumpkins song, simply called "Untitled," which the band recorded and sent to Chicago radio shortly before the December 2nd Metro show. Although not available as a commercial single, "Untitled" sounds like a lost hit from Siamese Dream -- buzzing pop with thick layers of guitar and the soft-loud dynamics of classic alt-rock.

"I still believe in the Alternative Nation," Corgan insists, "even if MTV doesn't run the program anymore. I will stand for that, I will speak for that. If I'm your whipping boy or poster child, fine. But the one thing you can't take away from me is I was there. Our band was there. We fucking lived it."

[From Issue 860 — January 18, 2001]