Billy Corgan: Nirvana, Pearl Jam success resulted in ‘suicidal depression’

Smashing Pumpkins vocalist Billy Corgan says the success of Nirvana and Pearl Jam in the early 90s caused him to have ‘suicidal depression.’

The Pumpkins released their debut album Gish in 1991, with Nirvana and Pearl Jam launching Nevermind and Ten that same year.

And Corgan says that those releases caused him to re-evaluate his work and reveals he struggled emotionally at that time.

He tells the Why Not Now podcast: “The Smashing Pumpkins had put out one album which was very successful – but as we were out promoting our album, the Nirvana album came out and as everyone knows, Nevermind was massive. Then Pearl Jam came out at that time and they were massive.

“Within a short span of time, I went from thinking I was very successful within my given field, to all the rules had changed in my given field.

“Everything I had built myself up to be and do was no longer as relevant as it needed to be. I went into a very strange depression because I felt like something had been not taken, but the change made me feel kind of inadequate in a way I wasn’t prepared for.”

Corgan continues: “I went through a very long depression where I couldn’t write songs and really struggled for a breakthrough.

“It really came off the heels of a suicidal depression – I just really struggled with the emotions I was feeling and I reached this morning in my life where I was either going to jump out a window or I was going to change my life.”

He reports that waking up one morning he “stared out the window and thought, ‘Okay, well, if you’re not going to jump out the window, you better do whatever it is you need to do.”

He then wrote the song Today, which featured on the second Smashing Pumpkins album Siamese Dream.

Corgan adds: “It’s sort of a wry observation on suicide, but in essence the meditation behind the lyric is that every day is the best day, if you let it be.”

Last year, Corgan revealed he was back on talking terms with the original members of Smashing Pumpkins and was thinking about the possibility of a reunion.

The last Smashing Pumpkins album was 2014’s Monuments To An Elegy.

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Scott has spent 37 years in newspapers, magazines and online as an editor, production editor, sub-editor, designer, writer and reviewer. Scott joined our news desk in 2014 before moving into e-commerce in 2020. Scott maintains Louder’s buyer’s guides, highlights deals, and reviews headphones, speakers, earplugs and more. Over the last 12 years, Scott has written more than 11,500 articles across Louder, Classic Rock, Metal Hammer and Prog. He's previously written for publications including IGN, Sunday Mirror, Daily Record and The Herald, covering everything from news and features, to tech reviews, video games, travel and whisky. Scott's favourite bands are Fields Of The Nephilim, The Cure, New Model Army, All About Eve, The Mission, Cocteau Twins, Drab Majesty, Marillion and Rush.