Along with news of their upcoming album, Oceania, last week, alt-rock icons Smashing Pumpkins announced that they will be reissuing their entire back catalogue starting next year. But if you were worried that the project will just overhaul their tunes with a remastering credit, think again. There are apparently hours of unreleased material to sift through.
An interview with lead Pumpkin Billy Corgan had him confirming that though old B-sides will pop up as extra material on the deluxe reissues, there are also oodles of demos that could make the cut as well.
"For the first album [Gish], there are something like 30 demos from even before the album was made," he told Rolling Stone. "So, a lot of that stuff needs to be remixed, and there's a lot of good versions of things and unheard stuff."
That being said, Corgan isn't willing to just toss on any jank leftover.
"I want it to be a document about the materials that surrounded the records, so if you're a fan of that record, you kind of get more of that record," he continued. "But I want to be really selective and not just put out anything. I want it to be almost like a nice mixtape -- if you're a fan of Gish, then the Gish bonus disc would have some really cool stuff to listen to that's in that period.
"I've gone on some message boards to see what fans are saying, and they think they've heard everything and they haven't. There's a lot of stuff we have that no one's ever heard."
Regrettably, while unearthing material from the band's heyday seems as if it would make Corgan nostalgic to get the original lineup together, that just isn't the case.
"There's been lawsuits and lots of stupid stuff. It's only made it worse. If it was bad before, it's really bad now," he said. "Jimmy [Chamberlin, drummer] and I aren't enemies -- he's just off doing what he wants to do, as he should. There's not super bad blood between me and Jimmy that we'd never get on stage again. But I cannot in any way, shape, or form ever envision standing on a stage, playing music again with James [Iha, guitarist] and D'arcy [Wretzky, bassist]. I just don't see any situation where that would be possible."
An interview with lead Pumpkin Billy Corgan had him confirming that though old B-sides will pop up as extra material on the deluxe reissues, there are also oodles of demos that could make the cut as well.
"For the first album [Gish], there are something like 30 demos from even before the album was made," he told Rolling Stone. "So, a lot of that stuff needs to be remixed, and there's a lot of good versions of things and unheard stuff."
That being said, Corgan isn't willing to just toss on any jank leftover.
"I want it to be a document about the materials that surrounded the records, so if you're a fan of that record, you kind of get more of that record," he continued. "But I want to be really selective and not just put out anything. I want it to be almost like a nice mixtape -- if you're a fan of Gish, then the Gish bonus disc would have some really cool stuff to listen to that's in that period.
"I've gone on some message boards to see what fans are saying, and they think they've heard everything and they haven't. There's a lot of stuff we have that no one's ever heard."
Regrettably, while unearthing material from the band's heyday seems as if it would make Corgan nostalgic to get the original lineup together, that just isn't the case.
"There's been lawsuits and lots of stupid stuff. It's only made it worse. If it was bad before, it's really bad now," he said. "Jimmy [Chamberlin, drummer] and I aren't enemies -- he's just off doing what he wants to do, as he should. There's not super bad blood between me and Jimmy that we'd never get on stage again. But I cannot in any way, shape, or form ever envision standing on a stage, playing music again with James [Iha, guitarist] and D'arcy [Wretzky, bassist]. I just don't see any situation where that would be possible."
