Apparently Billy Corgan has moved to stop the idea that he was caught in some sort of deadly feud with OK Go:

Corgan wants to put an end to the spat before it escalates and has taken to his Twitter.com page to insist he is a big fan of the band's work.
He writes, "I don't mind OK Go having a go at me if it gets their music heard. It will never be a fight because I think they are a great band."

No, I wasn't aware that this Godzuki-meets-Kid-Kong scrap was raging. Luckily, Contact Music is on hand to explain what it was all about:

Billy Corgan has moved to end a feud with members of Ok Go after accusing the band of using "gimmicks" to sell records.

It's right that Corgan backs down here, then. If there's one thing you cannot accuse OK Go of ever having done, it is selling records.

Billy Corgan thinks that Facebook is stifling innovation in rock music:

"You've got a Facebook with a few hundred friends. If you do something truly radical, are you ready to withstand the forty negative comments?," Corgan asks. "Most people aren't. So they're getting peer pressured at levels they don't even realize," he adds.

Corgan, of course, is known for his radicalism, taking the wild and crazy step of reviving the Smashing Pumpkins not to pacify the gods of iTunes or Facebook, but simply because it was a valuable brand name that could be used to shake dollars out of ageing fans desperate to chase their fading youth but who were, frankly, uninterested in either Zwan or his solo stuff ("for wild experimental reasons").

You've got to wonder how people would get 100 Facebook fans if 40% of them didn't really like what you were doing.

The bigger question, though, is if Corgan actually understands what experimentation and risk-taking actually are. If you do something really different, difficult and challenging and don't expect half of your fans to dislike it, you're probably not really taking that big a leap.

The suspicion has to be that Corgan doesn't really like the internet because it's not an environment that rewards very rich men pulling 'serious thinking face' with quiet nodding and the odd tear of respect. Corgan dates from an era when rock stars were at the top end of a one-way street of adoration. It's no wonder he doesn't feel comfortable in a world where the audience talks back.

The irony is that if the web had been a more common medium twenty years ago, Corgan might have been saved from disappearing into his own fundament.

Billy Corgan tweeted a couple of days ago that new Smashing Pumpkins bassist Nicole Fiorentino is one of the girls on the cover of Siamese Dreams:

Just found out the weirdest news: our bass player Nicole (@xocoleyf) just admitted she is one of the girls on the cover of Siamese Dream

That would be an amazing coincidence, right?

The only problem is it isn't true, as Ali Laenger, the other girl on the sleeve, says so:

-- Nicole's age doesn't match. Doing the math, Nicole would have been about 14 when the pic was shot ... the girl on the album is clearly around 7.
-- Ali says the photo was shot specifically for the album, and not a candid pic as Nicole has claimed.

You could understand why Nicole might have wanted to be the girl on the sleeve. It'd be the only chance she's got of appearing on a half-decent Smashing Pumpkins record.

Naturally, when Billy Corgan swoons on stage, he doesn't just swoon. He emotes as he collapses:

"For those that saw me fall last night during 'Bullet [With Butterfly Wings]' that wasn't a stage move or clumsiness," Corgan wrote on his Twitter page - Twitter.com/Billy. "That was me blacking out and wiping out."

He added: "I have no memory of falling against the drum riser and my guitar cabinet, but I can tell you I've got quite a good bruise + am moving slow."

Doctors report that it's likely that the sheer intenseness of Corgan's intensity might have caused his brow to be come intellectually over-furrowed, cutting off the flow of pure muse to his central self-belief.

Possibly his greatest gift to the musical world, Billy Corgan now says he regrets breaking up The Smashing Pumpkins:

"Breaking up the band was a mistake because I think it broke trust with the audience." Corgan told Spinner "You had an audience that was very invested in that idea - whether they were invested in the people or the idea or the songs, I don't know. Like a relationship that you break off from and then try to pick back up, it's never quite the same."

Although he talks of relationships, he sounds more like a brand consultant, doesn't he?

Billy Corgan is, you'll be vaguely aware, pushing grimly onwards with the Smashing Pumpkins, despite being the only original Pumpkin left.

There's been some mutterings that, perhaps, he shouldn't be pretending to be a band when it's just him and some hired hands.

Never one to let a muttering be unmet by a densely-argued essay, Corgan has tried to explain why he is right and everyone else is wrong and If Destroyed Still True:

The idea of identity is a strange one to tackle. For many years, I treated the idea of the band named The Smashing Pumpkins as an existential concept that exsisted away from my being and body. It was sort of 'over there', if you will. Jimmy leaving in 1996 made me deal quite heavily with the concept of loyalty to the 2 members who were left (James and D'arcy) as our relationships at that time were quickly drifting apart. And so on, and so forth, thru the different people coming and going. In the center of any of it has been for me, speaking personally, my music. Yes, MY music. The music that came out of this being and body. I've called the umbrella the songs came out under different names but to me I guess there really wasn't a whole lot of difference. As they say, a song is a song.

What the future holds is unknown to me. I am 100pct committed to the future of SP. I can tell you that. 100pct!! I've never been happier about being in SP, or a part of SP, than I am now. The music I am making sounds like The Smashing Pumpkins. It doesn't sound like solo work, I can assure you of that. But only when you hear the music can you decide for yourself. I'm not worried, because I know most of you are rooting for me to get it right. I want to get it right, but not for you, for me. Its been a long journey to get back to where I started. There have been many sad days along the road, but honestly, these are really happy days.

The road is long, explained Corgan, with many a winding turn. "It leads us to who knows where?" he pondered.

But you know what's missing here? Some hyped-up fauxmotion. Because this isn't just about what brand some so-so music gets released under. It's about... well, Michael Jackson, apparently:

We've all seen over the past 2 weeks what happens when a man loses touch with his hope, his spirit, and his music. The path I am on is one of feeling reborn by my love for my music. I wasn't really deep down sure I could get back here, but I am here.

You see? If you don't let him call his band Smashing Pumpkins, you're no better than those people who held Michael Jackson down and pumped him full of Bubbles. I'm sure Corgan doesn't mean to make it sound like he's suggesting not calling the band Smashing Pumpkins would be tantamount to murdering him. I'm sure.

I will never say to you what people say to me all the time, which is that 'I am the band'. I am not 'the band', I am just the leader of the band. I only want people around me who respect me and my music. I think that is a healthy thing to want, and is consistent with the ideas of holistic living. What would you say about me if I worked with people who didn't care about me or my music? Isn't that a form of selling out?

I am not the band. But it is MY BAND. I would never pretend to be the band, but if you touch my band, I shall have your legs broken. But also I shall break my own legs. Which are never, never, the band's legs.

There is a lot of discomfort as we watch our world change quite quickly before our eyes. Familiarity breeds a sort of security, but it also breeds contempt. If you know anything about me, you should know you won't catch me. Smashing Pumpkins is not a concept 'over there' anymore. Its where it has always been. Right HERE.

No matter where I serve my guests, it seems they like my kitchen best. But things aren't cooking in my kitchen. There's a name, and there's a band. Who knows if the rose would smell as sweet if it had a name that James Iha approved of? We might all die from swine flu, which somehow means that I can save the world by making Amazon customers get to see the new records when they're looking for the old stuff.

The only thing that's less than glittering about the plans coming from Billy Corgan is that the stuff you get is very-late-period, Corgan-as-Caligula stuff from Smashing Pumpkins. But it might be a neat model for other acts:

Billy Corgan has been hinting at future models for providing music and media from the studio to the fans during interviews and other press. Plans for this service are now underway and will be executed in the form of a 12-week paid subscription service for access to various media updates detailing the creative process within the studio. The media updates will be in the form of exclusive web-video and photographs. Subscribers will be able to watch the next era of Smashing Pumpkins music take shape.

Here are Billy's hopes and expectations for the upcoming project:

The goal is to create a working model that is not profit motivated but rather information and access motivated. In exchange for a fixed resource base fans will be let inside in an unprecedented way to the creative process of preparing to make the next SP album while also inspiring an inter-active dialogue that will help shape the work. Because of the open window, further efforts will be made to provide content so that anyone participating can more readily follow the arc over the 12 weeks, with unprecedented access to lyrical and musical content.

I guess you might have to be Billy Corgan to try and sell the idea that 'rehearsing and dicking about in the studio' constitutes a twelve-week artistic arc, but the basic idea is sound.

Jimmy Chamberlain having recently departed the not-even-quite-reformed-before-that Smashing Pumpkins, Billy Corgan has to fill a hole in the band.

He's doing what anybody would do and advertising:

"Auditions will be held Friday, April 10 in Los Angeles for drummers who are looking to play with THE SMASHING PUMPKINS. They should send their background info, photos and performance web links via email only to: pumpkinsdrummer@gmail.com."

Presumably he's hoofing it round the music shops and record stores of California with photocopies and blutac.

Judging by the chilly reaction of the DoneWaiting Message Board, the forty bucks a throw Smashing Pumpkins gig in Ohio last night was all trick, little treat:

the first hour was acoustic (though all the guitars were distorted) and featured covers such as "monster mash", "wipeout" and "hang on sloopy". there were no pumpkins songs. it was amusing for a couple songs, but wore thin when the band seemed to not really know how to play said tunes.

One poster suggested that it was like being hit in the face by Billy Corgan's dick - which, of course, some people would still pay good money for.

Virgin records used Smashing Pumpkins as part of the Amazon-Pepsi giveaway promotion, which hasn't pleased Billy Corgan. He feels it slights his integrity:

Virgin could, conceivably countersue that the current Corgan-only version of the Pumpkins is doing more to ruin the band's integrity than anything they could manage.

Trent Reznor wasn't especially thrilled with this year's Reading-Leeds, especially the company he was asked to keep:

It's a pity. They could have done with someone with Reznor's aim in the crowd.

We don't know if Billy Corgan is thinking of joining Focus On The Family anytime soon, but judging by his remarks at Reading, he'd fit right in with anyone who shares their views:

Erm... no, Corgan. Being "alternative" is not having those sort of views. Seeing women as sluts is more of a mainstream attitude. But even in the mainstream, blurting out that sort of shit is frowned upon these days.

Billy Corgan has been explaining how Paris Hilton wound up on the cover of the new Smashing Pumpkins single and album.

No, no, not "cheap publicity" - that's the why, not the how:

For some reason, we're mentally filing this alongside Ricky Gervais' 'I only did the Diana concert because Wills and Harry asked me personally' and that bit in Prick Up Your Ears when Joe Orton says "I met Paul McCartney".

We suspect there's an element of - let's be generous - press-friendly stuntery with the supposed search for the girls from the front of Siamese Dreams. We're not sure why they'd be seeking them - it's not like Billy Corgan needs a kidney and they'd be the only match, is it? - but good luck to them anyway. They can then join with Spencer Eldon to enjoy their walk-on part in rock mythology.

The Smashing Pumpkins, or what's passing for them these days, played a secret gig last night in Berlin. It was so secret, of course, to stop James Iha from turning up and spoiling things.

Billy Corgan then held a question and answer session - which, on one hand, is a lovely way of interacting with your fans, but on the other, does have an air of pompousness doing it after the gig - "I expect some of my songs have left you wanting to ask questions. After all, what better way to round off the night than me telling you how I suffer for my art?"

Corgan told the audience that making Zeitgeist, the new album, was "a long, laborious process to perfection", and we fully believe him. Except the bit about perfection, of course. Somebody asked him about the band sort-of-coming back together:

We prophesise the new album will be overblown and have a couple of good ideas stretched to breaking point.

Nothing happens anywhere in the world without someone capturing it for YouTube, of course:

James Iha has been pretty quiet while Billy Corgan has been running about trumpeting the Smashing Pumpkins reunion.

Up until now, anyway:

In other words: not only is the band Corgan touting not (quite) the Pumpkins, but he didn't even make an effort to see if Iha wanted in on the trading of a name that was as much Iha's as it was Corgan. Doubtless Corgan sent a postcard or something to the last address he had and never heard back.