Billy Corgan heads back to the future

Billy Corgan. Picture supplied by Warner Music

Billy Corgan sounds like he's enjoying his very own time-warp. Not only is he playing futuristic music from his past, he's talking about putting his old band back together.

The former Smashing Pumpkins' leader is talking from a New York hotel room in between early dates on a tour for debut solo album TheFutureEmbrace. This intimate album loudly cuddles up to the 80s influences (The Cure, New Order) that were fleetingly part of the Pumpkins' sound, which made them giants of the 90s alt-rock explosion, selling about 25 million albums.

A few days before the interview, Corgan took out a full-page ad in The Chicago Tribune. In it he thanked his hometown for its support, plugging the new album and announcing that he intended putting the Pumpkins back together five years after the troubled outfit called it a day.

But first he's out on that solo tour — with backing band — which hits New Zealand early in his schedule.

Will you be playing old material?

No, I haven't played any old songs since the last Pumpkins' show.

So it's basically the new album and a few other bits.

Oh yeah. You'll be surprised. It's been well received. My fans are fantastic. They are smart people. They get it.

How does it feel to be out under your own name after all these years?

You know, it's really not that different. The difference for me is the functional aspect. The Pumpkins were designed to be demonstrative. This is a different kind of show. It requires a different kind of patience and concentration. But as far as the act of getting up and playing and stuff, that feels pretty much the same.

Throughout the Pumpkins there was the occasional song that reflected the period you grew up in and your interest in British bands of the early to mid-80s, such as New Order and the Cure. Is the new album embracing that side fully?

I think it's more akin to my personal taste. I used to say back in the old days, the Pumpkins didn't necessarily reflect my taste but no one would believe me. So yeah it's closer to what I like to listen to.

The reason I chose to use that period of time as a starting point was because I thought it was an unfinished period of music. Whereas the 60s and 70s had been fully mined, there was some futurism in the 80s atmosphere that had not been finished. I was playing this kind of music in the 80s. It was fun to go back and bring it to the future.

In the beginning the Pumpkins were more like the Cure but Chicago was a working-class city — and playing in a bar on a Wednesday night, people would just talk and wouldn't listen, so we found by playing loud we shut them the [expletive] up. That became a signature thing and we got caught up in the times as well.

With the songs, the memoirs on the website, the album artwork you seem to be revealing a lot about yourself. Why now?

I think that there is a perception of me that's misguided — it's more like the real Billy Corgan is just willing to stand up and be himself and doesn't really give a damn if anyone gets it. That's a big change of attitude.

Those misperceptions — isn't that just part of being a famous rock star?

I grew to enjoy them. But it has been painful at times because I think it's overshadowed the work and no one has worked harder on music than me. For someone who has put out as much music as I have, to have still a great deal of what's written about me, be about me and not about my work, is sad. I've really been a musician first and foremost — not a personality.

Every generation has its archetypes and I got "tyrannical misanthrope". Although other people of my generation have been way more out of control than me, somehow I got that tag. I'm 38 years old now and on my seventh album. At some point it's just not who I am.

Were you ever a tyrannical misanthrope?

Yeah, of course. But the point is for what purpose? For what degree? In 17 years I've let one journalist watch me and my band work in the studio. Yet you can find mountains of information about the way I was and what I did. No one has ever told those stories. I think it's interesting for a fan to read actually what happened and how those things came to be.

Then there was Zwan, the band you put together after the Pumpkins, which lasted one album.

That turned into a nightmare — lots of lame stuff that had nothing to do with music. I was in a worse band that had the same problems.

Quite aside from the vintage electronic components, the new album sounds very much built around your voice.

I felt I needed to write a different kind of song, and by that I mean putting out melody as the centrepiece of the album as opposed to dynamics or catchiness.

Still, that BeeGees song, To Love Somebody, you've included is pretty catchy.

I really just wanted a song that had a certain feeling. That song totally nailed the feeling I was looking for. Fortunately for them and unfortu-nately for me I couldn't top that song. It's such a fantastic song. It does so much with so little and that is a high compliment.

When you asked him to sing backing vocals on the song, did Robert Smith [of the Cure] laugh?

Oh yeah. I basically told him just please listen to it and if you don't want to do it, that's fine. A few days later he phoned me and said, "I listened to it. I love it and it's fantastic."

Most people take me so seriously — they don't get it. There really is some joy in that song.

I work at a newspaper. I can probably get you a good rate for a full-page ad.

Ha ha. That was my full-page ad for the decade.

Why did you to do that?

It just had some class to it. Print still has a certain weight in the culture. We can blog our brains out but there's something about newsprint that still has a stamp about it.

What was the reaction in Chicago?

Incredible. Overwhelming. Off the charts. The band is so beloved in Chicago.

What have you done as far as the reunion?

There have been a lot of discussions behind the scenes.

Those must be fairly interesting discussions.

Yeah. A lot of people say, "Why now?" I think it's similar to, say, making a new Star Wars movie. It's a big undertaking. There are things that need to be resolved and I still don't have all the answers but it takes me saying, "I am going to do this" to start something in motion.