The Smashing Pumpkins

Chicago

The Smashing Pumpkins formed in Chicago in 1988. Billy Corgan, after his earlier band the Marked broke up, moved from St. Petersburg, Florida, to Chicago, took a job in a record store and met the guitarist James Iha there. The two wrote songs with a drum machine, heavily influenced by the Cure and New Order, and played their first show on 9 July 1988 at a Polish bar called Chicago 21. Corgan then met D'arcy Wretzky after a Dan Reed Network show and, learning she played bass, got her to join. The owner of the Cabaret Metro, Joe Shanahan, would book them only if they swapped the drum machine for a live drummer. That was Jimmy Chamberlin, a jazz drummer. Corgan recalled that his power let the band rock harder than they had imagined, and the full lineup first took the Metro stage on 5 October 1988.

A first single, I Am One, came out in 1990 on the local label Limited Potential and sold out. A follow-up, Tristessa, appeared on Sub Pop, and the band signed to Caroline Records. Gish (1991) was made with the producer Butch Vig at Smart Studios in Madison, Wisconsin, for $20,000. Corgan often played every instrument but the drums, which strained relations in the band. After the Lull EP in October 1991 they formally signed to Virgin Records.

Siamese Dream

For Siamese Dream (1993) the band moved to Triclops Studios in Marietta, Georgia, partly to avoid distractions, with Vig producing again alongside Corgan. Corgan and Vig layered guitars into dense walls of sound, and Alan Moulder, whom Corgan picked for his work on My Bloody Valentine's Loveless, took 36 days to mix it. The album entered the Billboard 200 at number ten and was later certified seven times platinum. Its singles were Cherub Rock, Today, Disarm and Rocket. In 1994 Virgin issued Pisces Iscariot, a collection of B-sides and outtakes that reached number four.

Mellon Collie

The next record, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (1995), was pitched by Corgan as The Wall for Generation X. The band dropped Vig for the producers Flood and Alan Moulder, began in a rehearsal space, worked in two rooms at once and gave Iha and Wretzky a much larger part than before. From 57 potential songs they kept 28 for a two-disc set, Dawn to Dusk and Twilight to Starlight. It entered the Billboard 200 at number one, remains the only Pumpkins album to do so, and was certified eleven times platinum.

Its singles were Bullet with Butterfly Wings, 1979, Zero, Tonight, Tonight, Muzzle and Thirty-Three. The band earned seven Grammy nominations and won one, for Bullet. Time called the album the group's most ambitious and accomplished work yet. The outtakes went into the 1996 box set The Aeroplane Flies High.

Adore and the break

Adore (1998) leaned toward electronics, and with no regular drummer the band used drum machines and drummers including Matt Cameron and Joey Waronker. It debuted at number two on the Billboard 200, though the band's US sales reached only about 830,000 by the end of the year. The charity shows that followed raised more than $2.8 million.

Wretzky's departure was announced in September 1999, during work on Machina/The Machines of God, and Melissa Auf der Maur joined for the tour. Machina came out in 2000 and entered the charts at number three. On 23 May 2000 Corgan told a Los Angeles radio station that the band would break up at the end of the year. The farewell show at the Metro on 2 December 2000 ran four and a half hours and 35 songs.

Return

Corgan and Chamberlin reconvened in 2006 for Zeitgeist (2007). Chamberlin left in early 2009, and Corgan began the Teargarden by Kaleidyscope series, which took in the albums Oceania (2012) and Monuments to an Elegy (2014). Chamberlin became a touring member in 2015 and Iha appeared with the band again in March 2016; both officially rejoined in 2018. Since then they have released Shiny and Oh So Bright, Vol. 1 (2018), Cyr (2020), Atum: A Rock Opera in Three Acts (2022 to 2023) and Aghori Mhori Mei (2024).

The band has sold 30 million albums worldwide. Reviewing a three-hour Wembley Arena show in 2018, the Guardian's Michael Hann judged Corgan's feel for melody, tone and texture miles ahead of most of his alt-rock contemporaries.