For Smashing Pumpkins fans, the Infinite Sadness has officially come to an end.
Billy Corgan has verified rumors that have been circulating for months that the Smashing Pumpkins would reunite. A post on the former frontman’s website reads: “It’s official, the Smashing Pumpkins are currently writing songs for their upcoming album, their first since 2000.”
Corgan has been hinting at a reunion since last summer when he took out a full-page ad in the Chicago Tribune expressing his desire to get the Pumpkins back together.
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“When I played the final Smashing Pumpkins show on the night of December 2, 2000,” he wrote in the ad, “I walked off the stage believing that I was forever leaving a piece of my life behind. I naively tried to start a new band, but found that my heart wasn’t in it. I moved away to pursue a love that I once had but got lost. So I moved back home to heal what was broken in me, and to my surprise I found what I was looking or. I found that my heart is in Chicago, and that my heart is in the Smashing Pumpkins.
“For a year now I have walked around with a secret, a secret I chose to keep. But now I want you to be among the first to know that I have made plans to renew and revive the Smashing Pumpkins I want my band back, and my songs, and my dreams. In this desire I feel I have come home again.”
In what capacity Corgan has his band back is not yet known. The singer is still in contact with former bassist Melissa Auf Der Maur, but there’s no word on whether Corgan has mended broken ties with guitarist James Iha.
In February, Auf Der Maur told MTV News she would take part in the reunion. “My services are there for [Corgan] whenever he needs them,” she said. “Assuming I’m not on tour — but even then, we can cross paths. I love the Pumpkins, and to play those songs again would be nothing but fun for me. It was a big part of my life.”
Drummer Jimmy Chamberlin (who also played with Corgan in Zwan), will be involved in the reunion, MTV reports.
Little else is known about the reunion and when we can expect to hear the first new material from the Pumpkins since 2000’s MACHINA/The Machines of God. “No release date has been set,” the post on Corgan’s site read, “but the band plans to begin recording this summer.”
Smashing Pumpkins official site
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