Billy Corgan
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"William Patrick "Billy" Corgan Jr." is an American musician, songwriter, producer, and poet, best known as the lead singer, guitarist, and sole permanent member of The Smashing Pumpkins. Formed by Corgan and guitarist James Iha in Chicago, Illinois, in 1987, the band quickly gained steam with the addition of bassist D'arcy Wretzky and drummer Jimmy Chamberlin. The band's direction has largely been driven by Corgan through his confessional lyrics, grandiose production values, and virtuosic musical interplay. In three years, The Smashing Pumpkins had transformed themselves into a major label success. Strong album sales and large-scale tours propelled the band's increasing fame in the 1990s in music/1990s until their break-up in 2000. Corgan started a new band called Zwan, and after their quick demise, he released a solo album (TheFutureEmbrace) and a collection of poetry (Blinking with Fists) before setting his sights on reforming the Smashing Pumpkins.

The new version of the Smashing Pumpkins, consisting of Corgan and a revolving tour lineup, has extensively released and toured new albums since the 2007 reunion album, "Zeitgeist".

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If practice makes perfect, and no one's perfect, then why practice?

Thinking about the future and thinking about the past is really only a way of ignoring the present.

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."

Great music completely obliterates any conceptions of genre.

You can't be greater than Elvis, change things as much as the Beatles, or be as original as Led Zeppelin. All you can do is rip them off.

I don't mean this in any sort of trite way, ... but the music has really been the thing that has healed us over and over again. It is the thing that has held us together and taught us about each other.

In a weird kind of way, music has afforded me an idealism and perfectionism that I could never attain as me.

It's my role as an artist to basically destroy the obvious and recreate the obvious, to put it back together into a form that maybe you wouldn't have considered, ... I'm not into making things unimaginable.

[According to reports from Australia, one fan shouted from the stage] play some Pumpkins ... Can I live my life for today?