SMASHING DIGNITY – Billy Corgan returns with new band, recycles old name

Billy Corgan has taken the Axl Rose route of re-forming his old band, The Smashing Pumpkins, even though only one other original member is involved. Corgan has set a July 7 release date for the new Pumpkins disc, now titled Zeitgeist. Former Extreme drummer and current Pumpkins manager Paul Geary spoke to MTV.com about the reunion. His statement appears below- along with our own running commentary in red.

“I’ve been involved with bands whose members can’t stand each other, like Extreme, and over time they run out of dough like Billy did and that’s why they (reunite). But Billy’s making a great record by himself because his former bandmates still can’t stand him, and for the sake of a younger generation that he wants to turn on to the band’s music, he is doing it with a band and by ‘band’ I mean ’employees’ that will more faithfully re-create the old songs than ever before. Yes, I said it: these dudes are gonna more faithfully re-create the old songs than the artists who actually recorded them in the first place.”

“They’ve had some amazingly big offers — some seven-figure ones to play certain shows — and Billy has passed on several because he didn’t think it was the right thing for the band. Also, because he couldn’t get James Iha or D’Arcy to return his calls.”

-AR

P.S. I know I’ll be called a “hypocrite” for supporting the new GN’R and dissing (yeah, I wrote “dissing,” wanna make something of it?!) the new Smashing Pumpkins; but there’s a myriad of differences between the two situations, not least of which are the fact that Rose’s former bandmates quit and were not fired, that Rose and not his former bandmates was the one who rejected the idea of a full-on reunion,that Rose’s new bandmates have never claimed to “more faithfully re-create” the old material than the original band, and that Rose is shinging the spotlight pretty bright on his new band, who are also his co-songwriters and artistic collaborators. Corgan is just making a new Zwan album but calling it Smashing Pumpkins so it’ll sell more copies, and blaming James Iha for breaking up the Pumpkins is a pretty dispicable move, if you ask me.