I know what you’re thinking: Ol’ Billy is at it again, changing his mind like his clothes, but if anything, it’s quite the opposite. In a killer recent interview with Consequence of Sound, Corgan was given the opportunity to justify his recent remarks regarding Radiohead.
News that Corgan commented that he’ll “piss on fuckin’ Radiohead” was everywhere, it was hard to miss it, though what was missing at the time was the entire back story. The end of the quote from the previous interview mentions the pomposity surrounding the band, which Corgan explains: “It’s not Radiohead that’s pompous; in fact, I think Radiohead is a great band. It’s the pomposity that surrounds Radiohead in a culture that needs to celebrate them to reaffirm their own value system. Like, ‘Isn’t it cool that Thom Yorke just rolls out of bed, puts on his hat, and doesn’t care?’ That’s people reflecting their own values back to themselves. That’s the pomposity. That’s what I said in that quote.”
As Corgan explains, it’s more so the people concerning themselves with the scene and image that comes hand in hand with enjoying his, and Radiohead’s music. Both bands share a similar fan base, but Corgan has had enough of people comparing artists; he continues: “The culture that needs to place me behind P.J. Harvey on guitar. And I love P.J. Harvey, and I have complete admiration for her, but, c’mon, me behind P.J. Harvey on guitar? I mean, c’mon, that’s a fucking asshole, in a beard, in New York, who has to put me there to make some sort of statement.”
It appears that The Smashing Pumpkins’ frontman has had enough of the common belief that fans know best. “That culture’s got to go. And what I mean by “got to go” is it needs to go back to where it belongs, in the basement. The fact that it’s being celebrated as some sort of cultural movement, the unchecked Id. We’’ve all sat there with the remote and we’re watching football, ‘Fucking idiot, he should have thrown the ball’. Okay, you try to stand there with five 320lb men who run four four-forties coming at you, and let’s see if you can make the fucking pass. That’s what athletes think, because I know them, because they tell me. And that’s what rock stars think. You get up on a fucking stage and hold an audience for two fucking hours.”
So having light shed on the topic has totally changed the perspective. We probably all owe Billy a bit of an apology, though I’m sure the band’s Australian fans will be undeterred from checking out their set at this year’s Splendour in the Grass, providing he doesn’t step in it anymore between now and then.
