Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan discussed the Pumpkins’ legendary 1991 tour with Pearl Jam and the Red Hot Chili Peppers in a new 101 WKQX interview. Alternative Nation transcribed his comments.
“That Chili Pepper tour was crazy because we got a call. Anthony Kiedis later told me he saw our video on MTV 120 Minutes, and just off seeing the Siva video one time, they invited us to be the opening band. On top of that, they threw on this unknown band named Pearl Jam. When the tour started, probably the first week or two there seemed to be, wrestling would call it booboo face, there seemed to be some unhappy people.
We were on the backend of our record, which was a big success, so we were flying high, a tour with the Chili Peppers and everything. I remember kind of pulling some people aside, not from the bands, but people involved with the bands, and I said, ‘What’s going on?’ They said, ‘Well the Chili Peppers are upset because the record company isn’t really supporting their record, and Pearl Jam is upset because the record company isn’t really supporting their record. So it almost looked like, and again we didn’t know everybody back then like we know them now, so it’s like, oh it’s really not going well for them.
But the Chili Peppers were a big band, then all of a sudden ‘Under The Bridge’ hits, and that tour starts to take off, because everyone wants to see the Chili Peppers. Then ‘Alive’ or ‘Jeremy’ hit, so we had this triple crowd of Chili Peppers fans, Pumpkins fans, and Pearl Jam fans. It was this legendary tour, because this was all hitting at the exact same time. It was a great time for rock.”
