Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan discussed his place in the music business in a new Creative Independent interview. He seemed to announce that he is no longer seeking relevance, and will just make music now and see where it goes.
I had this realization the other day. I was like, “Wow, I really looked to the music business to be like a surrogate father.” I really wanted these men in these boardrooms to be the good dad that I never had. I really only had one man in the music business in my entire history in the music business that was that man for me. It was Phil Quartararo, who I’m still friends with even though he’s only tangentially still in the business.
Phil was a radio guy who became an A&R guy or whatever and became president of Virgin and then went on to be the head of Warner Brothers for a while. He was the only man who would give me his word and follow through on his word and not inconsequentially he was at the helm of my most productive and successful period, because I needed someone to be that person.
I never had that person in my own life. I needed someone to run cover for me. I remember once telling him, “If you tell me that something is important, I’m just going to believe you. I’ve never given that power to anybody.” You know what I mean? I was always the paranoid street kid. It was always, “You’re going to fuck me eventually, it’s just a matter of when and it’s a matter of how long we can spin this narrative out.” It caused me so many problems. I remember Phil would call me on the phone and say, “Look, you’ve got to do this.”
I would bitch and complain and give him my theoretical seven million reasons and he’d say, “Look, just trust me.” He was that guy. Fuck, I wish I had 40 of those guys. I would’ve done a lot more good work and I would’ve saved myself a lot of pain and torture. I really feel at this point I’m more of a Vaudevillian or something. I’m out of time. My skill set is not really applicable to the world as it exists. I’m just going to do my work and it’s going to go where it’s going to go.
