Billy Corgan : On Chamberlin's Departure and Return
Modern Drummer Magazine (August 2000)

MD: Was the decision to boot Jimmy from the band an impulsive reaction or well thought-out?

Billy: It was certainly reactionary -- not because of the singular event, but because of a breach of trust. It was also reactionary in the sense that there was nowhere else to go from that point. But beyond that, I was really fearful for Jimmy's life. He was at a point where he needed to reach some sort of peace, and he wasn't able to do that within the band. It was really critical to get him out and wake him up, and it seems to have worked, because his energy is 180º from what it was. Before, I'd seen the attitude of, "Nothing can kill me." But I think he honors the moment now and there's a different depth of appreciation from his role and stature in the band.

MD: At the time the band kicked him out, were you hoping that he'd come back someday?

Billy: We'd discussed very deeply that we would take a strong public position because we didn't want Jimmy to think we were coming from any place of weakness. Internally, we'd discussed that it would only be something like six months. We didn't want him to leave. We forced him out because we felt it would save his life, and we hoped he would give us some kind of epiphany, give us a call in six months or so and say, "I screwed up," But that call never came, and over time the two sides just drifted further apart. And that's part of it -- we didn't rush back into anything -- so when we realized it wasn't going to happen as we'd planned, we moved ahead.

MD: Was it difficult for you, with Adore, to make an artistic statement without Jimmy?

Billy: There's the plus and the minus of that situation. The plus is that it removed the crutch that Jimmy is for me, because he can take a weak song and turn it into a great song. It really forced me to have to look at songs differently and to really learn how to write songs -- actual craft, studing the full mechanics of the structure. It totally changed the way we worked. Instead of rehearsing and rehearsing the way we normally would, we just worked in the studio.      The downside of it was I was suddenly cast into a role without somebody I'd played with for eight or nine years straight and had a psychic connection to, and I suddenly found myself working with a drummer and explaining things I never would have had to explain to Jimmy.      In hindsight, the smartest thing would have been to just stop, take a breateher, and let everyone get back to full mental capacity before going back in the studio -- just rehearse for eight months straight and find some new sort of musical connection with a new drummer. I did have an initial connection with Matt Walker, but I rushed him into a role that Jimmy and I had built over time, and I tried forcing him to be something in this band and never gave him the time to be Matt Walker. But it also made me really appreciate the connection that Jimmy and I have.

MD: Was it difficult or awkward at first to play again with Jimmy?

Billy: It was as if a day hadn't passed. We just literally picked right back up from where we had left off. The mechanics of like, hand speed and crispness -- the stamina -- that doesn't come back overnight. But Jimmy's not the kind of guy who sloughs off. He's one of the most preeminent drummers in rock 'n' roll, and I think he's willing to accept the responsibilities of that now and drive himself to a higher level and not be afraid of that.

MD: Did you notice anything that had changed or evolved about his playing?

Billy: That's a really good question. Beyond the obvious, like the rustiness, I think he plays a little less on top and I think he has more of an appreciation for a good grove. Take a song like "With Every Light." It was done in one take, and I don't think Jimmy would have just settled into a nice, mature swing -- not a jazzy swing -- for the whole song before. I think that has a lot to do with me, too, as a songwriter. I'm not trying to be as demonstrative as before, and the new music emphasizes different things.

MD: That trust you spoke of earlier -- is that an issue anymore?

Billy: Some of that deals with personal things I don't want to get into. But God has given both Jimmy and me tremendous gifts, and when you're younger and don't necessarily have self-respect or self-control, you don't realize the full breadth of what that gift can mean.      You think of it in an egoistic sense, and I think out time away from each other helped us appreciate that the gives we have individually and within the band can be such a good thing in people's lives. As friends and partners in music, its been a tremendous relationship. But we don't sit around and talk about how good we used to be; we talk about how good we're going to be. - Matt Peiken