I trust that in terms of legacy the most significant contribution an imitator will make is to illuminate and authenticate the true brilliance of the original.

Corgan Compares Chamberlin to Bonham

Corgan talks some sense this time;

Are there other things you admire about Zeppelin?
When John Bonham died, they announced the band is done. They didn't step back and think about it. I've always respected that, because he was their brother and they knew it wasn't gonna be the same without him. And I had to learn those lessons the hard way. When Jimmy Chamberlin left the band in '96, I thought, "I'll just get somebody. The band is big and we'll find somebody great. It won't be the same, but it'll be just as good in a different way." It just doesn't work like that. You just don't replace your brother like that.

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/q-a-billy-corgan-on-vocal-smashing-pumpkins-fans-led-zeppelins-greatness-20120618#ixzz1yBBqjS1z

 

Listen to Chamberlin's take on Moby Dick

Billy Corgan Stirs the Shit, Again...

None too surprisingly with an album to promote, "spiritually enlightened" Corgan once again grabs the headlines by bad-mouthing former friends/lovers/bandmates/other bands... etc etc etc ... from our pals over at HU here's a portion of a recent interview in NME:

Billy Corgan: Success held that band together longer than it should have been held together. It was dysfunctional. There were a lot of years there where I regretted the way it all went down, and now I think it was meant to die when it died how it died. We stole from the Promethean fire to fuel whatever our weird psychic death trip was and then we paid for it. Or got too close to the sun and crashed. It was just meant to be that way. And you can draw parallels from that with Jimmy’s situation [when he left the band in 2009] because maybe that was just a continuance of something that hadn’t been resolved back then.

NME/Emily Mackay: He said in his statement on leaving that he “couldn’t just cash the cheque”…

Corgan: See now, here is a perfect opportunity to bury Jimmy as a fucking liar. But I won’t. That’s a lie. That statement’s just a flat-out lie.

NME: Was it that you wanted to take the band in a commercial direction, and he didn’t?

Corgan: Ha ha! No, it’s the exact opposite. I wish I could explain it, but I don’t trust the world to understand the complexity of it. I think it’s telling that the first thing Jimmy did when he left the band was make a statement about money because that had a lot to do with it. But if you look at what I’ve done since he left, where have I made money?

Later: 

NME: Do you still feel any rancour towards the other band members about the way it ended? 

Corgan: Uhhh… I’m OK with Jimmy. We don’t have a relationship at the moment, but I mean, I have no ill will. I want to see him do well. James Iha I think is just a piece of shit. I think he’s one of the worst human beings I’ve ever met in my life. And D’Arcy, she’s sort of, in her own way, sort of an innocent [...]If there’s any culprit in this it’s Iha. But, y’know, he was there at the right time of my life, we did do good things together, I think he is a good musician when he gives a fuck, which most of the time he doesn’t. And that’s about it.

I'm not even going to bother to try and unravel the layers of bullshit in the above statements.

Happy Birthday JC

Have a good un.

Montessori fundraiser proves to be a masterpiece - Lake Forester

Montessori fundraiser proves to be a masterpiece - Lake Forester