Billy Corgan
Appearances
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's changing. I think in the next 20 years you're going to see a very different music business.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But like 20 years ago, your success and who you work with would have been unthinkable. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And you're an independent voice. You've built it. I mean, it's yours. Right. So that's what I'm saying. That's coming from music. this is coming for music. Well, that's good. Yes. I think ultimately will benefit the fans of the artists and they'll get more of what they want and less of what they don't want.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The Magnificent Others. You can get it on YouTube. Thank you, sir. Appreciate you. All right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And when I said, why won't you tell me where this person is or who this person is, he said, I'm trying to protect you. So when my stepmother had told me, it kind of made sense, like, well, if my half-brother is this super famous comedian... My dad, in a way, wouldn't want me to know because he wouldn't want me to feel like I was number two because Bill's so famous. I know it sounds crazy, right?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's really a testament to the power of his talent because my wife, who's 32, she loves him. And it's so cool because, like, we went to see him, I think, at Radio City Music Hall. And it's so cool because it's like, you know, I'm 57, she's 32. It's like that he can speak to both of us. Right. So... Yeah. Right to the heart. It's really a rare gift.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, you know, you got a picture out there, Richard Pryor, who was, you know, from Illinois like myself. And... My father loved Richard Pryor, and so because of my father's love of Richard Pryor, I paid a lot of attention to Richard when I was a kid. And he strikes me. He's got that transcendent ability to somehow almost heal the country with his messaging. Yes. The bits aren't just bits.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Murphy had that, too, in his own way. But to me, Chappelle's more in the Pryor mode of, like, somehow he can address issues that are uncomfortable. Yeah. And I know a lot of people have issues with what he says, but I ultimately see what he's trying to do is heal things.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, you would think he would just do one victory lap tour. If he wanted to, it would be sold out. Talk about stadiums.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
They only offer me parts like a serial killer, so I always turn it down.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Sitting on that set all day seems like a... It's a lot of work.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You think that's why he's trying to protect you? Well, I don't know. So fast forward to Howie saying something on the street. So I was like, you know what? I'm just going to say something. And I swear to God, hand on my heart, last time I was with you in California, I almost pulled you aside after we were on. And I was going to tell you the story because I knew you knew Bill.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
They're all just selling advertising and everybody's wearing a tux and it's like... Well, certainly the public's growing disinterest in awards shows is some indication that People no longer believe in either the integrity of the process or maybe the intent of the process.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The guy who won Best Picture, I was actually in talks with about five years ago. Because he had made some really cool movies. He made one on cell phones, I think it was called Tangerine, about prostitutes working the streets in L.A. And he got two street workers, I believe, and then he cast them. So it was a movie. It wasn't a documentary. It was a really beautiful movie.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And then he did that movie called The Florida Project, where he, at the end of the movie, they actually snuck into Disney World and shot stuff. And somehow Disney let it go.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. But it was kind of about the social milieu around a place like Disney World, like what goes on outside the gates. People living in motels and kind of perpetual tourist economy, kind of living hand to mouth and kind of using the white whale of tourism to just get enough money. Because there's always some turnover, you know, whether it's running scams and stuff.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So he made a really beautiful movie about that as well. So I was in talks with him for a while about doing something and then it just didn't go anywhere.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I can't remember because it's been a few years. It's just the idea that anywhere there's a tourist economy, there's money to be made. Right. You know, there's the guy standing on the corner selling brochures or hustling you into a van to see where the stars live. It was kind of about that. Right, right, right. It was about a cast of characters living in the shadow of this idealistic place.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, I always get offended when I walk down Hollywood Boulevard and they think I want to go on it. You know what I mean? It's like, I don't know what it is. I feel like, I don't want to go on your tour.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I was going to back channel see if there was anything to the story. From Bill's side.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, forever. Yeah. I mean, I have some of the old brochures, you know, see where Greta Garbo lives and all that stuff.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, back then, I mean, they went way out of their way to turn them into gods. They airbrushed the shit out of every photo and they cover up scandals. There's that one famous scandal where one of the top male stars, maybe it was Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, ran somebody over in a car. Really? You don't know about that? No. You might wanna look that one up.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So imagine seven, I think six or seven years since we talked on your show. Yeah, I don't even know. 2018, somebody said to me today. But so anyway, sorry to talk over you. But the point is, so here I am fast forward. I'm just sick of seeing memes of my face with Bill's. And so I just decide on a spur of the moment, you know. So Howie, of course, loves it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
No, it was a top A level star. I think he was drunk, ran over somebody in a car and somebody from the studio went to jail for like seven years and took the rap.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So that the star could stay out and the studio paid the guy like a stipend to go to jail. Wow. It's a very famous story. So some guy did seven years or something.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Have you heard the ones where, like, because there's so much plastic surgery in Asia where guys are suing their wives because they marry someone that they guess hot, and then the kid comes out, and the kid's not very good looking.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Somebody told me as much as 75% of the women in South Korea have surgery. Is it really? Somebody who's Korean told me that. I don't know if that's true.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Because last time I was in Korea, I was like, wow, these women here are really hot. It was like woman after woman after woman. And somebody pulled me aside and said, bro, that's just all plastic surgery. That's not real. Wow.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I like this whole new business of plastic surgery tourism, where it's cheaper to get on a plane and go somewhere. Oh, like go to Turkey and get your transplant. Yeah, somebody was recently trying to talk me to go to South Korea to get some work done on my face.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But I said on Howie's show that first time, I don't think Bill's my half brother. I don't think there's anything there other than like an uncanny resemblance. Fast forward. The thing comes out. It gets a little bit of social media and then it goes away. And I think, good. And Bill didn't say anything. So I figured Bill was kind of like, whatever. It was a mild amusement.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's cheaper. Yeah, cheaper. Cheaper and better because they can do stuff there that we can't do here yet. Oh, really? What can they do there? Apparently they have some new thing that's unbelievable. What is it? They tried to explain it to me. It doesn't make any sense. Some kind of new facelift that's not a facelift or something. Like a non-invasive facelift.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's a relative of mine through marriage, a Chinese relative. And he's in that business and knows the Koreans over there in L.A. and all this. And he was saying in five years, this will be the number one thing. So you might as well get to Korea now. This is the stuff I hear when I'm sitting around the hot pot dinner, you know?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't know. I mean, I don't know how I would feel if I wasn't in the entertainment business, right? I mean, you're in a cosmetic business on some level. On some level, I guess. It kind of helps you a little being uglier. I never thought of you as ugly. I'm not attracted to men per se, but I never thought you were unattractive.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Booze and not so much sleep. Success creates a glow around a man. It does a little bit of a glow. Right?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. I'm 57, so you kind of look down. I'm 57, too. Oh, are you? Yeah. When's your birthday? August. Okay, I'm older than you. I'm March. Nice. But, you know, you look down that road and you're like, like, am I going to be all right when I get to 80, you know? Very few people are. You know, there's a few people in 80.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
When you're calling UFC, like, 972 or, like, I don't know what the number would be, but.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You know, he could have made a joke out of the whole thing and he didn't. So then Howie calls me and I'm in L.A. working recently. And Howie's like, we've come on the show. Bill's going to be on. And I said, is Bill cool with it? Oh, yeah, no problem. So then I go there and it's like it turns into this thing that you see happening on camera. It's like it's weirdness times.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Sure. So I went to see Holyfield Lennox Lewis at Madison Square Garden. Oh, wow. And I was hanging out with all the cool people at the time. So I'm in the fourth row, and it was infamously a draw. It was almost all English tourists that had come in for the fight. They were booing the national anthem. I mean, it was a pretty riotous atmosphere. Whoa.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And, you know, I don't know anything about fights, but it was a pretty boring fight. And Lewis seemed to be a little bit more agile because of youth and all that. Anyway, so right when I, you know, whatever they're doing, HBO, they're over there in the corner. They're doing their bit. You know what I mean? They're talking before they go to the scorecards.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And a guy leans forward, the ref, to tell someone in the second row, might have been Don King. And I heard him go... It's a draw, right? So I knew it was a draw like 60 seconds before they announced it. And I was with a lot of well-known people. And I said, run. And they're like, what do you mean? I said, we got to run. And I started grabbing people and we ran out of Madison Square Garden.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And we're almost totally out the building, you know, kind of where you get to the concourse part. And you hear the decision and it's like, and people start like, here comes the riot vibe. Really? So somehow we ended up because it got so... Was it because the decision was bad? Well, the English people didn't like that it was a draw. Oh. Because Holyfield was on the older side and... Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't know. It's not a well-renowned fight. I can't remember it. It was just a draw. It was a stone-cold boring fight, but... Because it was a draw and all these English people were mad and Don King was involved. So it was like all that typical brouhaha that was going on in boxing at the time.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Anyway, so because of suddenly the riotous or potentially riotous situation, the police started making people go different ways, like funneling traffic or something. It was almost like they got Code Red or something because it suddenly got really weird. So then we couldn't get out of the building. So somebody recognized somebody in our party and said, follow me.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And so then next thing we know, we end up in the VIP backstage part where it's safe. And there's Michael Buffer on a chair. And he wasn't talking to me, but he's talking to somebody. And all I heard was go, that's bullshit. Like in that voice. That's all I remember. That's bullshit.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's like a like a like a skit, but it's real. And Bill's on me, then Bill's on Howie, and it gets just, okay. So I just told you basically everything I know, okay? I have people I've known for 20, 30 years coming up to me going, what do you think? And I said, I don't think we're related. I mean, yeah, there's a resemblance, but I don't think we're related. Well, did you get a DNA test?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, I mean, again, I'm not a fight aficionado, but I thought Lewis was slightly better.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
When it gets into the family and people I haven't talked to for 20 years... Then you have to break character and tell the truth? No, you know, the thing is... This is what's crazy. Okay. You want the whole setup story? Sure, sure, sure, sure. So where I take my podcast... He's in one of Howie Mandel's buildings and he has another building in this area.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And this is when Don King was still running everything. Did they ever rematch? I honestly don't remember. You don't think so?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Because you ever get that, like somebody wants you to do their bar mitzvah or anything, you ever get those requests? No. I get those requests. Will you come do my bar mitzvah?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. Well, they got their rematch. No, you get this thing like, hey, will you come do my... Right, right, right. I wonder what Michael Buffer gets to show up somewhere. You know what I mean?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I've done a few things, and it's always a bit awkward. Yeah. Which is weird because they're all paid gigs. Right. But something about a paid, paid gig feels different.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, and then you see the guy's wife going, who's this?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. I went to a billionaire thing once with a guy had hired Diana Ross. Whoa. It had to at least be a million dollar gig for her and maybe 700, 800 people. Wow. You know, and you're like, wow. I mean, basically a private concert with Diana Ross. I mean, that's pretty dope.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I'm like, no, I don't. There's nothing to get a DNA test for. Well, I think he's your brother. So people that know me and I'm telling him I don't think he's my brother, now they want a DNA test to prove it. That's how much it's taken on a life of its own.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Less than 50. To be fair, or not fair, we don't get asked to do it a lot. I don't think we're on most people's bingo's card for a private event. Yeah. I think my rep precedes me, you know?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Although, I mean, have you ever heard some of the numbers that some of those pop people get coming out of Saudi Arabia? Yeah. Like 14 mil and nobody calling us. You know what I mean? Yeah. I'd take that phone call.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Like they spent 50 mil on entertainment alone. Something crazy like that. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. I mean, I wish there was a perfect formula for it, but there isn't. Because that's what I mean. I mean, every time we play, we basically get paid.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, if I'm Beyonce's manager, she's not going over there for less than $20,000, $25,000. Yeah, why not?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, you just had a billionaire in here. A couple days ago. Yeah. I mean, you've met your share of billionaires. It's always an interesting thing how they spend or don't spend their money. There's no consistent guide for billionaires.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Who gives a fuck? I'd like to have a billion dollars to make that decision, Sia.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
For real, for real? Yes. Really? For real. I swear to God. I mean, people I'm close to, people that were at my wedding, I'm like, no, you need a DNA test.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, Jimmy Chamberlain of the Pumpkins, the drummer, is friends with Jimmy John, the sub king. Oh, okay. So I know Jimmy John a little bit. And we were at dinner one night in Nashville at a place he owns with other people. And one of my buddies started pitching him on some kind of money thing. And I just saw his face change because everybody in the world wants to pitch.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We're back to pitching ideas, right? Of course. And Jimmy John knows this mutual friend. So it's not as rude as it might sound coming out of my mouth. But at some point, he looks at me and goes, Tommy, you know how I got that money? I made a lot of fucking sandwiches. That was the way you shut him down. I know what I had to go through to make that money. You just see me as a walking ATM.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, nobody trusts Tommy. Tommy's a mess? Tommy's infamous, actually.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yes, man. Infa-mess. I've literally been walking down the street in foreign countries and strangers will come up to me and say, oh, you know Tommy? He's just a legendary character in the entertainment business. What was he trying to pitch Jimmy John on? Some kind of investment scheme or something. Because my friend Tommy collects billionaires. I call it, he plays billionaire lotto.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
He's hoping that when one of them knocks over, they'll leave him a taste.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, what's interesting about Tommy is his uncle was the founder of Hard Rock Cafe. So he grew up in a family with money. So instead of somebody who you figure was poor and aspirational and want to hang out with billionaires, he actually came from money. So he knows how to speak the language of wealthy people.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And so he's kind of generally welcome in those circles where I grew up poor in the suburbs. I don't know how to roll in that world. And so, yeah. But, yeah, Tommy, I think he's probably up to about seven or eight billionaires that he counts as friends with.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
No, my father wouldn't talk to me about it at all. Okay, some more context. Okay. My stepmother in that same time 10 years ago when she told me that she thought Bill Burr was my half-brother. Jesus. This guy I don't know, right? I mean, just imagine if I, hey, do you know Joe Polonsky? Right. And you look up and it's a famous comedian. You know what I mean? Right, right, right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's the legend of Tommy. Really? Yeah. And in fact, I pitched Tommy once. I'm making a documentary called Who the Fuck is Tommy Lipnick? That's his name, Tommy Lipnick. And he doesn't like the idea.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And just the fact that we're talking about Tommy will really please Tommy, but he'll take umbrage. In fact, I have to tell you a story about my father, too, but he'll take umbrage with the way I'm portraying him.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The story I want to tell you about my father was when I was on your show, I told you a story about how I found a double-barreled sawed-off shotgun under my father's bed. It was in a guitar case. Well, my father heard the show about a month after I told the story on your show. And so I get this text from my father's when he's still alive, obviously.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And he goes, yeah, I heard what you said on Joe's show. And I'm like, you know, you're looking at your phone like here it comes, you know, because I think he's going to be pissed at me. He goes, there's one thing you left out of the story. Waiting. Text. The shotgun wasn't loaded. That's all he wanted me to know. Like somehow he made it better. How bizarre.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Your father sounds like a fucking character. He was unbelievable. Unbelievable.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Guitar. Wow. Great musician. Really, truly great musician. He's the classic guy that should have made it and didn't. So when I made it, it made the whole thing really weird. Oh. Because he looked at me and said, how did my schlubby kid make it? And I didn't. Wow. He must have gotten lucky. He must have done something. Because if it didn't work for me, how could it work for him?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
a weird thing but he was talented i mean he really was talented that's great did he did you get did you feel resentment did you get along with him after that my father had a lot of issues with drugs it was always kind of like it can be with addicts it was like depending on the day one day he would tell me i was the greatest thing that ever happened to him and i was the number one son and two weeks later he's telling me he wished i'd never been born i should have been aborted
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So it was a weird, it was weird. It was a weird thing. So that's why, that's why that story is funny to me because he didn't mind that I told you about finding a sawed off shotgun. He minded that I implied it was dangerous when he made sure that it wasn't loaded. So it was okay. That's the way his brain worked.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He was, he should have been an arch criminal or something, but he didn't have the nerve. So he just became a guitarist. No, he was a drug dealer, and he used to run drugs and guns for the mob. Really? Oh, he would do stuff like... Melrose Park is kind of an infamous city just outside the Chicago city limits where a lot of the mob wise guys lived.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And he was friends with the kid of a wise guy. And the kid would dabble because he was protected because his father was a made man. So we'd go over to that guy's house for hours and just hear these crazy stories about the mob. And my dad would pick up something in a satchel and deliver it. I was eight years old going through all this shit. Wow. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So in that same thing with my stepmother, she told me that she thought my father had sired 12 children. Whoa. You know, all over the place. All over the place. He was a traveling musician and a whore to his own admittance. So it kind of makes sense. He once told me he'd slept with a thousand women. So 12 out of a thousand, you know what I mean? Normal odds. Yeah, the math is actually pretty good.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I saw a lot of stuff, but it was like, you know, when adults are trying to hide stuff from you, but not really.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You know? So like, for example, they would stay in the basement all night and party, whoever he was with, musicians, whatever. Right. So I'd come down at night and there'd be coke everywhere and rolled up 20s on Black Sabbath mirrors. I was like seven, 10.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I had a feeling, call it intuition, I had a feeling that he wanted me to clean up but not the mirrors. And I was like, what's on the mirror that you left behind? He was like, oh, that's have a cold or something. But yeah, it's good you didn't get rid of it. And they're like, why do you need the rolled up 20? Oh, it's just easier to, you know. So you knew it was bullshit, but you're 10.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You don't know what Coke is. Right, right, right. So you don't have any concept of what they're doing, but you know something's going on.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, and my dad would do stuff like he'd take me to lunch with his mistresses and stuff and introduce them as his friends. Yeah. Wow. So it was all kind of in plain sight weirdness. But, you know, you'd be driving down the street and suddenly you were in a drug deal and it was... Whoa. He told me he was shot at nine times and stabbed three times. Holy shit. Yeah. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It was one of my favorite stories. Yeah. So the band had a van. He had a van and we bought it off him. It was our band van for a while. And then after we didn't need it anymore because we got too big, he wanted to buy it back. So we sold it to him. So one day I went over to his house.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And if this is the driver's thing, right behind the driver's, where the driver's head would be, but in the middle of the car was a bullet hole. So I said, did somebody shoot at you? He goes, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. What happened? Exactly. He's like, yeah, I was stopped over there on Narragansett and some guy came up and I thought he needed something like a dollar or something.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I rolled down the window. As soon as I did, he put a gun through the window at my head. And then, you know, I hit the gas. And sped off. And so as I went to try to shoot me, but then he missed and the bullet went in behind my head and I got away. That's the story he told me at the time. So years later, the story came back up somehow. He goes, oh, that wasn't the real story.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Here's the real story. So same setup. He's sitting somewhere, but it was a drug deal. He rolls down the window to make the drug deal. Guy puts a gun at his head. He does hit the gas. The guy does try to shoot him. But because my father's mad now, he spins the van around and he tries to run the guy over. And the guy's trucking down the street. and the guy ran into a gas station.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So my dad came barreling at the gas station at full speed in this van, and he was going to run the guy over. And he said he reached a point where the guy was going to— if the guy stopped, he would run him over, but the guy leapt a fence, and the only way to kill the guy was to have to run the fence and ram into a house that was next to the gas station.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So he hit the brakes and didn't run the guy over. So that was the real story. So back to the kid thing, excuse me, that's why it's so hard to pin this whole thing down because there's so much smoke, you know? Right. Like he did tell me there was another kid named Bill. That's a real thing. Wow. And when he told me when I was 18, he lied and said he didn't know where the kid was.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, when my stepmother brought up the whole Bill Burr thing later and I asked him, he admitted that he did know where the kid was, but he didn't want to tell me.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't think Bill gives it any credence. That's my sense of it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't know. Honestly, I don't know what Bill thinks, you know what I mean?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. And so when I went to my father and I told him what my stepmother had said, he got really cagey and wouldn't tell me anything. He promised me that he would write down the names of the illegitimate children on a piece of paper so I could find them after he died. Oh my God. And he died. He's died and there's no paper. Oh, my God.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, the only way... Like a Scorsese movie maniac. Well, put it this way. If a person doesn't believe that somebody is their father, not their real father, that they grew up with... And I do know people who've had that. They grew up with somebody, and in fact, it just happened in my family.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That a cousin of mine found out that her father was not her father, and she's in her 60s. Because of a DNA test.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So it is possible that people can find out later in life, oh, by the way, that guy that you thought was your dad, he ain't your dad. Here's your real dad, right?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So it does happen. But I don't get any sense from Bill that he believes that's possible. Got it. So the only way it would be possible if Bill grew up in some kind of weird lie, you see what I'm saying? Right. And I don't believe that.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And you're a little kid. To be fair, I think a lot of people grew up in that atmosphere. I think we just don't hear about it. Yeah, but not a lot of people grew up with a dad that's running guns and drugs for the mob.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We would have conversations. Because as you get older, you start to ask questions, right? Yeah. So I'd say, Dad, aren't you worried if you get pulled over? Because he would carry a lot of fucking weed in the car just for his own personal use. He smoked constantly my whole childhood. Yeah. I mean, I just remember joint after joint all day. At the dinner table, in the car, I'd contact high.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So there was like a compartment in the engine compartment, like a thing that was full of whiskey. And then he would put a waterproof baggie with the weed in the whiskey. And so if a dog came around the car, it would never smell it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So now I got people wanting DNA tests because they're convinced that Bill is my half-brother. Is Bill willing to do a DNA test? I think that's ridiculous. You know what I'm saying? It's like... No, you have to do it. No, no. That's what I'm saying. I mean, first of all... To Bill's credit, he's been... Everything you saw on camera was, I think, his general irritation on the thing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I noticed one thing because I was in L.A. for a couple months this winter. And when they first, whatever, decriminalized in L.A., it seemed like everywhere you went, everybody was smoking weed. It became like a thing. You couldn't go anywhere without smelling, you know, the telltale smoke. And now it seems to have calmed down.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I think it's almost like now it's like Holland back in the day where it's like it's so normal. It's no longer a thing to like openly smoke weed. So I think it's gone back to a... oh, it's not that big a deal, which I think is probably best. Because there was a year there where you would go there and everybody was stoned. You couldn't get service at a restaurant.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, it was like people were staring off into space. Edibles.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I grew up – Because of my father's life, I mean, I don't know what age I became conscious of my father doing drugs constantly, but let's say I was five years old. So that's 1972. So I've been in weed culture since 1972. Jesus.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, and I met all those guys too, you know, these guys with PTSD and all that stuff. Wow. So I guess what I'm after is— I never understood what the big deal was. And the only thing that freaks me out are people that are really into weed. Like, you know what I mean? Like the 420 credit. Yeah. Like that's their identity. That freaks me out.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But he also kind of finds it funny because he's a comedian.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Juggalo is a whole thing. We've done business because of the NWA. We've done business with the juggalos. They seem like fun guys. They're great. No problem with him. You know, Violent J, as he's known, was in the NWA for a hot second. Oh, really? And he's kind of re-fired his promotion now, Juggalo, I guess, JCW? Juggalo Clown Promotions or something? So a lot of my wrestlers wrestle for him too.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
They did back in the day. They used to wrestle. I know they wrestled for WCW and TNA. So they were wrestling at the highest level for a while when they were sort of in the 90s times when they were on MTV and all that stuff.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Let me put it to you this way. Have you ever seen it? Well, I'm assuming, but you tell me if I'm wrong. Two guys get in the ring to roll around a bit. They're bros, they're going to roll around a bit. Emotions kick in and next thing you know, somebody's tapping somebody out. Do you ever see that happen? For sure. Okay.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, but it's freaky when people admit secretly being Juggalos. Have you ever had that experience?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And you're like, this is so out there. Juggalo makeup. Do they dress? Do they do like insane clown posse? They do very specific makeup.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It seems to me there's this kind of a particular way they do the Juggalo makeup.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yes, but that's Violet J on the top there. That's Violet J there. But they'll do the makeup kind of like how J is.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
How about the guys who split their cock? Have you ever seen that?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Donnie Fargo, who was a famous wrestler, he was famous for him. As a party trick, he would put a nail through his cock.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
In the heat of that moment with Bill and Howie egging it on, the emotionality of the thing came out because it's sort of a weird thing. We're suddenly in the middle of a situation. It's like a meta situation. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You're right. Because of all this body talk, my wife loves all sorts of weird body talk. And she wanted me to send you a message because she's literally about to have a baby like right now. Oh, congratulations. So we were somewhat concerned coming in because it was possible I may not be able to come because of her about to have this baby.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So when we were talking last night, I said, please don't have the baby today. I want to be on Joe's show. And she said, you tell Joe that if I start to have the baby, I expect him to give you some of his net jet points so you can get home. It's a very rich person joke.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Because she loves talking about this type of shit. Why does she like talking about that stuff? I don't know. In my family, we didn't talk about anything. Sex, you know, was all just kind of implied. Oh, I see. I grew up in a family where nobody hugged, nobody kissed, everyone hated each other, and nobody talked about the secrets of life. You know, good or bad. It was all kind of...
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
In the shadows, you know what I mean? And she grew up in a family where it's like, because she has five brothers and a sister. So they talk about everything, like to the point where just like at dinner, like you're talking about all this like weird body stuff. I don't want to be graphic because it turns me off, you know, but they seem to think it's funny.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's funny you asked me that. I didn't grow up with my mother. My mother went crazy when I was four and I never lived with her again. And we started to become close again when I was in my 20s. And I remember this one time where I walked through her door and it was that thing where I wanted to hug her because I never really hugged her my whole life.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I just made this decision at 24, like I was going to hug my mother and give her a kiss on the cheek. And it was like that was the opening of this other life where people hug and kiss each other. You know what I mean? I mean, obviously I had fool around with girls, but it was only within the context of being romantic. I had no physical affection in my life outside of that.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So, yes, on some level we were playing along, but then it starts to become like, wait, this is kind of weird, and then it starts to kick in, and then Billy Bush is in there, and it just took on a life of its own. So what I'm saying is... There's enough there that people are all over me to come up with more answers. But you see what I'm saying? It's like it's spun out of control into its own thing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Now my kids are all over me and, you know, I got nine and six year olds. So it's like, I'm used to kids like, you know, rugrats climbing all over you. But I didn't grow up in that at all. Like I had no, the idea of affection was, was alien. In fact, when I first started chasing girls at 17, 18, you know, girls want to hold your hand or hug you or, you know, in the car.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I was like, it was so freaky to me. When did you relax?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
No, I'm actually a very naturally affectionate person. And it's nice to give you a hug. And it's nice to see you. And it's nice to love on people that you admire. And are you friends? And that's the great stuff of life. But I came very late. You can even see I'm just uncomfortable. I'm sure you know Howie Mandel. You must. I mean, Howie with his...
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I made the mistake of hugging Howie once, and I mean, you know, I killed his cat, you know?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
See, I think I'm secretly a germaphobe. Really? Secretly. We just talked about it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I had him on my podcast and we did talk about it. It hasn't aired yet, but we talked about all his, I guess, phobias would be the word. Yeah. Conditions. I mean, there's all these letters. You know, ADHD, OCD, this and that. He's very open about it to his credit.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Except when he puts you in front of a professional comedian who's kind of irritated that you're there and claiming you're his half brother.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
He's such an alpha. I mean, he's just one of those guys. He just can't help it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Right. He can't help himself. Yeah, at one point he looked at me. Actually, I was wearing this coat. He goes, where'd you get that? Like a Moroccan bazaar? Yeah. It's like a regular coat. It's like, oh, this is a very expensive coat.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But I'm asking you this in an empathetic way. Because you're a professional comedian, so maybe it's different. But when a professional comedian puts their death ray on you and wants to make fun of you, it's a very particular feeling. It's like getting carved up by a chef. Right. You know what I mean? Because they're so good at... Yeah. Zorro. Zorro. It's kind of cool.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Now it's a DNA test problem, which is a bit on its own. We're going to do like a live stream. We'll do it here.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's like, wow, I'm being insulted by Bill Burr. It's kind of an honor. But at the same time, it's really fucked up because they know exactly where to poke you.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Who's like the meanest comedian you ever kind of locked horns on you?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't want to be Tony Hinchcliffe. Tony, I'm going to say right now, I don't think he's my brother.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I got the feeling that Bill wasn't really given the heads up. Yeah, probably. It was a little bit irritating to him.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You know? Yes, and my mind doesn't work like that, so it's hard. Like, I would have a better time understanding like a rocket scientist than a professional comedian, I think. Really? Because the professional comedians I've known personally a little bit, like Bobcat Goldthwait or Carrot Top, their minds are so different than the average human mind. I think the way they process information and
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
They're looking for something that, almost like a meme, coalesces a whole set of ideas. That's what makes it funny, right? It works on all these different levels at one time. The great comedians, like Dice to me is the greatest. And Dice will tell a joke. It works on like eight different levels. You know, it's like high, low, middle.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Oh, I watch him. You mean when he just goes up to people? Yeah. Oh, it's unbelievable.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I just love that he'll just double and triple and quadruple down on the bit. He just won't give it up. He won't give it up. Zamuda's the same thing with Tony Clifton. Just the discomfort of it all.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Unbelievable. That is so... The Day the Laughter Died. The Day the Laughter Died. Rick Rubin produced it. Yeah, yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I've listened to it multiple times and it's one of the funniest things I've ever heard.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Oh, I see. Pryor took that and that honesty. I never connected that dot, but it makes sense when you say it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, remember that whole thing where he would just go on and read his court transcripts? Yeah. Well, that was the end. That must have been really out there. I mean-
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I was working on something and I was supposed to go on Howie's show that day. And they said, Howie will meet you out in the street or something for whatever reason. So I go out in the street and the first thing Howie says to me when he sees me, he goes, here comes Bill Burr. And I go, you too? Like, do you know this story? And he said, no, I don't know about it. And I said, you know what?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Again, all I know is I don't think, but when I look at him, he looks just like my father. Right. He doesn't look... We look similar-ish, but when I look at him, he's got the same thing as my dad had. I don't know how to... You would know if somebody looked like your dad, right? Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's where it's freaky for me. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
No. I saw him live a few times. I was going to say, I think age-wise it probably does.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, he felt... It was like, to me at the time, he was the rock and roll equivalent of comedy or something. Yes. And didn't Guns N' Roses take him on tour or something? There was some... I seem to remember somebody took him on tour. Something like that.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And, you know, if you want to play the game one step further, you've got two world-class communicators. People might argue against me calling myself a world-class communicator, but I've been doing it for over 30 years. You're a world-class communicator. God bless. So... It's not too crazy that you'd have one guy go this way and one guy, you know what I mean?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You're right, because when Eddie Murphy did his HBO special, that was when he just like – Yep, delirious. He had that leather suit. Yep. I remember high school, everybody was like – Norton, I've been looking at you.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Oh! I tried to talk my wife into seeing if we could hire Dice to do our wedding. She wasn't having it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The vision I had, my wife wanted to do kind of an after party of the wedding. We had it at my house. So the idea was, you know, when half the crowd bangs off because it's been a long day, there's still be a crowd that want to hang out and just party. And then Dice shows up. And then Dice shows up. At 1 a.m. And then puts the death ray on me. Right? She just was not having it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I'm having Bill Burr PTSD because that feeling when they put the death ray on you. Did it really bother you? No, it didn't bother me. It's just... It's uncomfortable. Well, I'm not... What do they always say? Don't... don't bring a knife to a gunfight, right? Like, what am I going to say? You know what I mean? Why was he picking on you? I think because he was uncomfortable about the whole setup.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Because at the end of the day, it's my fault. I'm the one who said something in public.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So at the end of the day, I do bear the responsibility for initiating this insanity.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Because, I mean, I walk through public now and people are like, hey, it's Bill Burr's brother. So he's got to be getting it the other way.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You're the brother of that weirdo from the pumpkins, you know?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's somewhere between a bit and reality. And I think that's where it gets confusing. That's why I would use the word meta. There's this moment, if you watch it back, where Howie splits and just leaves me and Bill alone. And Howie has a band that plays when he does a show, so the gentleman who runs the band starts playing a really sad piano. And Bill just starts riffing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's just me and him in this room alone. I mean, I don't know Bill at all. And he starts talking about our shared dad and... it gets really weird because on some level it's like, it's possible, right? Right. Even if it's 1%, it's not a zero. Right. So that's where it gets kind of, that's why I say meta. It's like you're looking down a hall of mirrors and you start almost playing with your mind.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
There's something about – I brought a wrestler with me today who runs the promotions for the NWA. But you know what I'm saying?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Tommy Jr., a famous ECW wrestler, went on to work for WWE and now works for TNA. Tommy's the classic salty veteran, you know, seen it all, done it all, you know, been split in half and the whole thing. So there's nothing Tommy hasn't seen. And, you know, Tommy will say something like— It's all a work. It's all a work. Basically, it's the cynical view that everything you see in the world is fake.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The news is fake. It's all a work. So once you go there cynically, it's hard to back out of that. So I like the discomfort. The artist in me likes the discomfort.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I really do like the discomfort. I remember watching Andy Kaufman on Saturday Night Live circa 78 or whatever. And it's that idea that you can create a vibration in the room between what's expected and where you're willing to go. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I have this one friend who was a performance artist, and she would do stuff like when she was in college, she would just walk in the cafeteria and take off all her clothes. And she would stick a camera in the corner and just film people's reactions. And it was interesting to watch because one guy would just keep eating his food and no-sell it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Like, I'm just going to eat my salad and just pretend this isn't happening. Like, every human being goes in a different direction with the weirdness. Right. So, as an artist, you know, on a stage, you know, there is this kind of...
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
crazy power that you have because depending on what comes out of your mouth next or what you do can affect thousands of people and then obviously through a digital medium even more so there's something about flirting with the the uh the uncomfortable but the the what makes it uncomfortable is there's always always has a foundation of truth You know what I'm saying?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. If it didn't have a foundation of truth, it would just be silly. Right, right, right. The discomfort comes from like, oh, there's something you're doing that I recognize in myself or I know somebody that's like this.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Okay, so if I walked out of that room that day after meeting Bill for the first time and it was a 1% chance, now that I walk through life, we're up into like the 10 percentile in the public's mind. Yes. 10% of the public is convinced we're brothers. Even if I sat there and told them, no, it's not true. More now. That's okay. But that's what I'm saying. Now after this show.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But that's why it's like when you say it's a bit, yeah, it's a bit to the extent that you're playing with the idea. Yes. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. It would be like if I sat down and say, you know, I'm sure you remember the last time I was on your show, but you know, I met you when I was 12 and I told you this whole story about how I met you.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Like Carrot Top in his show tells this whole story about meeting Gallagher when he's a kid. Have you ever heard that?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Gallagher is Carrot Top's hero. Sure. And he even does a thing at the end of his show in tribute to Gallagher. He kind of does a watermelon bit or something like that. But he tells this thing in the show about how meeting Gallagher when he was like 14 years old. And Gallagher actually gave him some advice that inspired him to be who he became. But, I mean, for all I know, it's a bit.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But he says it with such earnestness, and it does have some, it feels right, but for all I know, it's just another bit. Everything's a work. That's what I'm saying. So if I came here, oh, Joe, I met you when I was 12. You were at an airport. You were so nice. You signed an autograph, you know. There's a part of you that would be like, well, it's possible. I mean, you know what I mean?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I think our whole culture has been turned into like, where are we? Right. Like, you know, that's why I started calling it like five, seven years ago, a post-truth era. Right. I mean, we've all been in that situation where somebody in our inner circle will bring up something that we know from a factually presented basis isn't true. I heard so-and-so did so-and-so, and you go, no, that's not true.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Let me show you the YouTube clip. You know what I mean? This didn't happen. Or, no, so-and-so made a left, not a right. But because of what they've heard, they believe it. And you can literally show them something and say, no, no, look. And they're like, well, that must be AI or edited. It's like once somebody becomes convinced of this culture, it's really hard to unconvince them. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And so from a performing point of view and somebody who's now also in the podcasting sphere, it's like – No. Yeah. You know about that? He did this thing where it was like he would talk and then play songs.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Oh, yeah, it was huge. He went on this massive Broadway run.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And HBO did it and put it on as a special. But he literally, in the first five minutes of talking, and it's about 1,200 people a night, so it's a live audience, and he says in the first five minutes, by the way, I'm not Bruce Springsteen. I mean, that's my name, but the Bruce Springsteen you think, he's like, I don't know how to fix a car. I've never been a factory in my life. He explains.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Serious. Yeah. Now, I knew that as a performer. I knew that what I was watching wasn't real, but people want him to play John Wayne so bad that he puts his finger in there and says, okay, you want me to be John Wayne? I'll be John Wayne.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yes, but now we're in the business of it. I mean, there's obviously examples, historical antecedents over the last hundred years of media where people would figure it out. Right. Charlie Chaplin or something, you know what I mean? Like they wanted him to be the tramp, so he became the tramp.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
He wasn't that guy at all. Right. He fed into it and obviously connected to something real in him, but he wasn't really a tramp. He was a complete rich Lothario.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So that's what I'm saying. What is more valuable, what the public wants from you or what is true? In the entertainment world, we're used to it, right? Yeah. Like you could play Joe Rogan, the comedian, at the drop of a hat because you've done it. And Joe Rogan, the UFC announcer, you know, just I'm not saying it's not who you are, but it's an extenuation.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's still Joe Rogan. I don't see you as being disingenuous. I can't even think of one time I've ever seen you in any media where I thought that he's not playing. He's not Joe Rogan. You know what I'm saying? Right. I've done it. I've played other people. So what I'm trying to say is now we're in this thing where like everybody's doing it. I mean, everybody.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We've all looked at some girl on the Internet and said, that's not how she really looks. And you got to go through the Instagram and like you find the real picture. Like everybody's kind of become comfortable with like a filter over everything. So that's what I mean. We're in a post-truth world where the impression is becoming more valuable than the reality. That's really, I think, unprecedented.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, that would be my argument for why my band has risen back up. Because we're one of the only bands left that sort of represents some ideal that's long abandoned.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But I actually, on my podcast recently, interviewed... Mickey Dolenz. And we talk a lot about this very subject. It hasn't aired yet. But he was less interested in the discussion than I was because my argument would be is that the monkeys are actually the template that came. Our whole lives, the monkeys were dismissed as an anachronistic thing that went against the integrity of the Beatles.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But if you actually look now, Beatles versus monkeys, the monkeys are more accurate of what came than the Beatles. In what way? Because authenticity is less and less and less important. Oh. Those who establish authenticity, and I would include myself amongst that, and I would include you in that, they're very valuable.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But you also know, because of your public things that have gone on, you've had to stand there and take a lot of shit because... Just even speaking your own truth is inconvenient in a post-truth world. Yeah. Right? So it's actually more politically expedient to create a character that can navigate this new world. And by the way, change on a dime.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So my argument would be from a rock and roll historical point of view is that the monkeys are actually more relevant now in a particular way. The Beatles are this preeminent band. That's not the argument I'm making. I'm saying is the model of the monkeys, which was always held up as for a form of mockery.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
See, this is what you get when you make plastic music. No, no. We live in the age of plastic music now.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I used to work with a musician, and I was in therapy at the time, and I was having a lot of problems with the musician. And the musician was from a wealthy family, but he always, he didn't bathe, and he wore junky clothes. He wanted people to believe he was somebody that he wasn't. Right. You know, I was actually from a poorish family. He was from a rich family pretending to be poor.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And my therapist had the great line about him. He said, he looks like a junkie, he smells like a junkie, but he doesn't have the guts to be a junkie. So if in this culture you can pick up anything you want... And adapt it without the downside of actually becoming it. Yeah. Well, you can see why so many people without courage or chops, it puts them in a game.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It puts them in this social me-you that we all sort of have to navigate. So now we're into this place where we're talking to a lot of people who believe that they're furry number 463 because that's all their status comes from their digital online group.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. You know, I'm 57. I got two kids, another one on the way. I work with animal charities and I have a tea house and a wrestling company. And I'm still fighting at 57 with people who want me to be this guy that they believe I am from 30 years ago. Right. And no amount of empirical evidence will change their minds.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Sam Kennison's second act should have been get sober, get straight, and go on another hellacious run.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
and they're wild and impulsive and aggressive and they do crazy things like some of them like they just go off on benders they disappear for days like i think it's common with people with severe cts uh cte because i'm on the board i'm on honorary on the board of the concussion legacy foundation which i'm sure you know has some tie to ufc too because you know chris nowinski who runs it is my friend
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
One of the main things that happens with people who start to get CTE early in life is lack of impulse control. So suddenly you have a 40-year-old retired professional athlete who's faster and stronger than 99% of the population who can't control his temper.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's what makes that situation so frightening for the families because— they lose the ability to kind of keep it all reined in.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It probably happens with a lot of— It's getting better, I think, with wrestling. The awareness is helping. In our organization, we forbid headshots. That's good. You know, the classic chair to the head. There's none of that in my world. Good. You don't need it. For what?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, I think also, and I'm not speaking from experiences, but I've heard the stories. You take people who are held up as almost like masculine ideals. That fall isn't just the fall physically. It's the fall of like, I'm not the person. I'm not the hero that you've made me out to be anymore. I'm broken. And there's nothing I can do to put the pieces back together.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I assume you know Carrot Top. Sure, very well. Okay, so Carrot Top and I become friends recently. He's great. Love him. He's a total sweetheart. Sweetheart of a guy. Genuine. Just a great guy to know. Yeah. But as you know, because you do this for a living, suddenly everybody wants to start pitching you bits. So I made the mistake of pitching Carrot Top a bit. I thought I had a good bit for him.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I know this is a leap of discussion, but that's one of the discussions that's going on internally in my band is I'm 57 and one guy's 56 and one guy's, I think, 61. It's like, at what point do you start to dial the thing down? My brain is wired, I'm going to go until I run into a brick wall. And they're more like, well, things are pretty good.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Do we have to keep throwing ourselves into the maw of the public? And my argument is, it'd be like going into a UFC fight and not fighting to win.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
fighting not to lose that seems to me far more dangerous and that's kind of my argument is like in order to be in the arts you've got to it's a pell-mell all in all in or all out that's the only gear I know yeah this is the thing that happens to bands when they get to a point where they never make any new music right and they just tour on the old music you're touching on the nerve of my life yeah how do you navigate that I just keep working I refuse
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's it. In my case, back to my daddy for a second, I watched my dad play songs he didn't want to play. I watched him doing drug deals rather than make money from music. I watched him give up on his talent, his dream, all of it. I watched it destroy my father. And then if you want to even go further in a kind of a mythical way, my success destroyed him again.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So if you've watched that, well, then I was lucky enough to have kids late in life. My first kid came when I was 48 and we're about to have one again, 57. Once my kid came, I was like, this kid is not going to look at me how I looked at my father. Like shoulda, woulda, coulda.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I had to get myself up off the couch and like get serious again. And again, that's that mentality, that killer mentality. Like I can still go. I'm going to go. So until somebody stops me, I'm going to go.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, even doing the podcast. You know, it looks easy to just sit and talk, but it requires prep and mental focus. And it's a lot harder than I would have thought, you know. And, you know, I got money. I mean, I could sit home. I like being in the game. I like the hustle. I like having to learn things.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
A quick story was I did a podcast based on an album that we put out that was 33 songs. And I did it for iHeartRadio, and they were fine and everything. But when it all finished, I started to kind of enjoy it a bit. And I poked around, as you do, to see if anybody was interested. And it was like crickets. Nobody gave a shit about me being a podcaster, like at all.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And if any kind of response came back, it'd be like, well, if you want to tell stories about the 90s and get other 90s artists on to talk about the 90s, we'd be cool with that. But other than that, we have no use for you. So I just thought, okay, not for me, not meant to be. And then I did Club Random with Bill Maher.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And as soon as I was done with the episode and shaking everybody's hands, they said, Bill's starting a podcast network. Would you be interested in doing this? And I said, only if I could do whatever I want to do. And they said, tell us what it is. And I pitched them the idea that is the show called Magnificent Others Now.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I said, I want to talk to whoever I want to talk to about whatever I want to talk about. But here's the reason. And the reason to the heart of your question is I feel there's a lot of people in this culture that don't get celebrated in the way that I would celebrate them because we've become so skewed with influencers and people who are famous that don't do shit. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I think there's a lot of value in American culture that can be celebrated. So you're talking about, like, a retired fighter or something. There's a lot we can learn from a retired fighter.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And he didn't respond, you know what I mean? And then I texted him like an hour later and said, hey, did you get that bit they sent? He goes, yeah, that's why I didn't respond.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You know, you have a shogun armor out here, you know what I mean? To me, a retired fighter is like, you think I don't want to sit down with a retired shogun?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And ask them about what it's like to be in there alone?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Recently interviewed Steve Vai, great guitar player. And for some reason, I had this idea of, you know, like the classic Sergio Leone, two guys at the end of the street with the gun. Yeah. So I said to Steve Vai, who do you fear at the end of, like, who's the faster gun? You know what I mean? That's his.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I'm projecting, but I'm saying we all have that moment, like, who do we not want to be in the octagon with?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
For me? Yeah. Or for him? For Steve Vai. He didn't want to say. Really? Yeah. Well, I think he's a top guy. Right, right, right. Why would you want to create heat where there's no need to create heat? I mean, he's at an elite level. Right. I'll tell you what. I wouldn't want to be at the end of the street with him, Steve Vai at the other end of the street. Yeah. Or Yngwie.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, right, right, right. Those guys are like insane. Shredders. I mean, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm an amateur, you know, compared to those guys. So I wouldn't want the woo-woo-woo-woo.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, do you still train MMA? I still do martial arts. Okay. I don't spar, though. I don't get hit in the head anymore. But there's got to be those times where you see a fighter that they just get it. Yeah. And it looks easy for them, and you're like, how is that? Autism. Okay, God bless. But I'm saying that's the way it is for me with other musicians sometimes. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I'll look at a guy like Steve Veyer and Eddie Van Halen, Ring Van, like, how do you do that?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
My dad had a story, actually. He was playing a club in Wisconsin. He never heard of Jimi Hendrix. And Jimi Hendrix was playing the night before they were playing the same club. So one of his boys said, why don't we go up, watch this new guy, Jimi Hendrix. We'll hang out. We'll play the gig the next night. We'll drive back to Chicago.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So imagine my dad's in a club in Wisconsin with like 1,000 people in 1966 or 67, and out walks Jimi Hendrix. Whoa. My dad said he'd never even heard his music, so it split his mind. And he said it was so shocking the way he played and how masterful he was at it. He said when he got on stage the next night, he felt like he couldn't play the guitar at all. Wow. It was like an alien instrument.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And Clapton talks about it. Yeah. Like, Jimi Hendrix blew Clapton's mind. Yeah. Roy Albert Hall, whatever it was, it was like, oh, my God, what the hell is happening?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I think it was bag of nails or something it was called.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And this is when people were spray painting on the walls in London, Clapton as God. And here shows up this guy who was on the Chitlin circuit, is what they used to call playing for Little Richard and the Isley Brothers. I mean, he was just in the backup band. And he shows up in England. Chaz Chandler, the bassist from the Animals, goes, this guy could be a star. Gets him a record deal.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
He shows up in England. And next thing you know, he's like, Hey Joe is the number one hit. And he's on TV. And it's like, I mean, imagine that.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So, yeah, there are those people that's like, it's so shocking. Van Halen was the same way. I got to interview him once and sit in his studio for four hours. He would just play the guitar and you'd just be like, I don't understand how this is possible. You're doing inhuman things. And I know how to do what you do. And I can't even come close to doing what you're doing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, it's like somebody telling me how to write a song. I get that. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Do you play guitar at all? No. So the one thing I'll tell you, guitar player to non-guitar players, the thing you learned about the great guitar players, it's all in their hands. Everybody focuses on what amp, what guitar, the gear. Somehow it's the way they hit the strings. I couldn't even explain it to you.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We call it attack. I have no idea. Stevie Ray Vaughan, for example, he played his strings purposely high. He made it harder to play the guitar. Really? And still played at that level. Now, there's a belief with certain guitar players that the higher you put the strings, the more you have to dig out the notes, and so it becomes more emotive. So imagine he's doing it at that level.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
He's making it harder to do what he's doing, and he's doing it at that level. Wow. Unbelievable. Incredible talent. I mean, shocking. Again, shocking. It's like, where does that come from? Just has it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And think about this, because he talked about it. There was a point in his life where he was dropping rocks of Coke, I think in whiskey, and drinking it. Jeez. And rotting his stomach out. And he got sober, like, in the last year or so of his life, and he played even better. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
heck with it. I'm just going to tell it on your show, so don't ask me anymore. And I went on the show, and I told this story about how 10 years ago my stepmother came to me and said, do you know who Bill Burr is? I'd never heard of Bill, didn't know who he was, because I don't really consume much popular culture. I had no idea he was a famous comedian. He could have been the lawnmower guy.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
If you listen to the recordings that he made live, particularly in the last year or so of his life, he's playing even better. So that's what I say about Sam Kinison. Imagine if he was able to make that left and...
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Maybe. But you know why he, you know, this is my opinion, but you know why he plays Voodoo Child so well? Why? Because he had studied the same guys that Hendrix had studied. So he's not imitating Hendrix. He's coming from the same wellspring of information. Like who are the guys? Albert King.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
B.B. King, Albert King, you know. It's Muddy Waters. It's understanding the way those guys played. So he's not imitating Jimi Hendrix. He's playing from the same spot.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. I don't even know where he's from. I can't even identify where he's from.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Isn't that weird? And that was part of the vibe that my father put on me, which was like, well, how the hell did you get out?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Dig it out. But that's kind of what I was saying before. It's a curious thing why certain people make it and certain people don't. My father, before he passed away, he told me, you had the one thing that I didn't have, which was the ambition. Like he wanted it. He said, I didn't really want it. I just wanted it to come to me.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. So I've had a couple professional comedians, Carrot Top, preeminent among them, kind of let me know you're not that funny.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, that's what he was saying. He was admitting to me that he had made some sort of internal decision that he didn't want to do whatever he had to do to do it. He made certain excuses involving the mob. He did say that back then, and it is a known thing in Chicago, that in order to be successful in Chicago, you had to basically sign contracts with the mob.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
There's always been rumors about the band Chicago that there were mob ties with their world. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, yeah, I've read about that. That gets into other types of complications. And I don't have an opinion on it. It's like saying there's no way to separate the two things at the time. Anybody back then, any clubs at the time, particularly in Chicago, they were all mob groups. And Los Angeles as well. Sure.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So if you were a comedian or, you know what I mean, an emcee or whatever you were doing, like, here's Lola the dancer, you know. You were connected. There was a white guy standing there and everybody knew who they were because that's how they did their business. Because if you didn't like what Johnny Rocco was doing, you were going to get in trouble and you didn't want to get in trouble.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I went to school with a bunch of the mob wise guys' kids and grandkids.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We played a club on Long Island once where the crowd was moshing. And in the middle of the four song, the guy on the side of the stage that worked for me was waving, like, stop playing in the middle of the song. And I thought, fucking stop playing. Got a thousand people out in front of me. And he kind of did one of these, and there were two wise guys standing there with suits on.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Kind of like you're going to get in trouble with these guys if you don't stop. And I said, I don't give a fuck. And I kept going. So they waited one more song and then they came out between songs on stage with their backs to the audience and they pulled their coats open and showed me a gun and said, you better calm the fuck down. Whoa. Because of the moshing? Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Because it was one of, we used to call them brass and fern bars, you know, like the brass bar and the ferns.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You know that bar, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've all been there. And we were playing one of those places for some reason. And the crowd was going apeshit. They were bouncing off the wall. So they were blaming us for the reaction of the crowd. So they wanted us to bring the crowd down. But how do you bring the crowd down? So they literally showed me a gun and said, you better calm the fuck down.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So what did you do? I just kept going. Were they going to kill me on stage? Jesus Christ.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
They weren't gone. Really? I mean, there might have been a problem if somebody had done some real damage or something, but there was no problem. But they definitely threatened me on stage. How did they not know about moshes? This is me at like 180 pounds and long hair and bad attitude.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't think they'd ever seen anything like moshing. This is like 92. This is a very new phenomenon to the outside world.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Oh, yeah, but it was only in the underground clubs is what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. You're in a wise guy's club on Long Island with brass rails and ferns.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. From the mosh pit. I remember Poison Ivy. She was the guitar player for the cramps. Oh, right. So great.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Did you ever kind of encounter the alternative scene when you were a kid? Not really, no. Not for you, the freaks?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's a lot of, what do you call it, when the brains don't connect, the brain hemispheres? Bipolar. A lot of bipolarity in musicians. Particularly high levels? My theory is the reason they become musicians is they overdevelop one side of their brain. Oh. You know, you probably get on somebody who knows what they're talking about.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But the idea is that if people's brain hemisphere, and that's why a lot of musicians do coke, is it helps the polarities work. It helps the brain communicate left to right. Really? Oh, yeah. It's a known thing that coke really helps that if you have that bipolarity. Huh.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't know. I mean, I've worked with people who are bipolar and they've talked about their medications and stuff, you know? And it's still kind of an inexact science, bipolarity. It's crazy to think that Coke helps fix some things. I think it helps. What I've heard is it helps the brain communications. Anybody I've known that's bipolar as a musician that did Coke told me they felt normal.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And it's a good one. What is it? I can't give it away. I'll tell you privately, but it's a good one. You and Carrot Top? Yeah. Oh, nice. That he likes. Okay. He likes my movie idea.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's the first time in their life they felt normal, that their brain worked normally.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Or you can get tea, coca tea. Yeah. I was just in South America. I've had that. Mate de Coca. Yeah. Yeah. I've had that.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. But back to the theory, the idea is if you have one side of your brain overdevelop, it makes you good at something that you wouldn't necessarily be good at. And then bad at life. Yeah, probably. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You need a colonel. So if you're meeting a successful musician, they're the graduating class of the bipolarity.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That makes sense. So there's some functional level of acumen.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's why through the years as I've heard people give rumor to any number of famous rock stars – It's like I recognize all the behaviors. Most people treat it like, oh, can you believe so-and-so did this and made this erratic decision? It's like, no, that's a musician. That's how most of their brains work.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't know what it is, and maybe there's a comedic parallel, but it just strikes me that the reason there's such consistent bad behavior with musicians is because their brains don't work right. And I'm sure somebody's going to get mad at me for saying that, but I mean it as a compliment. It makes them good at something that they maybe wouldn't necessarily be good at. And maybe – I don't know.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, there's no good band members. That's the problem.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's the thing. I mean, we broke up in 2000 and then the drummer and I brought the band back in 2007 and it only lasted two years. And then I soldiered on. alone is the only original member from 2009 to 2015. And then the drummer came back and then the guitar player who I didn't talk to for 16, 17 years came back in 2018. So we've been an intact three quarter unit since 2018.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's just real heat. It's real heat. Yeah. That sucks. No, it's all resolved now. I mean, it's all good. I mean, I think if you don't talk to somebody for 16, 17 years, there's a beef there that, you know what I mean? It lasts. A real one. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I'm nodding my head because this is my life experience for 35 years.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
All we need is other comics to work with us. The problem with the band is... the band members have no idea why it works. We're clueless as to the mystery of why people are attracted to us as a unit.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We can certainly conceptualize, like I write good songs and I play good guitar, but there's something about bands that creates a kind of a magical, Pete Townshend referred to it as a gang, a gang that you want to be in. That's what makes bands attractive to people. That was his opinion. I don't totally, I don't disagree.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
There's something that goes on in those relationships that's kinetic enough that it sustains past whether or not you have a good song or two.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yes. All together. So if you're lucky, and in this new world, you know, you got the Stones playing into their 80s. Yeah. So the economy of music has changed where it's like you're in an elongated state of success. It's just totally unprecedented, by the way. There's no – what's going on with rock bands in their 50s and beyond is there's no prior parallel in 100 plus years of recorded music.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
There's not even one instance you can point to and say it worked that way then. So we're all in uncharted territory. And there's nobody that can even really advise you. There's always the material thing of like, well, you're going to make a lot of money and, you know, you got this IP and the band. But it's like the actual sort of the nuts and bolts of how to hang together.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So for us, it's been really – I call it the family of the band. There's some sort of pride that's emerged with, like, we've all survived, our relationships are intact enough for us to get on a stage, and somehow it benefits our families individually. So it has allowed us a sort of pride, you know, because it's less about our relationship and more about our relationship with our families.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's allowed us to have a sweetness between the three of us that we didn't have when we were young.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You're really going out on a limb there with the growing up shit.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Perpetual adolescence over here. Well, that is part of the fun, though. I mean, you don't actually have to really grow up. You know, it's funny. Even when I say something like this, there's already some guy getting ready to go on Reddit. But there is a day you wake up and you look in the mirror like, I'm a rock star. This is fucking cool.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And there's another day that you wake up and go, you know, I don't have to get off this rock star train if I don't want to.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, well, the mythical part—see, in his case, the mythical part of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards is integrated. They become the avatar. They're the living example of where it actually works. My argument is against those people where it doesn't work. You know, Larry465 on the internet, who thinks he's lord of, like, you know, D&D or something.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I never tried stand-up, so that's... You could do it. It seems terrifying to me. Eh, so singing on stage. You could do it. It's a lot easier to scream with 50,000 watts behind your voice than tell a joke and bomb. Is it, though?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, that's where I get kind of like, what is that? I get the other thing. You know, because, you know, whether it's, you know— What do you mean by Larry— I'm joking about the guy on the internet whose entire status is based on being in a subculture and achieving some status within the subculture, which doesn't really apply into the outside world. Oh, like a Reddit forum or something.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, whatever. Whatever it is. Mick Jagger walks into a stadium full of people. They're there to see Mick Jagger and Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood. Right. Even though they're 80. And you, who's been around everybody, goes, holy shit, there it is.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Okay, but it's the myth made real. Yes. Have you ever watched those YouTube videos like, what was Caesar really like? You know what I mean? That type of stuff. What was it like to live in those times? Because there's the myth and then there's the reality.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And then sometimes if you learn about the reality, you're like, wow, that guy was really a badass or she was really a badass because the thing is real. The mythology is real. It has truth or resonance in it. It's all this other culture that's risen up where we're supposed to pay tribute, and that goes back to the podcast. It's like we're paying tribute to people who haven't done shit.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I want to pay tribute to people who've actually done something.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The other day, I interviewed Susan Olsen, who was Cindy Brady. Oh, wow. The Brady Bunch is, as far as the original show, I think it's been over for 50 years. Yes. Right? Yeah. Okay. Every interview you look up on YouTube on Susan Olsen, it's just getting her to regurgitate the same stories. And she did the Brady Bunch when she was like 7 to 12 years old or something. Wow.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You know what I'm saying? Yeah. You're Gilligan for life. Okay. My thing is, no, you're not Gilligan for life. And we had a great chat because I think there's a lot to learn from somebody who went through a zeitgeist moment at such a young age. How do you navigate past that? What do you do with yourself? How do you pick yourself up off the ground? How do you deal with typecasting?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
How do you navigate the fact that as you walk through the airport, you're not Susan Olsen, you're Cindy Brady?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I'm still the rat in the cage guy. I deal with that too, you know?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I didn't get it at the time. I actually had to be talked into it. Really? Yeah. We were putting out our double album and it was this big pressure moment, 95. And I wanted a different song to be the first song. And the guy from the record company called, who's now passed away, his name was Phil Cordero, lovely guy. And he literally did the thing on the phone, kid, it's a smash. You got to trust me.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You created it. The only time I've been able to experience that is when I was really high.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Like getting so high that I could hear it as if it was somebody else singing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
What really tripped me out about doing a lot of drugs back in the day was I would hear messages in my music that I didn't even know I was putting in there. And at some point I became conscious of my unconscious ability to put messages inside. Sorry, you're looking at me like I'm crazy. No, no, no. It's fascinating. So imagine, I'll try to reset up the scenario. Okay.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You write a song, you think it's about something. You're sure of it. In fact, you would tell people, sorry, this horrible plague I got. No worries. You're convinced that the song that you've written is about your ex-girlfriend. And then when you're super high, you listen and you can hear yourself actually singing about something else.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So now you have a conscious understanding of something you're unconscious is implanted in the art. And once I became conscious of the process, I became more aware of how to consciously plant messages in my music. Does that make sense?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, I don't know. That part doesn't bother me, strangely. Well, that's why you're good at it. Right? I feel like I kind of know what I'm doing up there for some reason.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yes, but I didn't know that I was doing it until I did a lot of drugs, that there was this other voice at work, this subliminal voice.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The conscious mind wants to believe the song's about your ex-girlfriend, but what it's really about is about being abandoned by your mother. If you came up to me and said, what's that song about? And I trust you, and I go, oh, it's just about my ex. I would believe it. Like 100%. And then I listened to it high on drugs and I'm like, oh my God, I'm singing about my mother and I'm weeping.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And then once I have that kind of agape moment of like, holy shit, then I go back and listen to the music sober and I can totally hear it. And then where it gets really weird is people would come up to me and say, that song is That reminded me of my relationship with my mother. Thank you.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
People would come up and respond to me on the unconscious recognition, not what I thought I wrote the song about. That blew my mind, that there was this other person in their layer at work. And I gained a lot more respect for, I guess you would call it the shamanic aspects of art. I don't know if you've ever read Castaneda's, but do you ever read Castaneda's?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. It was kind of a thing for our generation. Everybody kind of read Castanedas. Yeah. And it's still to this day debated about whether Castanedas was a real thing. It was a documentary. It was true stories or made up. And did Don Juan, the shaman, was he a real person? Is there really a Don Juan? There's a lot of debate. I think there's even been New York Times articles written about it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
About whether Castanedas, this whole thing is a fraud and all this stuff. And I think Castanedas may even still be alive. That might be one to look up sometime. But anyway, I gained a lot more respect that artists have the ability to communicate at subconscious levels that they're not even aware of.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I don't know if that resonates the way I'm explaining it, but it moved something in me, allowed me to be a better artist.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The best explanation I ever heard that resonated with me was, you know, the entire universe is constructed on waves. Light, everything has to do with waves. So music is the closest thing to the foundational aspects of the universe. Sorry.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, well, that makes sense. Because it penetrates the cellular.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Looked up Bill. First thing I saw was like, oh my God, he looks just like Daddy. When I was 18 years old, at an IHOP on my 18th birthday, my father told me, you have a half-brother that I sired at the same time as you whose name is Bill. So suddenly these facts come together, my mother telling me these stories. I talked to my dad subsequently about it, and he was very cagey about it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Okay, but you're hitting on exactly what I'm saying. I think artists, and I'll exclude myself from the discussion so I don't make somebody mad. Artists have a way of knowing how to do that without anybody teaching them. They just know what music, beats, chords, melodies, lyrics to use to penetrate. And the successful artists, think of it, they do it at scale.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, you do normalize to the insanity of standing in front of 10,000 people.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, part of that is... You know, a lot of shamanic work involves the breath. So think a singer is rhythmically breathing and rhythmically chanting. So that's one thing that most people would not pick up on. There's a ton of expiration of breath. You know, like what's the Wim Hof? I do that for two hours. I mean, I'm totally asphyxiated the entire time.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's not natural to scream your head off for two hours. It just isn't.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You have to to a certain extent. I don't know how to explain it. Like I'm off cycle right now. So if you came to see me play an hour and a half show tomorrow, I could do it, but I probably couldn't talk the next day. But if I do a week of rehearsals and prep up, then I can do it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Something, yeah. I don't understand it. It's almost like a trained fury. Like you learn to not go too far. You learn how to pace it. People say blow your voice out. You have to really know where the line is. By the way, when you're dealing with a ton of adrenaline, like the thing with fighters comes to mind, like they'll come in, they'll gas in a minute because they're so jacked. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Sometimes you see a guy get in the rain, they're just like...
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
like yeah and they gas in a minute i mean i know how to see that because of watching wrestlers gas you know you get you you learn that the body language of somebody getting gas you know they kind of start to lose their posture and yeah goosey right they get loose okay same thing for a singer i mean you can gas in the first three minutes and you're dead and you're dead oh no what are you gonna do yeah so you have to almost like have a controlled fury
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I can't imagine being in there and somebody's on the other side wanting to kill you and being able to be like, I'm just going to work my way through these.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I did, yeah. I work with a lady. It's a funny story. I worked with a lady at one point. They hooked me up with somebody from the opera. Oh, perfect. And she came to my – well, no, it's actually – she was great. But she came to my house and she said, oh, you sing totally wrong. But here's how to sing right and you won't blow your voice out. And it was all about the right posture and all this stuff.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And the first time I tried to do it at a concert with 4,000 kids going nuts – I tried to do what she taught me and it didn't work because I just, I was in the deep end of the pool and I ended up having to go back to all my old bad habits.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So eventually I found a woman who was used to working with rock singers and she explained to me a bunch of theories about, I think per memory, I think she said the human body has 11 folds of tissue in the throat. And if rock singers don't warm up all that tissue, that's how they damage their singing. And she'd also worked with Steven Tyler and,
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And she said, the thing about rock singers is you guys sing wrong because that's the way you want to sound. It's part of your gimmick. Right, right. I'm sure Steven Tyler and myself, we could sing like choir boys if we wanted to, but that's not what attracts people to us. It's the razor's edge in the voice or something. So you have to learn how to warm up to sing like an idiot, basically.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And that's the sound that people are attracted to with rock singers, and even the gentleman you played before. I mean, he's totally abusing his voice. That is not proper singing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
like there's there's Axl Rose for example like you know he sings a very particular way the way he uses his throat in a particular way that makes it you would say that's the actual sound or whatever it's not natural but it's awesome when he does it that's kind of the thing yeah that has got to be really hard to maintain I saw them play in Athens Greece
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It was very fun. I actually know Dave from way back in the day. He's the best. When he first, first kind of burst on the scene, we used to hang out a little bit. So I feel like it's cool that I knew him. Like what year is this? Like, remember he did like a couple things on SNL, like really early on, or he was kind of around TV.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. Yeah. So singing like that, it's wrong, but that's what makes it right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Trust me, no one can tell you. You're surrounded by a lot of people with a lot of opinions. I was told when I was very young, that voice you sing with will never sell records, ever. And most people that don't like my music will often cite my voice as the reason they don't like my music. But that's the why that my voice is the reason that people who do like my music, like my music. Right.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's a weird, it's like a, like, what do you do with that? Well, you can't do it for other people. No, no, but I sing the way I sing. And it's like, it's like, don't sing that way. Well, I don't.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Singing against a wall of guitars is a particular skill set. It's like singing against three airline jets at the same time. Right, right, right. We have three guitars in our band playing at the same time. So my voice has to cut like a razor through that wall of noise.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
There's something about it. Okay, so back to my argument about the unconscious thing. Certain voices convey an unconscious information. Yeah. Tonally, it registers in the public as a certain authority or wisdom or sorrow. Yeah. Some voices just have so much sorrow in them. Yeah. Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Like for our generation, when Kurt would sing, and I saw Kurt many times live, it sounded like, it was like the literal howl of our generation. It had this great connectivity to what we were experiencing as latchkey kids. Yes. I don't want to say tantrum-ish, but it had a certain kind of anger. But it was the anger of disaffection. It wasn't the anger of a hardcore band like Screw Capitalism.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It was like when he, the first year he was on television, I don't remember. I'd see him in New York and he was hanging out with some other... Maybe it was because he was hanging out with SNL people. And I'd see him out in New York back, I guess, with like late 90s? Yeah. Early 2000s. And so I knew him when... I don't want to say he was a nobody, but I... He wasn't famous.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. It was for our generation, it was the door getting kicked open. Yes. Everything after just got easier.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
This is crazy. What strikes me, and this is a business point, but that's where all the money is. And yet the music business is not to nurture those talents. In fact, the music business works against those talents. It's almost like they blow up their business model so it becomes inconvenient.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Control. They want control. The biggest problem I've seen in the music business is they don't understand why musicians can't be as supple in the business part of the equation as a guy who makes cookies or something. Like, this is what it costs. Here's your quality control. The public wants more chocolate chips. Can't you just put more chocolate chips in there? Yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And none of that is what attracts the public to great artists. Right. It's like completely counterintuitive. So they sit there and you just end up as a name on a piece of paper or an inconvenient problem. I mean, I've said this a few times publicly, but it bears repeating here is I've been in meetings where they're complaining to me about me.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That basically the person that I am in the world is inconvenient to their business. The things I'm saying, the things I'm doing, the music I'm making is inconvenient to the business. And could I temper those things more in the direction that they want?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
He wasn't a known... I'd seen him on TV, but he wasn't like a household name like he is now. Right, right, right. And so it's... So there was this one night where I was out. I did a benefit for Roger Waters and... uh, and military vets. It was amazing in New York. It was all these guys who were like single, double and triple amputees playing Pink Floyd music.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
it could be anything from, you know, you're too negative, to your songs are too weird, to your voice is too weird, to your guitars are too loud. They just want to sell more albums. Yes. So to them, it's an intellectual thing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Be like, Joe, if you could just make more jokes about the economy, you'd sell two stadiums, not just one.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, so it's this weird thing where you're sitting there and then you're like, and what I always try to tell them is, I didn't get here with that type of thinking.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And off goes the organic switch and on goes the, oh, you want me to be the next door neighbor. Right. Or, you know... Romantic movie ballads. Whatever.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But to their credit, and I didn't understand at the time... It was a brilliant move, because they'd gone about as far as they could go in the one thing, and they're super influential, including on alternative music. And it ended up being a really smart watershed moment for them to do what they did. At the time, they were doing SNL skits.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
You remember Adam Sandler used to come out, and he would do, I think it was Adam Sandler, we could do the seven Aerosmith ballads in a row. And it was like, I'm crying, I'm really crying. They would just play, and he'd just sing all those songs, like Steven Tyler. But I think looking back, it was really smart what they did.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
As far as I know, and your Herstute assistant over there would probably check, but I think Aerosmith is the biggest selling American rock band of all time.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So if you're Aerosmith, did they make a wrong turn? My argument would be no.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah. So that's what I'm saying is, only the bands can really know what the right direction to go in is, because at some point, what seems so obvious to the audience or some guy in an office isn't necessarily what drives the band forward.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And so I did this concert with the, with, um, Roger. So afterwards somebody came, said, Oh, Chappelle's in this hotel, you know? And I hadn't seen him for a few years. And I said, well, I know him. And you could see people think like, you don't know him. You know what I mean? So when he came by, I was like, Oh, It was like that moment, like, see, motherfuckers, I do know him.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But if you talk to the average Van Halen fan, they want to hear the David Lee Roth Van Halen.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Right, but I'm saying there's no obvious argument of which is superior, you know what I'm saying? No, there's no superior. One sold more records, one is sort of held more in people's hearts because of a particular generational thing, which would be our generation.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, I think you're about to see that Nickelback and Creed are about to go on a huge run of business. Really? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's kind of my point is they've survived it and now here comes the inevitable moment of like, oh yeah, it was really good and they wrote a lot of great songs.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So, yeah, I think history has a way of sorting out the bodies is the way I look at it. Yeah. That's kind of how I feel. I mean, this is selfish for me to say this, but it's kind of how I feel about my musical life. I think time will tell my story much better than I did. You seem at peace with that. I am. It doesn't seem to bother you at all. I made my peace with it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I mean, it bothered me when it bothered me because it felt unfair or, yeah, it felt like I was being sort of made to pay for the sins of the people who are no longer here. Because particularly in Gen X, we've had so many great talents die.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That's the, let's call it the simpler version. The more complicated version is generations move with a collective energy. And by the mid-2000s, the collective energy of Generation X had mostly dissipated in the musical thing. There were bands out playing, but a lot of the lead singers had died.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So it's hard to sort of stand and carry a flag for something that people feel very sentimental about if there isn't an army around you carrying the same flag. So you start to – people start to put on you like a set of cultural and generational expectations that you don't want. You become the emblem of like the living version of what doesn't work.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
What a great guy, though. He's a genuine person. He's another sweetheart.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But the other guys or girls aren't there to grow old with you and, you know, receive the same discernment or criticism.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Like one time a guy tried to goad me into an argument of comparing myself to one of the top people, musical people in my generation. I don't want to say who, but you'll understand the flow on this. And they said, can you compare, you know, who do you think's better? So it was like a real cheese setup. And I said, well, I think they were more talented. But I said, I feel I'm in the conversation.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And they said, why are you in the conversation? I said, because I'm alive. You know what I'm saying?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, Joe, that's a whole other episode because the band is probably one of the most misunderstood. I mean, we're probably one of the most misunderstood bands in the history of rock and roll. I mean, that sounds like a wrestling statement, but it's fairly accurate.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I think it has a lot to do with the issues of Gen X, and it has a lot to do with a relationship that I set into motion with the media when I was a very young person playing kind of a funny game, like doing my own version of Andy Kaufman or Bob Zmuda. You understand? Because I thought it was all shitty.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Oh, yeah. I mean, guys with that kind of mind, it blows my mind. Because they just, I mean, I could sit and listen to him for hours.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I was just like, I'm just going to play with this like a toy because I think it's kind of funny. I didn't realize that the coming culture was going to kind of almost be attracted to people who are willing to immolate themselves on the public stage. Does that make sense?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Most people who are attracted to fame, they want to run towards the shiny part of it. I was attracted to the non-shiny part, which is, okay, I'll light myself on fire and let's see what happens. Or I'll light you on fire and let's see what happens. So it kind of worked in the 90s when everybody was rolling and moving along. Well, here comes Napster, the music business craters.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Then a bunch of people die. And there you are standing, you know, now at 40 years old. You're supposed to carry some flag for a generation that doesn't even know who it is anymore.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Yeah, it's very difficult. The simple version is, and I had some of the top, top people in the music business sit me down one-on-one in a room and say, just give them what they want.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Your life will be a lot better. You'll make a lot more money. And you could put your head on your pillow at night and not have to think about all these things. And my response every time was that I don't give a fuck. And I used to quote Popeye, I am what I am. I'm here. I'm here because I'm a freak. And I ain't changing for anything. Good for you. And part of that goes back to my daddy.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I watched a man literally broken by the business. So I'm the last person that's going to fucking bow down for that shit. Fuck off.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So you didn't have to. Well, there is that. But at the end of the day, how can I explain it? Everybody in the music business will tell you your value is exponentially related to your success. So your biggest song is here, and your next biggest song is here, and there's like a pyramid. And as you go down, you lose value. Your aging becomes part of that loss of value.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
How do you maintain value, relevancy? You no longer have the record business that used to exist. You no longer have the structure. I mean, the music business is basically a touring business first now, and everything else is in support of the touring business. We're lucky in that we continue to be a very large touring band.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So you're told over and over again, almost in a propagandistic way, that your value is related to what's on a piece of paper. And then somehow I woke up in the middle of it and I thought, no, no, that's actually not my value. And so the minute I started saying, no, I know what my real value is, it's that I'm an independent artist who, like a voice in the wilderness, represents something.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And I know it's not for everybody. Trust me, I've been getting that message since I was a little kid, including from my own family. But I know what I represent represents something that's valuable. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I see the consistency of the, let's call it the communication between myself and somebody who's interested in what I do.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And once I started doubling and tripling down on the value, my business started going back up.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The way I would say it in a crass way is I reasserted my brand. Not the brand I was being handed in 40 plus brand. You know, you're an oldies band. You're an oldies artist. You play these songs.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It seems silly, but that's what I had to figure out. I had to figure that out on my own because there was nobody telling me that. I mean, you got to understand. And you're a man of the world. So you know what I'm saying. When you're in a room with somebody who runs the fucking world. in my case, runs the music business.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
The guy who can get shit done, the guy who can get you canceled, the guy who can fucking make stuff happen. And that guy tells you, here's your value. It's awfully hard to go back to Chicago, Illinois and convince yourself that he's wrong. Right. There's nobody. And who do you talk to about it?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I didn't know that he didn't do stand-up for 10 years.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
We know how you can be back on top. I don't read comments, but I have a social media person who occasionally relays what she sees.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Well, we kind of keep it on the positive. But my favorite comment of the last few years was she started poking around with young fans, 16, 18-year-olds, who were suddenly seeming to come out of the woodwork and liking the band and me. Almost like a cuddly bear or something. They suddenly were attracted to me in a way that the 16 and 18-year-olds of the previous generation weren't.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
So I asked her, I said, why don't you poke around with these people and ask them what's interesting? And my favorite comment, and it became kind of common amongst the feedback that she got, was, I like him because other people told me not to like him.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But what that says to me, anybody can interpret the way they want, but what it said to me is we need people in the zeitgeist of the culture who don't represent the collective yes. There's always room for somebody on the corner saying no.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And that goes back to Lenny Bruce. As crazy as all that was, you still need that guy going, no, no, no, no, no. You know what I'm saying? And you can call them whatever, disruptors or whatever.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
That sounds nicer than disruptor. I like disruptor because that's what I do.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I've told many people in the music business, I know that you don't want me in this business, but I'm here. And I've made a lot of money, and I've made a lot of people a lot of money. What's the problem?
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Having heard you many times do commentary for UFC, what I love about you as a commentator is you take me into the passion of the moment, the feeling of like two warriors are going to enter this thing and only one can emerge.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
There's a feeling there that's like, and I've been to some of the events, it's like, it has that like, it's a sort of a life affirming, like, here we are, you know, and you, you know, because you're behind the scenes, the training that went in, the injuries the guy had overcome, or the girl or whatever, or the crazy girlfriend, and they got, you know, the training camp and all of it.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
And there it is the clash. It's no different for the musician. It's like, you know, I sit in a room for a year and make songs with only three, four people hearing them. And I have to believe that I'm going to walk into my version of that octagon, and what I'm going to offer is not going to get me killed.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I just want to curl up in a ball and just die. Because here it comes. Here it comes. And sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised. But I've had more negative experiences than positive ones.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's like the people on the outside peering in. 20 years ago, I would have given you a different answer. Now, nobody's the problem. It's ultimately the game is you versus yourself. I don't know if there's any commonality in the fighting world or the comedic world. Yes. It's you versus yourself. It's not the audience's fault. It's not the guy at the radio station or the girl at the arena.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I remember that. And you know, it became a big conspiracy thing.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It's nothing to do with them. Because the one thing you do know is if you find that value that makes a wheel turn that prints cash, they don't care who you are. They'll push you right back under the spotlight. So once you can figure that game out, that's the game. The game is you versus you. It's not you versus them. In fact, that's the sucker's game.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
It became a conspiracy. He was saying no to the Illuminati.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Let's do a simple math. And anybody wants to have a problem with it, I don't care. My band, in over 30 years, has been in the top 0.1 percentile of touring artists in the world. Period. Period. You would think that if you were in that business and you were at that elite level, you would think the whole business would rally around you and try to get you to do more and make more.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
Not even close to that. There is no system by which you get that kind of support. You are completely on your own.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
I think so. I hear different stories about the top pop artists, but I think that's because they're making so much money. It's like they're like a multinational corporation. Most bands, their experiences are similar to ours. You're kind of on your own. You have your team of people, and then you walk into the arena with what you got or what you think is going to work.
The Joe Rogan Experience
#2283 - Billy Corgan
But I hear about the modern pop stars. I mean, I hear stuff that sounds like they're running a Fortune 500 company because they are literally printing cash.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Who's singing when you're writing?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is it 1,500 songs at this point? You're up in Irving Berlin territory of first songs written. I've written a lot of songs. That's what the internet says, 1,500.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I don't know, yeah. You know, but I never, I just... That's why I asked the question, because I assume things, but sometimes I think it just might be in my own head, just like I'm imagining.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Um... So when you start to enter into like, let's call it the professional side of the equation.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
What's the first time you're like, okay, I'm here. I'm in this weird Willy Wonka world of now I'm a writer. Now I'm... What's like for you, what's the first like stake in the ground that you see?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Like again... You made that clear. Okay.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, it's at 85.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
My father used to cover it, you know. No.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Wow.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Guitar.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It was more of a, he could play lead, no problem, but he was a great rhythm player. Wow. So he liked anything that had a good.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So just a bunch of keyboards, drum machines. Like what is your kind of work path?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So describe the music world, because I'm always interested in what it felt like. So it's one thing to say, you know, I wrote the song, it was a big song, 1985, but it's another thing like, what did it feel like to you, that environment? Because the music business back then was smaller than it is today, less corporate than it is today, maybe a little bit more Wild West, free for all.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm just trying to get a sense from you, like a snapshot of what is the environment.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, that's kind of what I'm saying, yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's kind of what I'm after.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Oh, yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. That's kind of what I'm after. It's important sometimes because especially I think for young people, especially people looking to get into the business, whether it's as an artist or as a writer, they're presented such a corporate, wound up, weird business.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's what I'm trying to say.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Would he have to do silly stuff to...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's kind of what I'm after. You saw it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's more of like, I think it's important to illustrate that the business that you and I came up in had a different sense of opportunity, which is like if you were willing to go for it and you got it done and you had the gift to do it... Doors would open.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm sure you've heard those stories where major labels in this town will sign artists solely on their numbers. They don't even care if they can sing.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So you touch my heart when you talk like this because... You and I have a very similar experience of just thousands and thousands of hours by ourselves. Yeah. In a bedroom.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay. Um, I'm curious of, was there a point where you made the decision? I don't want to be the person behind the microphone. I want to be the person.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Really? Yeah. Somehow I got the sense that at some point there was a moment where you, okay.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is there a frustration, though, that comes in when you know you've got a song and you can hear it in your mind and you trust it and then the person singing it doesn't have the right understanding of it? It's not the right voice.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But is that frustrating?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But what I'm saying is in my mind, I go back to... You know, I'm always oriented to, I got to sing my own song. Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, God bless you.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Don't make me laugh. Do you write with singers in mind when you're?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, it's the idea of when you're writing, in my mind, you would always be the star of the movie, right? Is that fair?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Right, but I'm saying is I'm not trying to project because, again, it's all respect with your gift. It's just trying to understand because you've written so many great songs and you had such great success. I feel like there's got to be some consistent voice in there, even if it's eternal. Does that make sense?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Oh, no. We're getting to the list of people that have recorded your songs.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's my happiest place. Me too.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So I must be projecting. I just imagine.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. I'm just curious, like, who's singing when you're writing?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But that's... I mean, because I'm the one in the room. But we've all had that experience of we're totally into a song and we record it and we feel it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And then we listen back and go, oh my God, like who's singing the song? The voice in the head for me is always stronger than this voice.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's where all the dreams come true or something, right?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's kind of what I'm after. That's what I'm saying. I don't know, but it just... Is it characters you can play, you know?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Are you the type of writer that you go in thinking, I want to write a great song or I want to write a great single?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So I really, when you're talking, I can feel it. Yeah, you get it. Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, because your success at writing singles is...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But is there a song that we would know that you thought, I really love this song. I don't think it'll ever be a single and it became a big success.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So when you start having hits, 85, right? Does the phone start ringing?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Suddenly you're a genius. Suddenly now you're a genius.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Can you write to order?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is it out yet?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Can you share the name?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So you're writing to the characters?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
This is a totally self-indulgent question. Do you have a favorite key to write in? Hmm.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It has a different, it has a sorrow to it. Do you feel that?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Right, even if it's major. Yeah, it's dark. It feels a bit dark, yeah. I know you don't just write alone, but.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I was getting there. But my point is, is there an inner reason or that's just, again, your comfort?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So not in the, like we're sitting in front of a bunch of kids, like they want to write songs. Yeah. Like a pro like me. Like what's your most sage writing advice?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Right. Well, you've showed up.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I always say my personal breakthrough, and I want to ask yours, my personal breakthrough was when I allowed myself to write a bad song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But was there a moment where you felt this breaking open of the doors? Does that make sense? You know, like... There are those periods when we're learning like, oh, Lennon McCartney wrote this kind of cool intro and you kind of learn it and you go, oh, okay, now I understand why they did it that way. There's the mechanical part of learning the chop.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And then there comes a point where it's like you're writing your song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Was there a sort of personal breakthrough where you felt that?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
No, I meant like more along the lines of like...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I know there's stuff all over the floor. There's cassettes.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yes, where you're like, okay, now I'm writing my song. Like, this is what I envisioned. I'm writing it. It exists. And now it is in the world.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's kind of what I mean.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
For people who don't know writing, can you break that down a little bit?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is there DAT tapes? Are we going like... Oh, there's DATs.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Was it identifying an emotional part of you that you had?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm a nerd, so I apologize. No, it's okay. It's okay.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. I feel, I feel the best writers don't analyze.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I spend all my time trying to figure out how I do what I do.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
This is a fun list. It's long, but I think it's important because for those who don't know why we're here. These are some of the people that have recorded songs of yours. Bette Midler, Stevie B, Celine Dion, Cheap Trick, En Vogue, Whitney Houston, Belinda Carlyle, Taylor Dane, Britney Spears, Marsha Hines, Alice Cooper, Christina Aguilera, Beyonce, TLC, Aliyah, right? Aliyah. Aliyah, sorry.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Hart, Agnetha Faltzong. Is that from ABBA?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I know. What a voice.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm just going what's on the papers.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Elton John, Cher, Tina Turner, Brian Adams, Selena, Jessica Simpson, Air Supply, Olivia Newton-John, Barbara Streisand, Aretha Franklin, Roberta Flack, Roy Orbison, Trisha Yearwood, Patti LaBelle, Michael Bolden, NSYNC, Renee Froger, Lori Estefaner, Reba McIntyre, Enrique Iglesias, Paloma Faith, Russell Watson, Rod Stewart, Aerosmith, The Cult, Kiss, Ricky Martin, Monica Faith Hill, Meatloaf, Sugar Babes, Mariah Carey, Toni Braxton.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Lady Gaga, I mean, Starship, Weezer, Joe Cocker, Milli Vanilli. I mean, it's just... And this is just like part of the iceberg. Yeah, that's... So, you know, obviously I want to flatter you, but... You don't have to flatter me. I like flattering. No.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's just such a rare list of accomplishment.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Do you feel that? Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is it 1,500 songs at this point? You're up in Irving Berlin territory for songs written.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, it's all like mold and... Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's what the internet says, 1,500.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You know, he could only play the black keys.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Isn't that weird? Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, he would have either been playing in E-flat or D-sharp, however you want to say it. I'm not trained.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Or F-sharp. So he's basically playing F-sharp, E or C-sharp.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
How do you write like that, right?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Nine number one songs.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You. You.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Look out, Lionel. But what a great writer, too. Oh, yeah. Great writer.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
When you go in to write, are you focused on one idea that captures your attention? Are you in a free associative state and then go back and review?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's my parlance, but when people can write like you, I call you assassins. You guys are assassins.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You're an assassin.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I mean, you are a song assassin.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I love it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Recently, in an interview with a fellow musician, I was using the analogy of, like, you know, the gunfighters in the movies. Yeah. Like, and, you know, like, I'd be afraid to face you on the street, you know. I don't know. Because you're an assassin.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm my own kind of assassin.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
33 top 10 songs. Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is that enough for... No, nothing's enough. I love it. I love it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I got to tell you one moment that really connects me to you. We've met in the past, which was nice because I got to talk to you in the past, but... This is, let's call it the snobby musician not really understanding how great you were until this moment.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm a totally snobby musician.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Listen... You're a lot cooler than you think you are. I mean, when you can do what you can do, it's pretty cool to me. So I don't care what anybody thinks. Well, I think you're cool too, but you really are cool. Thank you. God bless you. But okay, so let me tell you this moment.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So I don't remember where it was. It's some MTV thing. Could have been the Grammys. I don't remember. And it was when the Aerosmith song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I don't want to miss a thing. And like a lot of old school Aerosmith fans, I was kind of condemnatory of ballad Aerosmith.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, I was probably one of those snobby rock fans saying the same thing. And, you know, remember they used to do that skit on SNL where it would be like, I think with Adam Sandler, where he would sing like seven different Aerosmith ballads.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It was kind of a funny skit. He would sing crying and then like, it was just like they would just play the same song, you know, musically. And he would sing the lyrics to like seven different Aerosmith ballads. So by the time it got to the song that it was from the movie, I can't remember. Armageddon. Armageddon.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I hate this question, but I'm such a fan of your writing, I'm going to ask the question I don't like being asked. Oh, thank you. Which is, melody, what's the first thing generally?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Huge movie, huge moment. And I, you know, it's one of those things like when you're at one of those award shows, I was like in the seventh row and I could see Steven, who I didn't know then, and I don't know him now, but I've met him since. But I saw him on the side of the stage getting ready, you know, typical musician kind of pacing around. And he's chewing gum. Like, like, right.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And then, you know, you can see somebody coming over going like, you know, you know, we're about to go. He spits out his gum and he steps up and he, and that performance was just, I was like, and then for the first time.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yes. But for the first time, that's the last time they invited me to the Grammys, by the way.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
God bless. We'll get to that, too. But for the first time, I found myself going, who the f*** wrote this song?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Right?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
As a musician, right? Like, as a snobby musician, I'm like... I f***ing hate that, but... Well, I'm not the biggest fan of that type of music. It's just the way I am. It's nothing personal, but I'm watching him kill this vocal.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
right yeah and so the first thing i did was who wrote this song oh wow and then i saw your name now i knew your name you know i mean because you're just yeah you're in the ether but then i started going oh she wrote that song and she wrote that song and she wrote that song and then it was like i hate them all but but but since that moment i've paid attention because i was like because i was like okay this person knows what they're doing sometimes yeah well
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
major league baseball you've only got to get three hits out of ten and you're you're a star okay they're paying you a billion dollars okay 16 academy award nominations i'm on 16 right now yes um and ask me how many i won well one of my nicknames is zero so i think it's zero
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So I'm going to steal this because this is really about me getting a free classroom.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, but come on.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But you wrote all of them. That's the problem.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Maybe that's what it's going to take. You've got to write all five.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Hopefully by the time people see this, you will have one. Yeah, or I'll just... I'm superstitious. Like, I can't pre-congratulate you.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is songwriting therapeutic? Another question I don't like, but... Yeah, but it is, isn't it?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I feel better when I write a good song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is it true that going to therapy helped you write songs?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Can you explore that a little bit? What happens, I bought...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Oh, I was going to, because I've been to the other one.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, I can't imagine that.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
This is not the typical, you know, explain it for those in the crowd who don't understand, but it's addressed in your documentary, which, again, I haven't seen yet, but I saw some of the clips. But... whether it's Asperger's or on the spectrum.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay, but if it's an idea, is it a scenario, like a...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well... I don't know, because I don't feel I'm on the spectrum, and I'm just as... Driven and... Driven and... Laser-focused. Obsessive as you are.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Do you have that thing, and this is a shop question, but... Like the song gets in you and it won't leave. Like you go to bed and you wake up and it's like, oh my God, leave me alone.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I just kind of... Anything.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Have you had the thing where you go to bed and you wake up and your brain has rearranged the song?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That happens to me sometimes. That's your lucky. Which is cool.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's so cool. Because my brain does a better arrangement than I did. Wow. So I'll wake up and I'll... It figured everything out? Yeah, it solves the problems for me. Wow.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It doesn't happen all the time.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But have you dreamt songs? Have you had that?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I have three or four songs that came out in records that were from dreams. Wow. Yeah. But they never sound as good on record as they sounded in a dream.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
In the dream, it's like, oh my God, this is the greatest song ever. Wow.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm not looking for gossip. This is not a gossip show. But I'm curious about... I am.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm happy to talk gossip with you. You all talk gossip with me all day. But this idea of being single or saying I don't want a relationship, I feel the way it comes off, the stuff I read, it feels like reductionist or something.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But can the cat write songs?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is there any connection, though, with...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Never, huh? I've done that a few times and it's always worked. I don't know why I don't do it more. I don't think it's my, excuse me, I don't think it's my natural state. I think my natural state is melody first.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
When you're writing and you're poking around a melody, is it more phonetic or are you looking for lyrics?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay. Yeah. I get that. What's your favorite... story in a song. And what I mean by that is like, you know how they say in Hollywood there's only 12 stories. You know, boy meets girl, boy loses girl, girl... So what was my favorite?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Do you have a favorite kind of mythological... No. Really?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It seems to be... Looking for something that doesn't exist.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I think it has a lot to do with growing up without my mother.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, well, thank you. But so going back to the California.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Because we're here to talk about.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You got a scrappy thing to you. Yeah, I'm pretty scrappy.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Nomination 16. Number 16.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay, so that is foundational. Yeah, there's a mythological foundation to that, right?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is it being small too? Is that part of the scrappiness?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So... I'm intrigued about the cave. Do you have a name for the cave?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And then kind of the melody takes, almost tells me the story. Exactly. Okay. Are you superstitious?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It is. It might even be more than one in a billion.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is there a musical genre you can't write for?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, I once got into kind of a quasi-argument with somebody on Broadway who didn't think I could write for Broadway.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, that's what I told him.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And... And I said, you know, that's like telling someone who cooks really good Italian food they can't cook good Mexican. Right, right. You don't understand the chop of a writer. A writer can write.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
A cook can cook and a writer can write. Exactly, exactly. But I was just wondering if there's anything that you would be intimidated by genre-wise.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Have you tried your hand at alternative rock?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Not a lot of melody there.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I know the answer to the question, but tell me if I'm wrong, which is like, there's never enough songs.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
There's always another song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is there, at the root of it, is there some pathological drive there?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, we're here to think about it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Is there something that you still hope to achieve in song? Like...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Please tell me why you don't want to clean your room.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You must have been approached to write musicals and stuff like that.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Isn't there something where they're talking about doing like a songbook musical?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's definitely a different...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
They're very driven by other forces than we would be in writing a pop song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You could probably speed it up a bit, but it still takes too long.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. It's weird because I've talked to people on Broadway and say, don't you want to have songs on Broadway that people would want to buy?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, you know, as we say, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's what I don't understand. It's weird, right? It seems to have worked that out of their business model. Like Oklahoma and all that.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
They were on the charts.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, not only that, those songs would be covered by Charlie Parker or Miles Davis.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, I don't understand what happened to that part of the culture.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
There you go. Okay, last question. And I want to explore this a little bit in depth because it's so at the heart of your writing. Is there a perfect love or a perfect, not lover like a person, but is there an ideal there in your mind?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay, well, we can go there too. No, I'm just kidding. Well, my point is, what's the oppositional force to the scrappy fighter? Does it make sense? Yes.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Explain, I think I know, but I want to hear it from you. Explain the advantage of writing in a place that you feel comfortable in or safe in.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
No, it's like if you're a person who wants to be understood or seen, the foe on that end of the equation is somebody who doesn't see you or doesn't appreciate you.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And you have to prove them wrong. Yeah, it's kind of funny. But the positive side of that equation is somebody who understands, but what is it that they understand about you that maybe most people... I don't know.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But so when you're writing a love song and you're writing about somebody else, is it just a sort of miasmic idea of... Well, I'm just in that character.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But is there an oppositional character usually that you're speaking to?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I've heard the angry songs, too, but... Yeah, those are fun. I was just wondering if there's, like, sort of an idealized thing. Does it make sense?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
not one idealized thing yeah so i think i i have an idealized thing that's kind of what is that what is that i think it has something to do with my mother and i you know it has something well maybe mine does too the proving people wrong that that was the first person i had to prove wrong was my mom so right that's what i'm saying your site you're sort of speaking to somebody
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, because part of my story is my mother was institutionalized when I was four. So my mother was in my life, but at a distance. So I had to create a kind of mental version of my mother that was or wasn't real that over time had to be amended.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So when that became a... You know, there's that old... I'm sure you've heard it like... little boys marry their mothers and little girls marry their fathers, that type of thing.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But the notion is that if you have an idealized conception of, in this case, the mother, well, then when you go into adult life and you're trying to find a partner, and if that holds true that you're looking for your mother, well, you're looking for somebody that doesn't exist. Because I had to create an idealized version of my mother in my mind because the real person I couldn't
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Oh, yeah. I was very close to my mother. And it's a very strange long story that I'd love to tell you if you want to hear it. But so I feel like I'm oftentimes writing to like a ghost.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And then by extension, and that's why I asked about California and growing up here, because by extension, I think, and I think this is a very similar to a lot of people grew up in the Midwest in basements and latchkey kids. Right. We're kind of talking about something that we were sort of promised, but we know it isn't real. But television created a fake.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Because there it was.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But the 1975 version was Eric Estrada on a motorcycle.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Or Farrah Fawcett, Charlie's Angels, all this.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I'm always oriented to, I've got to sing my own song. Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yes, and it created a kind of mental idea of something. Even though it's not real, you believe it to be real, so you kind of chase it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Endless.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
See, you growing up here, I think it's probably a different perspective. The analogy I always get is people get off the bus.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Think how many Sally Mays came from Kansas. They were the high school prom queen.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Oh, yeah. Can you imagine that moment where you look around and you realize you're like, you're working with the other prom queen that was from the other state.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Can you explain that a little bit?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So are your parents alive?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Both, yeah, they're gone, yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So it's a more, it's a lack of distraction in a way, like...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So when did your mommy and daddy pass away?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay. So dad got to see some success.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So, and your mother, how would she see your success?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I know.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's that old logic. Like, it's not going to last.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay, last question. So did you prove whoever you're trying to prove wrong?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But not all of them.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
You too. Thank you, Diane.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. So are you an astrology believer?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But what do you call it?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So I looked up your birthday, September 7th. And it said this, I thought this was funny. Visionaries and ready to act on impulse as long as their instincts are nurtured as they grow up. I'll say it again. Visionaries, so your date, birth date is September 7th. Visionaries and ready to act on impulse as long as their instincts are nurtured as they grow up.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, that's kind of what I was getting at. You know, there's these apocryphal stories that you read, and of course I want your version, but this idea that your father was more supportive of your interest in music than your mother.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's so weird.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
There's zero.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
See, my father was a musician, but he didn't want me to play music. Oh, wow. So it worked the opposite. Everybody assumed he would be supportive, and he was totally not supportive.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, and other reasons, but it's not important to me. So describe for me, here we are in Van Nuys, describe for me Van Nuys sort of mid-60s. Because, you know, in Chicago, we have such a Beach Boy version of California.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But give me your version in your team.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I guess I'm looking for when you really started in, you know, let's call it 10, 12, 14, when music becomes sort of central to your identity.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So you saw the Beatles?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Was it Santa Monica Civic or something?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Ah, you saw the Hollywood Bowl. Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It lit a lot of people, yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
The show tunes I can hear in your writing.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I can hear it, but the other thing is, it's also in McCartney's writing, too. He had a lot of show tunes. I guess I would say it's...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's a melody thing. But also the melody tells a story.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Do you remember like a first song?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I've seen the pictures.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Right. And who would you have been listening to when you first... To the radio. Okay.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Well, the pop radio at the time was pretty sophisticated.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Matula Clark. Yeah, yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. I just heard it the other day. It's such a cool song.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah, right.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So was your father's support in hindsight just an act of loyalty because it meant something to you? Or do you think he saw something in you?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Can you try to define that a bit?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
What time do you start every day?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Wow.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But how old is he?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's a pretty... Yeah. Tell me a story like going to see a publisher because this is...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And is it... Okay, what's your normal work day?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Because I started doing that, too, around a similar age. It was like... who's really running this thing, right? Like, did you start to see songwriters, you know, like you see Carole King's name and you start, you know, did you?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But who sticks out in your mind that?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It even sounds good, right?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Amazing.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's kind of a fantasy, right? Like to go back in the time machine and just be in that building.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah. But are there any other writers, whether, I mean, you might not have been conscious of them at the time, but are there writers looking back or even then that really stick out in your mind?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I mean, you are a song assassin. I love it.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But when I... It was just... You're obviously bright, so was disinterested.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I was at, I was off, like.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Um, this is a bit of an esoteric question, but in your mind, is there a sort of a California dream? I mean, you grew up.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Sure. Yeah, I think it's hard because back in Chicago, through the prism of television, this looked like this magical... It's almost like how Hollywood looks outside. Oh, absolutely. It looks so...
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
And then go record whatever you're writing?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
It's the title of your documentary.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Relentless.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
At what age did you think, okay, I can do this? This is like my thing.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Okay, so what makes you great?
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Yeah.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Absolutely.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So you had the drive innately.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
So once you found that thing, you were like.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That to me is impressive.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Because, you know, your chops haven't been in dispute for a long, long time.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's what impresses me as a fellow writer is like, you just won't give it up.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Like, there's no resting on the laurels. No. It's impressive. It really is.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I think it's your most admirable quality because talent is a weird thing, whether you want to argue it was given to us or, you know what I mean? It's like we were sort of hit with a wand somewhere coming down. Somewhere, yeah. But the rest of it is really up to us.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
yeah um did you because because of that environment uh that late 60s early 70s environment did you see that being a woman in the music business on the production writing side was going to work again no i mean i never first of all i never got the memo because i'm a woman i couldn't do something you know no i don't mean it that way i'm just talking about the culture around you oh no i never meant to be well i never wanted to be a producer anyways
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
But did you feel there was any prohibition? No.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
I think if I was... I didn't mean to, like... Maybe I'm not phrasing it. I mean it along the sense of, like, if... If a young man walks in an office in 1972 versus a young woman walking into an office in 1972. Right. By and large, the history of this business is the man would have a better opportunity to be heard, listened to, supported.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Than the female writer on the business side. You know what I mean? Meaning like, because the business of making music is its own business. You own your publishing and all that type of stuff, right? Right. I just was wondering if there was any, you felt any of that coming in.
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
That's amazing. No, I didn't.