5 More Wild Smashing Pumpkins Stories from Siamese Dream (Beyond the 40-Guitar Wall)

Hey everyone, PJ Pat here. Just dropped a Short on Smashing Pumpkins' Siamese Dream. Billy Corgan's perfectionism. Forty individual guitar tracks on "Soma." The album that almost broke up the band before it was even released. One of the defining records of the 90s.

But the lore behind Siamese Dream goes way deeper than the gear. The album was made under conditions that should have killed the band. Here are 5 more wild stories from those sessions. Crank it up.

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1. The album cover features two random kids the band paid about $500

Look at the cover of Siamese Dream. Two little girls in matching outfits, holding hands. Iconic. They aren't models. They aren't actors. They aren't related to anyone in the band.

Photographer Melodie McDaniel found two random kids, Ali Laenger and Lysandra Roberts, around Los Angeles for the shoot. The girls were paid roughly $500 each (some sources say even less). McDaniel had them stand in matching dresses for a few photos and that was that. Lysandra and Ali went on to live regular lives. Their image is on millions of CD copies, vinyl pressings, posters, T-shirts. One of the most-recognized rock album covers of the 90s, and the kids on it are anonymous to this day.

2. "Today" was written on Billy Corgan's most suicidal day

This is the part that hits hardest. Billy Corgan has been open about it in interviews. He wrote "Today" on a day in early 1993 when he had been seriously contemplating suicide. The brightest, sunniest sounding song on the album, "today is the greatest day I've ever known," was written from the lowest mental health moment of his life.

The cheerful sound is intentionally ironic. Corgan was telling himself it was the greatest day BECAUSE he had decided not to act on the impulse. The song was a survival reminder. Once you know that, you can never hear "Today" the same way again. It's not a feel-good 90s anthem. It's a man writing his way out of the pit. Powerful stuff.

3. James Iha and D'arcy Wretzky were secretly dating during the album sessions and broke up

Add another layer of band tension. While Billy Corgan was already alienating James and D'arcy by re-recording their parts himself (per the Short), the two of them had been romantically involved before recording started. Their relationship ended during the Siamese Dream sessions.

So picture this: Billy is working 14-hour days obsessing over guitar layers. James and D'arcy are simultaneously recording an album AND going through a breakup AND being told their playing isn't good enough for the record. The band was working in the same studio while one of its couples was unwinding their relationship. Somehow they made one of the best 90s rock albums in those exact conditions. The miracle of Siamese Dream is that it exists at all.

4. Jimmy Chamberlin's heroin addiction climaxed in a touring keyboardist's death

Drummer Jimmy Chamberlin's struggles with addiction got worse during and after Siamese Dream. By 1996, on the Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness tour, the situation had escalated dangerously. On July 12, 1996, in a New York City hotel room, touring keyboardist Jonathan Melvoin overdosed on heroin and died. Chamberlin was with him at the time and survived.

The band fired Chamberlin shortly after. Corgan had to continue touring without his drummer, the same drummer whose performance had defined Siamese Dream. Chamberlin eventually got clean and rejoined the band years later. But this is the post-Siamese Dream chapter most fans skim past. The album that almost broke the band before release nearly killed them after.

5. "Cherub Rock" is a furious diss track to the indie rock scene

"Cherub Rock," the album's lead single, sounds like a triumphant rock anthem. Look at the lyrics: "Let me out! Let me out!" "Stay cool, and be somebody's fool this year." This is Billy Corgan ABSOLUTELY BLISTERING the indie rock scene that had been gatekeeping him.

By 1992 to 1993, the alternative scene's purists hated Pumpkins. Corgan was too ambitious, too pop, too commercial, too willing to be famous. The indie press was gaslighting him constantly. "Cherub Rock" is his middle finger to that scene. The song became a top 10 modern rock hit, which only proved Corgan's point. The "cherub" is the indie scene's poster boy, sheltered and useless. Corgan refused to play that role. The song became one of the album's defining tracks BECAUSE of how mad it is.

Wear it loud

If you've made it through 5 Smashing Pumpkins deep cuts, you know what time it is. Two picks for the certified rock heads:

Rock Hand Sign Graphic Tee →
Throw it on, queue up "Cherub Rock," yell along.

Volume Knob Rock Baseball Cap →
Forty guitar tracks deserve to be played at maximum volume.

Anyway

Siamese Dream is one of those records where the more you know about how it got made, the more incredible it sounds. The band was barely holding together. Billy Corgan was barely holding together. And out of all that came one of the most layered, ambitious rock albums of the decade. We don't deserve it. We have it anyway.

If you missed the Short, the embed is right at the top of this post. Subscribe to the Rock with PJ Pat YouTube channel for more rock breakdowns.

Got a band you want me to dig into next? Hit me on YouTube, Facebook, or just drop me a message at its1louder.com. Always reading.

Crank it up 1 louder.

PJ Pat