Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan yet again criticized Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder on The Howard Stern Show earlier this week, six years after saying Pearl Jam were ‘derivative.’ Corgan recently called Vedder a ‘great star.’
Long Red wrote on the Ten Club board, “Was an odd set of mentions about Ed by Billy Corgan on Stern earlier this week.
Started innocently enough with Corgan talking about sharing a bill with PJ in the early 90s and watching Ed climb the rafters at some gig and telling the Butthole Surfers front man that if he falls ‘not only is he gonna kill himself, but he’s gonna kill a few people down below.’
It was a funny moment, but it didn’t last. When Stern said something along the lines of ‘Eddie’s a nice guy, right?’ Corgan made sort of a poo-poo face and basically said, he doesn’t buy into the image that’s out there of Ed. He said the same about Trent Reznor. Though he wouldn’t go into specifics about any falling out he may or may not have had with Ed or Reznor.
Corgan is perplexing. He’s arguably one of the greatest songwriters of his generation, and simultaneously someone who seems to get along with absolutely no one outside of his Pumpkins bubble. It’s a shame. Why can’t we be friends?”
WNH1977 responded, “I think he’s taken his shots at Ed & PJ dating back to the 90’s. I remember a friend of mine went to a Pumpkins concert… I’m thinking around ’96? He said Corgan was talking shit about PJ at the show he was at… I think my friend said he was taking shots at Vitalogy. Then he called Pearl Jam ‘derivative’ on the Stern show a few years ago.
Seems like he always pads it by saying that he’s playing in theaters and PJ’s in baseball stadiums, so maybe it’s understandable why people change. But c’mon. You’re in your 50s, boys. And calling PJ ‘derivative’ as if he is some kind of genius at a higher level… he’s good, but I think he’s seen one too many shapeshifters.”
“I think if you stack my songs up; [Kurt] Cobain’s songs up and [Pearl Jam’s] songs, they don’t have the songs,” Corgan explained in 2014. At the time, he said he was no longer friends with Vedder.
“I haven’t been in a social frame with the guy,” he said.
Corgan said Vedder changed as he got more famous. “I think a lot of people are transformed by fame,” he told Stern. “I knew one person and then there was another person.”
