Статьи о группе Smashing Pumpkins
INTERVIEWS ON ROLLING STONE
This week, the Smashing Pumpkins filed a breach-of-contract
lawsuit against their former label, Virgin Records, alleging the
band's name was used without permission for a Pepsi promotion. Band
leader Billy Corgan called up Rolling Stone from a bathroom in Australia
to explain his side of the story and wound up dishing dirt on his
career, explaining how the Pumpkins will release music in the future
and offering an opinionated take on Amy Winehouse, Radiohead and
the state of the record industry: "I don't think the Beatles
would be making an album right now."
Tell us about your personal perspective on this lawsuit.
We've been treated very poorly by [Virgin] as a label for years
now. Even when we were going to put the band back together, we went
to them for the umpteenth time and said, look, it's a natural thing
to want to put out a best of, and they keep telling us nobody cares.
And then to turn around and use us like this against our will obviously
shows you how full of shit they are, because obviously you have
value or they wouldn't be trying to make money on you on the side.
And in our case we actually have the right to say no to these types
of things. They had to ask our permission to put our music on iTunes.
So this is just them getting really sneaky trying to push stuff
through, because the only place they're going to get money now is
from corporate sponsors.
And look, it's no secret that the record labels are out of touch.
They've lost money continuously for seven or eight years and they
continue to hold on to the Titanic. This is just another indication
of them thinking that they can get away with whatever because they're
the big old record business. You know, Josh Homme from Queens [of
the Stone Age] came out talking about Interscope, Trent Reznor ...
It's a very difficult position because whether it's blogs or people
posting on Web sites, fans can get very frustrated about what they
perceive about how you do your business, not being aware of how
we continually have a gun pointed at our head.
Did you approach the label with your concerns before filing the
suit?
No, because it's like talking to a brick wall. These people, they
treat your music like it's worthless and they treat you like you're
even more worthless. And that goes for our current label, Warner
Bros., too. There's no passion. There's no love. There's no respect.
It's just, like you're just a number. You might as well be some
cookies, or a rock. I really think it's total arrogance on their
part. I think they just thought they could get away with [using
our music for the Pepsi promotion] and we wouldn't do anything about
it. And luckily enough we have the ability to do something about
it.
Do you have thoughts about how to go forward with your music and
how to release it?
The first thing we're talking about doing is in essence not doing
an album that has any walls. So we'll release the album in different
forms in different places. Not just one CD with twelve songs. Our
next album might be forty songs. Now, to the mainstream person,
that's too many songs. So maybe you only give them one or two songs
at a time. And then I think what's cool is you can deal with different
people. You can do a deal with a skater Web site or you can work
with Pepsi if you choose.
The music business has sown the seeds for it's own destruction here.
So we're not in any hurry to go back and help save them. Warner
Bros. treats us like we're from another planet. We've had a good
record and we've sold records. And I haven't spoken to the label
president since 2005. Now we're free, we're out of our contracts.
So I think that makes us really dangerous, because we really are
the kind of band that's willing to take chances. We really will
work with anybody if we feel it's a cool, fun thing. And it doesn't
have to always be about money.
Trent Reznor and Radiohead and all kinds of people have been jumping
out of the major label system and doing things their own way. Can
the labels survive?
Well, as long as they have young dumb bands who are willing to sign
their lives away, yeah, of course. The label's going to continue
to sell them that they're star makers. They're not star makers.
Stars are born. MTV and the labels and secret people you don't know
about don't run the music business any more. MySpace runs the music
business now. Lots of other people run the music business now.
So it's safe to say that now that you are free of your contracts
you're not going to be rushing to sign a new deal?
Well, I think it's kind of interesting and it's a vulnerable thing
to say: People aren't beating our doors down to sign us, either.
It's not that we're not desirable. We're not dumb. They're not going
to be able to sell us their soap they're going to sell a twenty-two-year-old.
And that's why they don't want to do business with us.
They're still trying to sell you on the idea that they know something
that you don't know. But if you look at the numbers, they don't,
they know less than the consumer. The consumer's been telling them
for ten years they don't want albums. So what do they do? They continue
to try to sell them albums. The consumer says that they don't want
to pay $15 for fifteen songs when they only want one song. What
do they try to do? They try to shove albums down their throat.
A lot of artists love the album form or have some connection to
it. Is it going to bother you to be more single-focused?
No, we're still going to do albums. I think we're going to do it
in a different way. I can tell that our plans right now are to do
an album over two or three years and put it out in pieces and then
maybe eventually bring it all back together. The album doesn't have
to be perfect. It doesn't have to be ten songs. Some dumb white
guy somewhere doesn't have to like it. Some old fart, out-of-touch
has to decide, oh, these ten songs aren't as good as Sgt. Pepper's.
Well, you know what? I don't think the Beatles would be making an
album right now.
Artists are finding their own ways to get paid outside of the major-label
system, like the Eagles with their Wal-Mart deal, Madonna signing
up with Live Nation.
I think it's really difficult for the young artist, who doesn't
have at least some sense of a pathway. For example, if you were
a kid today and you're looking at the bands who are successful right
now, you think, if you don't sort of sell out and let somebody make
you a star, go on American Idol, then you can't be successful. Alternative
culture is really critical towards introducing new ideas. We need
those young bands to push old band like us, to push new boundaries.
We need our butts kicked regularly. That's where all the energy
comes from, from the bottom. And when the message on Amy Winehouse
is drama is better than music, and for Radiohead publicity is better
than music — no disrespect to them. But I think it's a bad message
to young bands of how to make it happen. It's almost like the evil
stepchild of the rap bling-bling thing, like, the only way to make
it work is I've got to come up with a gimmick.
Selling out has lost its negative stereotype in a sense.
We can all talk forever about how cool it is and how things are
different: The power's coming back to the artist. But sometimes
it takes an oppositional force to make things work. The old music
business wasn't great but at least it kind of gave you something
to kind of work with or against. Now, who do you work for and who
do you work against? The great example is American Idol. I mean,
who gets bigger marketing, whose TV show is bigger? And then those
artists don't sell. There's a complete disconnect between the drama
of the show, the emotional connection with the singers, and then
absolutely no care for their musical career. I mean, that's troubling.
Right, because, like you say, it's not really about the music at
the end of the day.
Right. And as an alternative artist, we're still here because it
is about the music. And anybody can point to any other 9,000 stupid
things I've said or done. The music still trumped any of those things.
So I can sit here at my rosy age and know that that's why we're
here, because the music has held us in good stead with a lot of
people around the world.
Speaking of the music, could you talk about new single "Superchrist"?
Is that indicative of what you guys might be working on next?
I think that's the band, me, whomever, back in free territory. I
think, if I was a fan of the Pumpkins, the great frustration is,
where's that energy that used to be there? We made the video for
$5,000. We spent our own money to record the song. We did it our
own way. There was nobody standing there and there was no timetable.
We just put it out when we wanted. It was great. I think that's
where the band belongs.
Coming back, we didn't really know what to expect. It's a weird
world. I mean, we never said we were bringing the original band
back. And then people were saying, oh, it's not the original band.
Well, we tried. I mean, what are we supposed to do? Stay home? You're
dealing with ideas and opinions and disappointments that aren't
yours. And there's not much you can do about them. We've rebelled
for years. It's just that we've been quietly rebelling in a system
that didn't give us a lot of options.
Is there a moment you can pinpoint that demonstrates your mistreatment
at the hands of a label?
I'll give you my favorite line of the past three years. I was talking
to the label president from Warner Bros., Tom Walley, and we were
having a call. They were actually thinking about dropping us, which
in retrospect probably would have been good. I was in Arizona, we
were starting to write the album, and so I said things are going
great. And he said, "What's the difference between Zwan and
Smashing Pumpkins?" And I was like, what do you say? What do
you say to a brick wall? What's the difference between your side
band and the band that was your blood and your sweat and your heart
for fourteen years? So we're out of Purgatory. And we're excited
now.
