Quotes By Billy Corgan

I'm from a lower middle class background; all my family were immigrants.

One thing I've learned to appreciate as I've gotten a little older is direct forms of communication.

I don't want to be a dead hero.

More than any audience in the world, Americans will cross their arms, stare at you and say, 'OK, whaddya got?' - no matter how many times you've proven it to them.

All I can go on is my own value system.

Somewhere between the intellectual idea of why we're attracted to certain things and the pragmatic reality is some form of ever-evolving truth.

There is something mighty suspicious about declaring an emergency for something that has yet to show itself to be a grand pandemic.

I still believe in my country.

I didn't find Jesus. He's been there the whole time.

I like my home and I like the nature.

Compliments and criticism are all ultimately based on some form of projection.

Well, I'm known as a guitar-rock guy, you know? You're not supposed to play with synthesizers. This is not in the rulebook.

In a weird kind of way, music has afforded me an idealism and perfectionism that I could never attain as me.

I never wanted to leave the Smashing Pumpkins. That was never the plan.

I do not think wrestling is going to save the world.

I'm a really honest person.

Like any good tree that one would hope to grow, we must set our roots deep into the ground so that what is real will prosper in the Light of Love.

The ideology of the Smashing Pumpkins was ultimately more valuable than the music of the Smashing Pumpkins. That's what critics can't put their finger on.

I think rock & roll has prepared me for a lot of flexibility.

As a citizen of the great city of Chicago, I find it impossible to root against the White Sox. The White Sox organization has been much more consistent, in my lifetime at least, at putting a winning ballclub on the field.

You know Americans are obsessed with life and death and rebirth, that's the American Cycle. You know, awakening, tragic, horrible death and then Phoenix rising from the ashes. That's the American story, again and again.

There's a difference between being a poseur and being someone who's so emotionally challenged they're kind of just doing their best to show you what they've got.

For someone who's had the level of success I've had, there's been very little critical review of my work, which is pretty fascinating.

I've seen foreigners really shift on their view of America, and that's hard for me to take.

Where is this great love for rock and roll that existed for 50 or 60 years?

I don't have any sentimental notion about how people are going to remember me.

Rock and Roll is still asking people like me to live up to the old guard's concept of what success is but it doesn't mean anything.

I was brought up Roman Catholic. I'm not even baptized.

There's a lot of days where you feel forgotten.

What most people do is try to find a comfortable persona that they're in alignment with and the public likes and appreciates them for.