Billy Corgan has revealed that he considered late Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain "the most talented guy" in his generation. The Smashing Pumpkins frontman made the statement in an interview with Apple Music personality Zane Lowe.
Reflecting on what motivated him throughout his career, Corgan went deep into Cobain's genius and his influence on his own band. Read his thoughts, as transcribed by Consequence below.
"I want the Pumpkins standing on the top of the heap of our generation,” Corgan said in the interview. “If that means I got to write 800 songs to do it, I’ll do it. I ain’t shy about that. I will go down always as saying, Kurt was the most talented guy of our generation. Kurt had so much talent. It’s like frightening. It was like a John Lennon level of talent, where you’re like, ‘How can you have all this talent?’ Or Prince, right? But Kurt’s not here, sadly. So I looked around, I was like, ‘All right, well, I could beat the rest of them for sure.'”
Corgan also revealed that he cried when he heard of Cobain's death, although perhaps not for the reason most would have expected.
“When Kurt died, I cried because I lost my greatest opponent. I want to beat the best. I don’t want to win the championship because it’s just me and a bunch of jabronis, to use a wrestling term. It’s like, Michael Jordan, arguably the greatest sports competitor I’ll ever see in my lifetime — I mean, you want to talk about an alpha. That guy wanted to win the valet tip. You know what I mean?”
The comments were some of many insights offered by Corgan during the extensive interview with Lowe, with Corgan also offering his thoughts on a number of other acts including Deftones, U2 and Australia's own Amyl & The Sniffers, who recently performed on The Smashing Pumpkins curated The World Is A Vampire Festival down under. As transcribed by Kill Your Stereo, Corgan was full of praise for the band's frontperson Amy Taylor stating “I hear all the hype. ‘She's the new Iggy Pop. She's the female this, she's the blah blah blah.’ And I'm thinking, ‘I've heard this so many times.’ It doesn't mean I was doubtful, but I'll wait until I see with my own eyes. I looked at her for ten seconds on stage and I said, ‘Holy mother of God. This is a true rockstar." “Great band. And that's the power of rock and roll. So, somebody asked me after I saw them play, an interview, what do you think? And I said, ‘Wee, this is the problem with comparisons. There's only one of her. There's not... She's not anybody. That's why she's a star."
Watch the full interview below.
The Smashing Pumpkins released the final record in their 33-track, triple album rock opera ATUM on May 5th.
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