Horsegirl is (from left to right) guitarists Penelope Lowenstein and Nora Cheng, with drummer Gigi Reece.
Since the dawn of garage rock, basements and carports across America have played host to untold thousands of high school friends looking to fulfill that insatiable need to form a band. And, of course, it’s never easy, but even when everything clicks, it’s probably safe to say that not many of them wind up getting signed to the genre-defining indie rock label Matador Records on their first try.
“For us, it started purely as three teenagers who were doing it for fun,” gushes Penelope Lowenstein—at 18, the youngest member of the teenaged three-piece Horsegirl, who in the short span of three years have gone from jamming together in their parents’ basements to, this October, opening for the legendary alt-rock outfit Pavement on their much-touted reunion tour. “I don’t know how it usually happens for bands, but it was just this weird moment where suddenly we were on peoples’ radar. Eventually we recorded a bunch of demos, put them on Soundcloud, and sent them to all the labels who had become interested, and that’s how we were connected with Matador.”
It isn’t easy to make good songwriting sound effortless, but this power trio—and they are definitely that—is making it happen.
There’s more to the story, but for now here’s the nitty-gritty: Versions of Modern Performance, Horsegirl’s debut album, is 34 minutes of voluminous sonic joy, tracked in its entirety at Steve Albini’s stalwart Electrical Audio and produced by studio vet John Agnello, whose prestigious credits include work with Dinosaur Jr., Sonic Youth, the Dream Syndicate, and Kurt Vile, to name just a few. Lowenstein switches off on guitar, bass, and vocals with Nora Cheng. They met and cemented their friendship while taking part in the School of Rock program in their native Chicago. (Sidenote: They first played together in a cover band that featured, you guessed it, Sonic Youth songs on the setlist). Gigi Reece, Horsegirl’s drummer, joined in early 2019, bringing an instant powerhouse backbeat to the band’s sound, which surges with a psychedelic fervor that conjures tastes of the Velvet Underground and Nico, My Bloody Valentine, Stereolab, and Yo La Tengo—again, to name just a few.
Beautiful Song
“We were brought together by this shared love for the same kind of music,” says Cheng, describing how the resurgent Chicago scene, tough-to-crack but nurturing when it counted, eventually helped propel Horsegirl into the spotlight. They recorded their first single, the cavernous and hauntingly folk-tinged “Ballroom Dance Scene,” with their friends Jack Lickerman and Niko Kapetan (whose own band, Friko, has carved out a distinctive dream-pop niche). Eventually the Chicago Tribune came calling, running a high-profile feature on Horsegirl that sparked a critical buzz. “This was after more and more bands had started popping up that seemed to share similar influences with us, or the same ethos, I guess you could call it,” Cheng observes. “I don’t know exactly how it happened, but it all turned into a very supportive, young community.”
In a sense then, Versions of Modern Performance is as much a reflection of the scene that elevated Horsegirl as it is the band’s full-throated statement of purpose. From the sharp angles and resonant chords of the uptempo opener “Anti-glory” to the layers of sludge and whistling guitars in the mournful “Billy” (loosely inspired, with its E–B–E–B–E–B tuning, by the music of Nick Drake), the album conveys a warm, enveloping analog atmosphere where heavy-leaded psych rock, recombinant proto-punk, wistful indie-pop melodies, and volcanic blooms of guitar feedback all collide in a crucible of spontaneity. Infuse all that with a healthy dose of controlled chaos and the multi-colored picture of what Horsegirl is all about begins to take shape.
Nora Cheng’s Gear
Nora Cheng gets sonic with her Ibanez Roadstar II at the Sinclair in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on August 7, 2022.
Photo by Tim Bugbee/Tinnitus Photography
Guitars
• Ibanez Roadstar II
• Fender Jaguar
Amps
• Vox AC30
• Fender Twin Reverb
Effects
• Ibanez Tube Screamer
• Keeley Electronics Loomer Fuzz/Reverb
Strings and Picks
• Ernie Ball Regular Slinkys (.010–.046)
• Various picks
“We had a very clear idea of how we wanted this record to sound,” Cheng says, referring to the band’s initial sessions with Agnello. “The main thing was to stay away from being too polished. We wanted it to sound like our live set. It just goes with the idea of us being a trio, and wanting to capture that live sense on the record. And it was really helpful to have somebody working with us who understood that.”
“It was hard to keep up on an actual bass, but the Bass VI made it easy for my hands. It was also a huge turning point for us songwriting-wise, because as a guitarist I can only think of it in guitar terms.” —Penelope Lowenstein
Daunted only slightly at first by the magnitude of recording at Electrical Audio (“it was crazy to see Fugazi’s thank-you note taped to the fridge there!” recalls Cheng), the trio quickly took to their surroundings and established a free-flowing collaborative rapport with their producer. “I think John’s philosophy was very much like, ‘If we get a good live energy going between the three of you, then you don’t really have to add very much else,’” Lowenstein recalls. The band set about duplicating their live setup, with Cheng relying on her Ibanez Roadstar II (her dad’s college guitar) running through a Vox AC30 or a Fender Twin, while Lowenstein played her early ’90s Fender Strat Ultra (which once belonged to her dad), often through a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. Interestingly, both guitarists also use coiled guitar cables from axe to pedalboard—a bit of an old-school move that’s perceived by many players as a midrange tone thickener, due to the cable’s length and high capacitance.
Penelope Lowenstein’s Gear
Penelope Lowenstein plays the Squier Classic Vibe Bass VI that she shares with Cheng. The instrument’s guitar-like playability made it an inspiration for songwriting for the band’s debut album.
Photo by Tim Bugbee/Tinnitus Photography
Guitars
• Early ’90s Fender Stratocaster Ultra
• Fender Jazzmaster
• Squier Classic Vibe Bass VI (also used by Nora Cheng)
Amps
• Fender Hot Rod Deluxe
Effects
• EarthQuaker Westwood Translucent Drive Manipulator
• EarthQuaker Bellows Fuzz Driver
Strings and Picks
• Ernie Ball Regular Slinkys (.010–.046)
• Various picks
For the low end, they switch off on a Squier Classic Vibe Bass VI, which Lowenstein acquired from a friend. “I’m still trying to figure out what it needs amp-wise when we play live,” she admits, “but it was really a solution to being in a trio. It was hard to keep up on an actual bass, but the Bass VI made it easy for my hands. It was also a huge turning point for us songwriting-wise, because as a guitarist I can only think of it in guitar terms, but because it’s not a bass I feel like it lets me write whatever the song needs. Sometimes I’ll do low-end things, and sometimes I’ll almost take a guitar solo on it.”
Naturally, both players have embraced the expressive scope of effects pedals, and distortion in particular. Cheng prefers her Ibanez Tube Screamer for most songs, but on the ironically titled “The Fall of Horsegirl,” the violin bow comes out (shades of Jimmy Page!) and she leans into a Keeley Electronics Loomer fuzz/reverb box. “I got it when I was really big into My Bloody Valentine,” she reveals, “and it has some really cool—I think they’re reverse—reverb sounds. We just cranked a bunch of stuff on it like, ‘Okay, what sounds cool with the bow?’ And it turned into this very big, cathedral-like sound. It’s noisy, but it’s also a bit beautiful. That came from a lot of experimentation.”
“The idea behind interludes is not just to be there for no reason. They’re meant to break apart the album and let you settle after this one and prepare for this next one.” —Nora Cheng
Lowenstein comes back to “Billy,” the album’s closing track. “I’ve basically stolen my dad’s Jazzmaster to play just that one song on tour, because it’s ridiculous to retune like that,” she says. “But I have an EarthQuaker Westwood on it—that’s the sound of my main distortion. I also use a Bellows pedal with it near the end. Whenever we want a crazy Horsegirl ending, I just hit the Bellows and it does the rest.”
Horsegirl’s itch for sonic exploration gets scratched on the album’s three brief interludes: the the cavernous “Bog Bog 1,” the feedback-soaked “Electrolocation 2,”and “The Guitar Is Dead 3,” which features all three band members seated at one piano, plunking out a single mournful chord progression that gets processed through a building wave of echo and delay.
Horsegirl digs into a song from their new record onstage at the Sinclair in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Photo by Tim Bugbee/Tinnitus Photography
“I guess the idea behind interludes is not just to be there for no reason,” Cheng says. “They’re meant to break apart the album and let you settle after this one and prepare for this next one. And something interesting about that was we’d developed interludes just playing them live, so it was something that was maybe natural for us to do anyway.”
The band’s most compelling collective trait is their willingness to explore all these possibilities together, as a unit. “Dirtbag Transformation (Still Dirty),” their latest single, is a beautiful example: Over a Breeders-like groove, Cheng and Lowenstein lay into chords that bend and move between Reece’s loping rhythm with judicious use of the whammy bar. “I play my Strat on that one,” Lowenstein recalls. “That’s the only song we recorded with two guitar parts first, and then we added the bass part. We’ve rearranged it live so Nora plays bass and I play a hybrid of the two guitar parts.” The song also moves between minor- and major-sounding moods, and tails out on a sunny coda where both singers take up the underlying wordless melody in unison.
What makes Versions of Modern Performance such a solid and endlessly accessible debut is how the band managed to harness their freewheeling sense of abandon into the rigid structure that memorable songs demand.
Further on, “World of Pots and Pans,” played in open E, harnesses the band’s psychedelic-punk leanings, as does the epic “Homage to Birdnoculars.” The song is a roiling workout that feels seamlessly drawn, with its simple two-note anchoring guitar melody and the recurring lyric “fall into my wormhole,” sounding inspired by the modern Texas-psych blueprint perfected by bands like the Black Angels. But it would be a mistake to try to pigeonhole Horsegirl’s sound as the sum of any set of perceived influences. What makes Versions of Modern Performance such a solid and endlessly accessible debut is how the band managed to harness their freewheeling sense of abandon into the rigid structure that memorable songs demand. It isn’t easy to make good songwriting sound effortless, but this power trio—and they are definitely that—is making it happen. And together with Agnello at the mixing desk they’ve crafted an album that merits repeated Saturday night listens in—where else?—the nearest basement you can find that’s tricked out for sound and kicked-back listening.
Cheng describes “Beautiful Song,” the album’s oceanic second track, as a vivid snapshot of what the band sought to harness and then release. “That’s how we want people to listen to us,” she says. “We all really enjoy the process of listening to a record all the way through, so it was something that we were thinking about. A record was the goal, from even before we had enough songs to make one. And there’s the typical first song that’s strong and sets the tone for the album, but I think the second song is underrated. I tend to really like second songs, because to me, that’s when we’re in the album.”
Recording at Steve Albini’s famed Electrical Audio studio was initially intimidating, but the trio doubled-down to make a compelling, vibrant live-vibe album that recalls primal Sonic Youth.
“I think this is the hardest we’ve all worked in our lives,” Lowenstein asserts, citing the hurdles Horsegirl had to overcome as a band of teenagers seeking entry into an adult world.
Their journey from the hyper-competitive live venues of Chicago to the hallowed studio spaces of Electrical Audio has been a rollercoaster, but, through it all, friendship and an ever-nurturing sense of community have kept them grounded. “We wrote all these songs while we were living this experience. Throughout high school, we were a live band. It was just what we love to do. And where we are right now feels like a really important thing to share with everyone. It’s very special to us.”
Horsegirl - Full Performance (Live on KEXP)
The band runs through some of the meatier cuts from their new album (as well as the fan fave “Ballroom Dance Scene”). Nora Cheng opens with her Fender Jaguar, tuned to open E, and then switches to her reliable Ibanez Roadstar II, while Penelope Lowenstein holds down the harmonic interplay and lower frequencies on her Squier Bass VI.
Billy Corgan shining with his Reverend Z One.
When the Smashing Pumpkins formed in 1988, they were ripping in rock clubs with psychedelic-inspired sets that drew on ’60s-rock influences like Blue Cheer, Jimi Hendrix, and Led Zeppelin. But by 1992, after the breakout success of the previous year’s swirling alt-rock masterpiece, Gish, “Suddenly, we’re on a major label,” recalls Corgan. “Pearl Jam sold a gazillion records. Nirvana sold a gazillion records. Alice in Chains is selling a gazillion records. And somebody puts a finger up to my temple and says, ‘You better figure out how to write pop songs or you’re going to go back to working at a record store.’
“So, how do I translate this kind of hazy psychedelic vision into something that sounds like pop-rock radio? I’d better figure this out, and fast.” On 1993’s Siamese Dream, Corgan had obviously gone far beyond simply figuring out how to fit his vision into a radio-ready format; he’d pushed alternative rock to new heights, masterfully crafting hooks fit for the band’s unique, massive guitar-driven sound.
More than three decades later, Corgan hasn’t stopped evolving his artistry to fit the times. On the firm foundation of his extremely well-developed, instantly recognizable musical voice, he’s made his career one of the most interesting in rock music, branching out into unpredictable trajectories. In 2017, he launched a new career as a professional wrestling producer when he purchased the National Wrestling Alliance, the source of the limited TV series Billy Corgan’s Adventures in Carnyland.The Smashing Pumpkins - "Edin"
And he’s applied that knack for spectacle—a de facto pre-req for anyone in the pro wrestling biz—to the band’s social media presence. In January 2024, when guitarist Jeff Schroeder split with the Smashing Pumpkins, they turned to the internet for an open call. Not only did the band eventually find new-hire Kiki Wong, but they effectively got every guitarist on the internet dreaming about joining the Pumpkins.
Corgan has also found a creative outlet as a guitar conceptualist. His four signature Reverends—the Billy Corgan Signature, Terz, Z-One, and Drop Z—were created in collaboration with Joe Naylor, the company’s visionary builder. Taken together, these models go well beyond standard signature artist instruments protocols. Not content to just design his own dream guitar, Corgan is equally concerned with contributing to the guitar community. The Billy Corgan Signature and Z-One models are forward-thinking electric guitars well-outfitted with hip, futuristic aesthetics and custom pickups; the Terz and Drop Z break new ground in guitar design. The Terz is a 21 1/2"-scale model meant to be tuned one and a half steps up—G to G—and the Drop Z model, at 26 1/2" scale, is intended for D standard or lower tunings. In the case of these alt-tuned guitars, the instruments are specifically voiced for their tunings, with custom pickups.
“In that quiet solitude of just you and the guitar, this communication can happen that sort of expresses something about yourself that is surprising.”
With all this action—plus signature Yamaha acoustics and his Highland Park, Illinois, café, Madame Zuzu’s, which he owns with his wife, Chloé Mendel—Corgan must be dialing into a deep, super-focused state when working on music, because he’s been prolific. In 2023, the Pumpkins released the epic ATUM: A Rock Opera in Three Acts, the third part of the trilogy that began with the Pumpkins’ smash-hit Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadnessin 1995, followed by 2000’s Machina/The Machines of God. In 2024, the band released Aghori Mhori Mei. Pitched as a stripped-down guitar record, and exempt from the former’s grandiosity, the songs are often riff-centric guitar jams, full of dark, in-your-face tones. But that pitch might belie the album’s rich compositional complexity and intense emotional breadth. Corgan’s writing on Aghori exemplifies all the nuance and finesse of his broader work, as do the dynamic, thoughtful guitar arrangements and hard-hitting performances.
With so much going on, how does Corgan keep his artistic vision focused and in step with the times? How does he find time to tap into the creative essence that has made his music so special? What drives his process? The only way to find out is from Corgan himself.
The Smashing Pumpkins’ Aghori Mhori Mei was pitched as a more stripped-down guitar record, but don’t let that description, fitting as it may be in comparison with their recent work, belie its majesty.
The premise of Aghori was to be more of a stripped-down guitar record. How did you approach this album from a compositional perspective?
Corgan: The idea was to return to the early language of the band and see if it had a modern application. If you were making a movie, it would be akin to: We’re going to shoot this on VHS cameras and edit in an old analog bay and see if you can make something that a modern audience would actually enjoy and appreciate.
The way most rock records are made these days is “in the box,” which is Pro Tools or whatever people use. You can hear that the digital technology is very important to the way modern rock music, whether it’s metal or alternative, is made. It’s become the fifth band member—you know what I’m saying? They’re able to do things and effect changes and musically innovate in a way that you wouldn’t if you were just on a floor with the band playing in a circle, like we used to. So, for us, we could continue down this digital path, and I’m not that interested in gridding out my guitars.
When you go listen to a Pumpkins record, that’s live playing. That’s not all chopped up—99% of what you hear is literally from our hands and mouths—we’ll still fly in a chorus here and there. If you’re at a particular crossroads, do you continue to move forward and with technology as your ally? Or do you kind of go back and see if that old way still has something magical about it? That becomes the sort of the existential debate of the record, both internally and publicly, which is: Is there a there, there?
But to clarify, this isn’t an analog recording.
Corgan: We record to Pro Tools. It’s using the technology of Pro Tools to make your records that we don’t do. I’m not trying to make a point. I’m saying using the technologies that are present to write your music or using it to do things that you can’t humanly do—that we don’t do.
Listen to your standard metal record. Everything is gridded to fuck: All the amps are in the box, all the drums are in the box, there’s not a missed note, everything’s tuned to fuck. You know what I mean? That’s modern metal, and I like it. It’s not like I turn up my nose at the thing, but that’s a way of making music for many people in 2024. We decided to try and go back and make a record the old-fashioned way, not to make some sort of analog point.
“There’s a certain loneliness in the way I play because I didn’t have anybody else to play guitar with.”
You write mostly on acoustic and piano. Where do the guitar arrangements come in?
Corgan: The fundamental process, going back to the beginning, is to create the basic track; the vocal then becomes the next most important thing, and then the icing on the cake is the guitar work over the top of that, basically to support and supplement the vocal and create more melodic interaction.
I got a lot of that from Queen and Boston and some Beatles—the idea that the guitar takes on a lead voice of its own that’s distinctive and almost becomes another lead singer in the band.
That stuff doesn’t show up literally until the last day working on the song. It’ll come off wrong, but we don’t spend a ton of time on it. And I don’t know what that means other than it seems to be like everything is done, and then you go, “Okay, time for the guitar work.” You’ll spend three hours, six hours just going through and trying stuff. Then it sort of just appears, and you go, “Oh, that sounds cool,” and you move on. It benefits from being fresh or feeling kind of like an emotional reaction.
I remember being in a car circa 1975 or ’76 and “Killer Queen” by Queen was on the radio. You’re listening to a song, the song sounds cool, and there’s flange vocals, and I’m 10 years old, in the backseat. All of a sudden, that lead break comes in; it’s just fucking loud. It has that feeling of somebody stepping forward into a spotlight. It’s not a show-off thing. It’s the way it makes you feel. It’s like a lighter type of moment. We’ve always chased that feeling.
Billy Corgan's Gear
Corgan with his signature Yamaha LJ16BC in 2022.
Photo by Mike White
Guitars
- E standard: Billy Corgan Signature Reverend Z-One Black
- E backup: Billy Corgan Signature Reverend - Satin Purple Burst
- Eb standard: Billy Corgan Signature Reverend Z-One - Silver Freeze
- Eb backup: Billy Corgan Signature Reverend Z-One - Orchard Pink
- Eb standard: ’70s Gibson ES-335 walnut
- C# standard: Billy Corgan Signature Reverend Drop Z - Pearl White
- Prototype Gibson Firebird
- Billy Corgan Custom Signature Yamaha LJ16BC Black with Silver Star
- Billy Corgan Custom Signature Yamaha White with Black Star
Amps
- Ampete 444 Amplifier & Cabinet Switching System
- Korg DT-1 Rack Tuner
- Carstens Cathedral
- Orange Rockerverb MkIII
- Carstens Grace Billy Corgan Signature Head
- Laney Supergroup LA100SM
- Laney LA412 4x12 Black Country Custom
Pedals
- RJM Mastermind GT/22 MIDI Controller
- Lehle D.Loop
- Warm Audio Warmdrive
- MXR Phase 90
- Catalinbread Zero Point Tape Flanger
- Behringer Octave Divider
- Strymon Brigadier dBucket Delay
- EarthQuaker Devices Time Shadows II
- Custom Audio Electronics MC-403 power supply
Strings
- Ernie Ball Regular Slinky (.010–.046)
- Ernie Ball Power Slinky (.011–.048)
- Ernie Ball Not Even Slinky (.012–.052)
- Ernie Ball Earthwood Medium Light (.012–.054)
Guitar starts out for so many of us as this really personal thing that we spend all our time doing, and then as life gets more complicated, you just have less time. What is your relationship with the guitar like in 2024? Do you have a day-to-day relationship with guitar playing?
Corgan: I do not. I don’t really pick up the guitar much unless I’m working.
When you do pick up the guitar, is it with intent? Do the ideas come inspired by the guitar, inspired by something you play? Or are they up in your head, and then you’re grabbing a guitar to realize it?
Corgan: If I pick up a guitar, I’m looking to play something that surprises me. It’s whatever comes out. And sometimes you hit the wrong chord and go, “Oh, that’s interesting.” Or you find a new inversion or something that you never thought of before. You try to play a different scale run than you’ve played 10,000 times, always landing on the same note. It’s just looking for something just a little bit new. I find oftentimes, in that quiet solitude of just you and the guitar, this communication can happen that sort of expresses something about yourself that is surprising—an emotional feeling or a way of approach.
“You could say to me, ‘Hey, play me some Siamese-type thing that you would’ve done in ’92,’ and in five minutes, I could write you something that would sound like a song that would’ve been a Siamese song in ’92.”
The style of my guitar playing came out of taking care of my disabled brother when I was a teenager, so I was stuck inside a lot. To paint a simple visual, imagine being stuck inside on a summer’s day and watching people play outside through the window as you’re playing the guitar. That was my life for much of my teenage years, because I was in this position where I had to look after somebody who was not so much homebound, but it wasn’t like the type of child at his stage of development that you could take him in the backyard and let him run around. You kind of had to look after him. It often became easier to stick him in front of a television or let him take a nap while you’re practicing.
There’s a certain loneliness in the way I play because I didn’t have anybody else to play guitar with. I developed a style that had a kind of call-and-response aspect to it in the open strings and the drone playing, because it was a way to effect a larger conversation without somebody else in the room.
Then, when it was James [Iha] and I in the early days of the band, James would basically do different versions of what I was playing. That created an even bigger conversation that seemed to create almost like a third guitarist. You can hear that in the whistling harmonics in the background. That’s just two guitars playing, but you create a ghost effect. I’ve done a lot of guitar work in the studio where people would be visiting me, and they look at the speakers, “What’s that sound?” And I’m like, “That’s just two guitars.” They don’t believe me. I literally have to solo the two guitars and just show them. That’s the harmonic effect.
I still have that inner relationship with my playing, where I could just sit down and play and find something that sounds like a bit of a conversation.
The Reverend Billy Corgan Signature in the hands of the man himself alongside drummer Jimmy Chamberlin and guitarist James Iha.
Photo by Ken Settle
When you’re writing, picking up a guitar, looking for those things, like you said, are you still after the same feeling you had initially or has the feeling changed?
Corgan: I think it’s more trying to find something that seems to signify whatever’s happening at the moment. It’s a truthfulness. You could say to me, “Hey, play me some Siamese-type thing that you would’ve done in ’92,” and in five minutes, I could write you something that would sound like a song that would’ve been a Siamese song in ’92. I can dial in any era of the band or my writing at will, because they’re all based on methodologies and certain emotional templates. So, I’m trying to do that for today. What is the 2024 version of that that makes me feel something—anything at all?
There’s this other creative side to your work, which is your signature gear. You have four Reverend guitars, and they’re all very different from each other. You’ve created them with Joe Naylor. Can you tell me about that collaboration?
Corgan: Somehow, Joe is able to go back and listen to what I’m referencing, and then translate that into something that’s physically tangible and consistent.
I don’t think a gimmicky guitar serves anybody. My signature guitars need to be useful to anybody else doing their music, not just my kind of music. And I’m very proud of that. I think that’s what makes a great guitar—it has application to whoever picks it up. And a lot of credit to Reverend to be willing to take these chances that I’ve sort of set them off chasing.
The Reverend Billy Corgan Drop Z is specially voiced in feel and sound for D standard and lower tunings.
They’re all bold guitars, but especially the Terz and the Drop Z, which are built specifically for alternate tunings. What were you looking for when you came up with the idea of those instruments?
Corgan: The thing with the Terz, which is G to G as opposed to E to E—a step and a half higher—was in listening to guitarists like Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead and other guitar players of that generation, I noticed that the function of the guitar for many alternative guitar players was becoming more atmospheric and less elemental. I thought maybe they would like to have a higher tonal range to work in. Because, ultimately, in 2024 logic, you want to get the guitar away from the vocal. If you think of the classic Telecaster sound, well, if you’re playing in the key of G on a Telecaster, that sits exactly where the vocal is. It’s like the worst possible place for a guitar in the 21st century. But if you can increase the harmonic range of the guitar, it does sort of sit, elementally, a little higher.
I don’t think people have figured that out yet about that guitar. But I have a funny feeling that at some point somebody will, much like when Korn took the Steve Vai guitar and took it in a completely different direction and made a whole new genre of music with it. I think the Terz opens a player up to a different tonal range.
“I don’t think a gimmicky guitar serves anybody. My signature guitars need to be useful to anybody else doing their music, not just my kind of music.”
A lot of these modern alternative guitar players, they don’t play super complicated stuff. Whether they were inspired by Jonny from Radiohead or the guy from Coldplay, it’s more like a tweedle-y guitar, like twilight, vibey.... You look at their pedalboards; it’s a lot of reverbs and bucket delays and stuff like that. I get it.
On the Drop—on making Aghori, I found myself thinking a lot about Mick Mars’s guitar sound and where Mick’s guitar sat in Mötley Crüe. Early Mötley Crüe was basically a guitar tuned down a step. Something about the D range—you could do it on a normal guitar, but it gets a little sloppy with the tuning and certainly the intonation. So, I talked to Reverend about making a D-to-D guitar that doesn’t feel like a baritone guitar, that plays and feels very much like an E-to-E guitar, but gives you range. For a modern guitar player who wants to make music that ends up on the radio, the specificities of where that guitar needs to sit tonally and how it would be mixed is what I was thinking of.
So, these are instruments for the modern player who wants to make music that can reach people vis-à-vis what is the media these days—streaming or whatever. If you want to take an old guitar and tune it down to F and all that … I did all that crazy stuff, too. I wouldn’t discourage anybody from doing it. But these are specific instruments with a very specific purpose, primarily for recording.
On “Edin” [from Aghori Mhori Mei], well, that’s that guitar. I think in that song, it’s dropped, so the low string is a C. But you can hear how that guitar sits so forward in the track. That’s a credit to Joe making that guitar exactly what I wanted, and the pickups really doing their job with how it sits in the track.
Corgan has an early memory of hearing Brian May’s lead break on “Killer Queen”: “It has that feeling of somebody stepping forward into a spotlight. It’s not a show-off thing. It’s the way it makes you feel. It’s like a lighter type of moment. We’ve always chased that feeling.”
I want to come back to how that affects your playing. You have these instruments that are now specifically voiced to your vision. When they get in your hands and you’re working on something, how do you exploit the sonics of those guitars? Maybe you wrote a song on acoustic, but now you have this instrument that you’ve helped ideate, and you can do stuff that your other guitars can’t. Where does that come in the creative process?
Corgan: I don’t think I have a romantic answer. For me, it’s more about recording accuracy or clarity. If you compare, let’s call it the “Mellon Collie ’95” guitar sound, where we were mostly a half-step down; it’s clear, but it’s very sludgy—a lot of midrange and not a lot of stuff above, say, 17k, because I was using those Lace Sensor pickups. Modern recording; everybody wants the guitar as far forward as you can get it.
These days, I’m mostly using these Carstens amps, which is a Chicago amp-maker, Brian Carstens. I used one amp that he made for me, the Grace, which he does sell, which is kind of a modern take on the Eddie Van Halen brown sound—a ton of gain, but clear. And then he has another amp called Empire, which is more for a metal player. I use that as well. And in some cases, I stack both amps on top of each other by reamping. He has another amp, called Cathedral, which is like a cross between a Fender Twin and a Hiwatt. Again, very clear.
“Modern recording; everybody wants the guitar as far forward as you can get it.”
The best way I can explain it, and this is my poor language-ing, but if I was to take a vintage Marshall plexi and a Les Paul, like a classic amazing guitar sound, and record the riff for “Edin,” and then I was to take my Reverend Drop Z run through a Carstens amp, and you listen to the two tracks, the modern stuff I’m using, the guitar is like six more feet forward in the track; the vintage stuff sounds kind of back there. You can hear it—a little gauzy, a little dark, and the modern stuff is right in your grill. It’s not harsh; it’s not overly midrange-y. It just sounds really good and present.
So that’s the key. Because I play so distinctively that I kind of sound like me whatever you put me through, my focus is more tonal and how it sits in the stereo field.
Are pedals just pragmatic means to achieve a tone? Or is there exploration involved there?
Corgan: Since Siamese Dream, where we famously used the op-amp Big Muff and EHX Micro Synth, and some MXR stuff, the main sound of the band is just crank through something. Going back to something my father told me many, many moons ago: guitar, chord, amp is the key. I worked in the studio with Tony Iommi. Those hands, a chord, an amp—and when he plays, God’s moving mountains. We get super granular when I’m in the studio; I might play a chord that’s no more than seven-feet long, anything so I can be as close to the amp as possible, so there’s the least amount of chord from the guitar to the amp.
It’s all about driving the amp and moving that air and moving those electrons in the tubes. That’s just the key for me. If there’s pedal work on any Pumpkins albums in the last 25 years, it’s for solos and little dinky things on the top. The main guitar sound is always pure power. We want as much pure power as possible.
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The Smashing Pumpkins kick out “Sighommi” from Aghori Mhori Meilive on Kimmel with new-hire Kiki Wong joining Corgan and James Iha in the guitar section.
