10 years ago today Zwan released Mary Star of the Sea.

For us at Ozphoria we came close with a petition in getting Zwan to be added to the Big Day Out line up, but sadly for us they decided to do a 5 night stand at The Metro to launch their debut.

While to most Mary Star of the Sea doesn’t live up to the power and energy of the live unit of Zwan, it still has some shining moments.

As fans I think we are lucky with can look back at this time and smile, I hope one day the band can too.

Crestfallen.com interview Billy Corgan Late last month Smashing Pumpkins fan website posted a five part interview with Billy, it’s worth a listen and a very casual chat with Billy about current and future Smashing Pumpkins projects. You can list to all parts here: Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five

Crestfallen.com interview Billy Corgan

Late last month Smashing Pumpkins fan website posted a five part interview with Billy, it’s worth a listen and a very casual chat with Billy about current and future Smashing Pumpkins projects.

You can list to all parts here:

Q&A: Billy Corgan Looks Back on the Smashing Pumpkins’ ‘Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness’ ‘We made something that was more about capturing the spirit of the times than worrying about making a perfect record’ You can read the full in depth interview with Rolling Stone here.

Q&A: Billy Corgan Looks Back on the Smashing Pumpkins’ ‘Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness’

‘We made something that was more about capturing the spirit of the times than worrying about making a perfect record’

You can read the full in depth interview with Rolling Stone here.

This is where I really wanted to go musically. I was a fan of Billy Corgan’s music for years, so to be able to work with him on his vision and help take the band to a new place is incredible. It’s great to be part of something that you can be completely passionate about.

Jeff Schroeder talks with Music Radar about being within the Smashing Pumpkins world and his future plans.

Read the full interview here.

A little late, but here is Billy talking with Wil Anderson at Splendour in the Grass when the Smashing Pumpkins toured Australia in July.

Thanks to Jon Steele for recording this and supplying the video to us to share. 

Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness reissue information and artwork Taken from www.antiquiet.com According to an Amazon listing, the double record will come in similar fashion to the Gish / Siamese Dream and Pisces Iscariot deluxe reissues before it. The page states the following: “Mellon Collie & The Infinite Sadness is being released in multiple physical and digital configurations, including an expanded 5CD+DVD Deluxe Box Set (also available digitally) and the remastered original album in 4LP Vinyl, 2CD, and digital formats. The Deluxe Box Set’s 5 CDs include 64 bonus tracks of previously unreleased material or alternate versions of Mellon Collie era songs, and its DVD features a live show filmed at the Brixton Academy, London (1996) and bonus performances from the German music television show Rockpalast (1996). It all comes housed in a 12 x 12 lift-top box with magnetic closure, reimagined cover art and velvet-lined disc holder. The package includes 2 books containing personal notes, lyrics, new collage artwork, plus a Decoupage kit for creating your own scenes from the Mellon Collie universe. The bonus content and special features were curated from the band’s archives by Corgan, and have been painstakingly remastered for the first time from the original master tapes by Bob Ludwig.” As Mellon Collie registered what was arguably the Pumpkins’ best creative period (even according to Corgan), the slew of extra content is perfectly understandable. While a full tracklisting has yet to be announced, the DVD mentioned in the description may already be within reach.

Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness reissue information and artwork

Taken from www.antiquiet.com

According to an Amazon listing, the double record will come in similar fashion to the Gish / Siamese Dream and Pisces Iscariot deluxe reissues before it. The page states the following: “Mellon Collie & The Infinite Sadness is being released in multiple physical and digital configurations, including an expanded 5CD+DVD Deluxe Box Set (also available digitally) and the remastered original album in 4LP Vinyl, 2CD, and digital formats. The Deluxe Box Set’s 5 CDs include 64 bonus tracks of previously unreleased material or alternate versions of Mellon Collie era songs, and its DVD features a live show filmed at the Brixton Academy, London (1996) and bonus performances from the German music television show Rockpalast (1996). It all comes housed in a 12 x 12 lift-top box with magnetic closure, reimagined cover art and velvet-lined disc holder. The package includes 2 books containing personal notes, lyrics, new collage artwork, plus a Decoupage kit for creating your own scenes from the Mellon Collie universe. The bonus content and special features were curated from the band’s archives by Corgan, and have been painstakingly remastered for the first time from the original master tapes by Bob Ludwig.”

As Mellon Collie registered what was arguably the Pumpkins’ best creative period (even according to Corgan), the slew of extra content is perfectly understandable. While a full tracklisting has yet to be announced, the DVD mentioned in the description may already be within reach.

Big announcement coming soon for Smashing Pumpkins reissue of Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

Audio of the new Smashing Pumpkins song ‘Black Sunshine’ from performed in Mexico City. Wonder if the song title has any reference to the setlist names used during the 20th Anniversary tours, which of course were “Black Sunshine,” & “White Crosses” 

The song has a very classic heavy rock sound to it, similar to the track Billy Corgan did with Tony Iommi (Black Oblivion) many years ago. It’s interesting to see if this is a direction we can expect for the Smashing Pumpkins with the next release.


A change for Hipsters United

One of the great Smashing Pumpkins fan sites Hipsters United updated today they are changing how they run the site:

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After today, we will no longer be updating the Hipsters United blog.

HipstersUnited.com will continue to exist as a portal archiving our old posts. New podcasts may be posted intermittently, and the HU Twitter account will remain a voice for the site, but Hipsters United will no longer be committed to coverage of Smashing Pumpkins ‘news’ on a continuous basis. The@PumpkinsNews Twitter account will accordingly be deleted, as will our Facebook page.

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You can read the full post here.

As a fellow fan site we know the time it takes to constantly report on the news and even visitors to our website would notice we only update now during more frequent times of relevant news.

Social media has allowed us all to get information about the Smashing Pumpkins as it happens from various sources and even the band themselves, websites like ours, Hipsters United and others will one day be more of a ‘catalogue’ of past events. 

We want to say a massive thank you to Hipsters United, they took reporting on and defending the Smashing Pumpkins to a new level with all fan websites and are glad they aren’t going away for good, it’s a change and change is good.

Billy Corgan launched his new teahouse business today, Madame ZuZu’s. At the launch today he performed a few sets of music, above is a video of Song for a Son. 

There are a number of other videos from today up on this YouTube account.