Quotes from Billy Corgan

I'm definitely responsible for coming in with some basic chord changes, or ideas. Everybody in the band looks to me to come up with the basic seed, so it's not very productive to come in with nothing.

The deeper I get into my life as a musician, I'm discovering that it becomes less and less about other people, and more about what I want to do. And that's a good place to be.

I don't have a problem with 'Idol' or 'X Factor,' I have a problem with when those things are not given the proper contextual hue.

I often have deer on my property and there's a fox and owls. You're not going to see that in the city.

In the beginning, though, I have to admit that I did have a chip on my shoulder. I did want to prove everyone wrong. But after I went through the process and came out the other side, it wasn't about anyone else.

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.

James, that's a bad situation. I'm not saying it's not repairable, but it's pretty far. When you go from being in one of the best bands in the world to some cover band... as far as I'm concerned, he was playing down at the pub.

To me, it's the folly of man to make God human.

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

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

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.

My mother and I parting company at four years old is a recurring theme; although it's not symbolically necessarily present, it's present in all my relationships.

Stay in school. Lie to your teachers, but stay in school.

I use music as some kind of weird salvation to get away from life

If you don't have some sort of belief system by which to center your life, it's hard sometimes to understand why you would put up with your family.

We don't make music for people to take drugs to, we make music for people to live their life.

Life is everything and nothing all at once.

Everything about life makes me lonely.

In my particular instance, I came from a family that didn't have anything. Everything I earned in life I made. Myself. With songs that I wrote.

I'm prepared to spend the rest of my life playing clubs, if that means I'm playing music that I believe in.

In my case I don't mind playing a character that irritates people or makes people question my sanity.

Radiohead and Our Lady Peace are doing the seven layers of guitar, and I kind of jumped on that before anyone else did.

Sometimes people just like being around each other, and good things come out of that.

There's nothing wrong with technology. It's when technology is the story and not the artist, that's the problem.