Billy Corgan Dusts Off Zwan, Smashing Pumpkins Rarities At Madame Zuzu's [Videos]

Billy Corgan ditched the lights and theatrics of a Smashing Pumpkins concert for a pair of stripped-down acoustic sets at his Madame Zuzu’s Teahouse earlier this week. The three performances spread across Sunday and Monday saw the singer-songwriter revisit Smashing Pumpkins rarities as well as his short-lived project Zwan.

The three performances, an early and late show on Sunday and one evening show on Monday, saw Corgan bat around with much of the same song sheet. Among the highlights of the solo shows were resurrections of Melon Collie And The Infinite Sadness‘ “By Starlight” and the Teagarden By Kaleidoscope track “Widow Wake My Mind”, which Billy hadn’t played since 2012 and 2010, respectively. Madame Zuzu’s has a habit of inspiring Corgan to mine his back catalog, with the last performance of “By Starlight” occurring at his Chicago-area vegan teahouse.

The biggest surprises of the series, however, came with the return to Zwan material. Corgan formed the then-quartet in 2001 following the brief dissolution of The Smashing Pumpkins. The original lineup featured Corgan, Pumpkins drummer Jimmy Chamberlin, guitarist Matt Sweeny, and guitarist/bassist David Pajo, later adding bassist Paz Lenchantin (A Perfect Circle). The band released one album, 2003’s Mary Star of the Sea, before breaking up later that year. During its brief tenure, Zwan mounted a pair of mini-tours as well as a five-night run at The Metro in Chicago, which altogether boasted upwards of 60 original songs from the group.

By all accounts, Corgan doesn’t look back on his time in Zwan fondly, telling Entertainment Weekly in 2005, “You’ll never see Zwan. I’ll never go anywhere near those people. Ever. I mean, I detest them. You can put that in capital letters. Bad people.”

That’s why it was so surprising to see Corgan dust off “W.P.” and “I Know My Time Is Coming Round” for the first time in 20 years, as well as the first “El-A-Noy” since 2015. Though Mary Star of the Sea is not available on streaming services, Corgan mentioned that a Zwan box set is on the way, according to a Reddit user.

Check out fan-shot videos from the recent Billy Corgan acoustic shows at Madame Zuzu’s, featuring bust-outs from Smashing Pumpkins and Zwan.

Billy Corgan – “W.P.” – 2/6/22