The band Billy Corgan called a “fucking rip-off” of The Smashing Pumpkins
It’s fair to say that Billy Corgan, the somewhat cantankerous frontman of Smashing Pumpkins, is not someone to cross. The singer, songwriter, and the band’s leader is well known for losing his cool with other groups and even the odd member of his own outfit. However, one band and one song pushed him over the edge as, in the eyes of Corgan, they committed one of the most egregious errors the music industry has to offer: plagiarism.
Having emerged as one of the most significant rock groups of the 1990s, The Smashing Pumpkins, a group that relied upon its unique originality, Corgan is rightly regarded as a pivotal figure in the music world. Having sold 30million albums worldwide, the group have cemented their spot in the annals of music history.
Having spent so much time in the public eye, Corgan has often been afforded column inches to share his opinions on other bands and artists. His feuds with the members of Pavement and Soundgarden are the stuff of alt-rock legend. Corgan ignited a feud with the latter when he criticised them for reuniting in 2012. He said: “There are those bands that are essentially coming back only to make money – playing their old albums, and maybe somewhere in the back of their minds, they’re thinking there might be a future.”
Corgan continued: “I am not in that business, obviously. I condemn anybody who’s in that business but doesn’t admit he’s in that business. When Soundgarden came back and they just played their old songs, great. I was a fan of Soundgarden, but call it for what it is. They’re just out there to have one more round at the till; same with Pavement and these other bands.”
The songwriter values his originality and desire to create more than most rockers, and this feeling emboldened his long-running hatred of the American rock band Collective Soul. The band found huge success with their track ‘Shine’ which Corgan believed to be a copy of his band’s track ‘Rhinoceros’ – though there is some debate as to which Pumpkins track was at the centre of the issues – with the riff of that cut distinguishably similar to the Collective Soul song.
Despite Collective Soul having a demo of ‘Shine’ that predated the Smashing Pumpkins song Corgan has remained a turbulent adversary for the group. His menacing presence was so intense that, in 1995, Collective Soul decided to write a song about the Pumpkins frontman titled ‘Smashing Young Man’ which directly insulted him with lyrics: “Your tongue is just lashing/ Just bitching by habit”.
In the true style of a curmudgeon frontman, Corgan held on to the anger for decades, and in 2010, he began covering the song during a live performance before stopping to state, “I fucking hate that song. What a fucking rip-off of my band.” However, in a 2019 interview with Alternative Nation, Corgan expressed that his distaste for the band still hasn’t subsided. When asked, “Did you make peace with Collective Soul?” he replied, “Fuck Collective Soul. Now and always.”
Listen to Collective Soul’s ‘Shine’ below.
