Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan recently posted on Instagram that he wants to be part of a ‘wider ranging societal discussion’ in helping others who are struggling, especially after losing contemporary Generation X singers like Chris Cornell, Scott Weiland, Layne Staley, and Kurt Cobain to suicide and drug addiction. He posted a photo of his son Augustus Juppiter Corgan as part of the Instagram post.
“AJC and I. Every day isn’t easy, but every day is worth it. In one 5 min span we went from him pouring water onto the floor (prompting a moment, as I’d asked him to stop), to him pointing out we have ants invading the kitchen (we live in the pseudo country). He asked, ‘are the ants marching?’ I affirmed this as I scooped them up (our policy, generally, is to displace interlopers gently to another location, for as I told him, ‘we must respect all life.’
I find myself in a slightly more introspective mood than usual as I’ve just watched my friend’s video (@mariakanellis) about her husband’s battle with pain pill addiction (an intro is posted on her IG page if you are interested); as well as I’ve also seen this week where my partner Chloe encouraged discussion on her IG page this week about moms struggling with post-partum depression. Point of saying all this being is I too want to be a positive part of a wider ranging societal discussion on how we can better help one another as human kind. My greatest recent interest being (in the public sphere) the issue of bullying, and how damaging it can be to children and, by extension, how the art of bullying is often acceptable behavior if someone can justify why their person of interest deserves it.
We all have regrets in that department, but now we are seeing the very real data of increased teen self-harm and suicide, and for my own generation, generation X, the loss of so many great artists due to suicide or drugs or both and of course a host of other factors we cannot unspool so simply. But let me put it to you this way: every life is worthy of restoration and rescue. And when we consider how many people can find hope in the aspirations of another’s journey, it is often the most fragile among us who have the most to contribute.
If the flight of this beautiful butterfly sounds like you, to you, keep fighting for the great things in life. They are absolutely worth it.”
Corgan discussed a similar topic in a 2017 SFWeekly interview.
You’re a member of a shrinking club, as so many of your alt-rock contemporaries — Kurt Cobain, Scott Weiland, Layne Staley, Bradley Nowell, Shannon Hoon, and, most recently, Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington, have died of accidental overdoses or taken their own lives. Do you have any insight into this troubling trend?
“I wish I had more answers and I’d done more. I knew Chris, and we had a bit of a falling out and were never able to patch that up. I wish I hadn’t contributed in even the most miniscule way to his unhappiness. I wish I’d have been a force for encouragement, because he influenced me, and I looked up to him. Chester was obviously one of the best rock singers ever, and it was such a great honor when he covered ‘Bullet with Butterfly Wings.’ It’s haunting to think all this talent is gone. That’s a lot of memory, a lot of music, a lot of we should be sitting on the lawn when we’re 60, singing ‘Black Hole Sun’ together with the guy who wrote it. Those are shared tragedies.
As far as why, I don’t think it’s as simple as we’re cursed as a generation. But we were the children of Baby Boomers, the generation that had the pill and decided they didn’t want kids. We were the latchkey kids, who grew up on Gilligan’s Island because there was no babysitter. Maybe that creates some sorrow or something that’s deeper than we even recognize.”
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