gish tour diary

[bullettwoutbutterflywings]

hi, i was looking at the user news on sp.com, bored again and found this peice of info, and looked on rspaa and found it, so i thought i would post it.

here is the link http://www.rspaa.org/rspaa/Interviews/p … 0diary.txt

here is the whole post from rspaa

Subject: *The Pre-Gish Pumpkin Tour Diary*
From: eyeadorebc@aol.com (EyeAdoreBC)
Date: 22 Apr 1999 18:04:33 GMT
Newsgroups: alt.music.smash-pumpkins

Hey all,
Here it is, typed up and ready for you all to enjoy.. I had a fun time reading
it, I do every time. Billy gave very good insights on what it was like back
before Gish, life on the road.. ect. It’s kind of long, it took me like almost
two hours to type.. the T.V. kept distracting me. Anyways.. here y’are.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Taken from Smashing News – December 1997

*The Pre-Gish Pumpkin Tour Diary*
As written by: Billy Corgan – November 1990

Hello and howdy from the dark cave we live in. We’ve been laying pretty low
from club dates, but we are gleeful to announce our next show at Cabaret Metro
w/ My Life with The Thrill Kill Kult headlining on New Year’s Eve. Our Sub-Pop
label single (\"Tristessa\" w/b \"La Dolly Vita\") is due out in late December or
in early January. So look for it at Reckless Records and at Wax Trax.
Contrary to popular belief, we haven’t signed a record deal yet. We’re
negotiating and still talking, but nothing’s been signed. We hope to have the
now mythic \"Gish\" album one day. Also, look for Star Children dates coming
your way. Being the amorphous leach that it is, beware of shows featuring pure
noise, Jimi Hendrix tributes, Black Sabbath tributes w/ the one and only Nick
Galiga on vocals, and more Pumpkins outcasts. There might even be a 4-song
Star Children demo for sale- possibly. The Pumpkins just finished 3 dates w/
the Lemonheads in various out of town locales- and we managed to portray all
three demons- the good, the bad, and the ugly. In honor of our Seattle trip
diary- here’s some mumbling about past shows..

SEPTEMBER- Kalamazoo, Mich. Since D’Arcy is from this neck of the woods, we
stayed with her father in D’Arcy’s childhood home. Walking distance from Lake
Michigan. We ingested some chemicals and went and sat out on the beach all
night- watching the stars. Everyone got sick except your humble writer- and we
watched a storm come over Lake Michigan. Guilty fun was had by all. The next
day, D’Arcy’s father kicked me and Jimmy off the tennis court for playing
baseball with a tennis racket. D’Arcy’s father also sang THE MAN WHO SHOT
LIBERTY VALENCE while cooking hamburgers. And D’Arcy talked him out of coming
to see us play. The show- at a club called Club Soda- was packed, and we
played a really good show. Many rock hands were seen flying in the air- and I
gave the sign of the cross to the big pictures of Gary Richrath and Duke
Tomatoe on the wall. I also spit on the Rick Derringer picture.

CINCINNATI- Home of the world champion Reds- we entered the underground which
was much akin to a bat cave. One of the shows where our music goes over
peoples heads and hits the back wall with a dull thud. Some bad girl band
opened up, pinball became a necessary option. We stayed in a hotel room where
there was some type of ongoing collage party- and we passed on their invitation
to \"party\" with them.

INDIANAPOLIS- Oh barren wasteland, Indianapolis left me with the same feeling
that you get after you vomit. The people who were at this show- (limited
edition- because there were so few) were very, very nice, but I wonder what
they did in a past life to get them stuck in Indianapolis.

MADISON- A total freak out- shoes and bodies were being hurtled onto stage at
an alarming rate. The energy was fever picthed throughout the show. I wish
they were all like this. Afterwards, we went to a party in someone’s basement
and Jimmy and I jammed with some dudes. I made a ton of noise and tried not to
hit my head on a pipe. Madison is very hippie, so our vibe was not mellow
enough for this scene. Some guy started yelling at us to get off the street-
that we didn’t understand things like they did in the sixties. This guy was
wearing a security gaurd uniform. Need I say more?

MILWAUKEE- The complete freak out to end all freak outs. Three people were up
on stage with us to prevent the other 150 from getting up onstage. I think we
played 4 encores. We played songs we didn’t even know- and Bob English joined
us onstage in his Japanese interpretation of \"Godzilla.\" A great, great show
and f*cking righteaously loud. I think we play better when we eat mexican.

MINNEAPOLIS- THREE HYPNOTICS last show before their car crash. We saw them
moments before this near fatal wreck- very spooky. We sucked, but let me tell
you about their set. At the end of their first set, they went offstage and got
very little encore-type applause. The house lights came up and the band came
back onstage with very little applause. (Uses my best english accent) \"TURN
OUT THE F*CKING LIGHTS!\" This went on for a while and the band got frustrated
and walked off. Two minutes later they returned, again with little fanfare.
Bars close at 1 AM in Minn.- and it was now five minutes to one. Forgetting
about the lights being on, the band launched into their encore. It lasted
nearly 30 minutes (one song) and was one of the most incredible things I had
ever seen. Fifteen minutes afterafter close, the management began to freak
out, and they threatened to shut off the power. The manager signaled they they
would be ending soon- and when they didn’t end after three warnings, they shut
off the P.A. power, but the band kept playing. The song ended up with the
guitar player up against his amp, feeding back, while a member of the audience
climbed onstage and worked his wah-wah pedal. Very Spinal Tap-pish, very
awesome.

NOV. 9, 10, 11- MILWAUKEE, GREENELL (IOWA), MINN- Our three day jaunt with the
Lemonheads. The first show was in the cafeteria of Marquette Universirty.
Sitting there watching collage students eat their veggies and the rock n’ roll
element didn’t seem to mix. The show started at roughly 5 o’clock- so you can
imagine that no one was really in the rock n’ roll concert mood. Needless to
say, the band was stiff and rusty and all those often horrible things when you
don’t play out for six weeks showed. The show was followed by a lot of
arguing, not a very good start to our little journey. Day 2 we were off to
Grenell (grim hell). A seven hour ride across rotting cornfields. We arrived
there to find we were playing in a basement conveniently disguised as a place
to play. We were led into a building, taken to a room, and given lasanga to
eat. The lasanga featured some type of meat featured in many dog food
commercials. Anyway, the show went great, seeing as these lowans don’t get
much excitement. Things definatly improved. The show ended with me being run
into by a flying (and I do mean flying) audience member who simultaneously
knocked the mike into my face, cut my hand, and broke a guitar string, all in
time to the music and the end of the set. After the show- some guy we’ll call
Charlie, who couldn’t even put a sentence together, offered us secret potions.
Being cautious people, we let three of the four in our party test this XXX
potion to test it’s level of toxicity. To make a long night short, our motel
room became a mecca of perpetual insanity (until we left for Minneapolis at 10
the next morning) with our hotel guestsbeating at us through the wall and
satanic life messages on T.V. Seeing as no one got any sleep, getting to
Minneapolis became one of lifes greatest chores. Never has the road seemed so
cold, barren, long, or moved of it’s own volition so much. Nevertheless, we
did reach the 7th street entry- site of the Three Hypnotics accident- and for
some mysterious reason, played a really great show, probably one of the best
we’ve ever played. I only wish you all could have been there to appreciate
it.. I only wish anyone could have been there to appreciate it, cause
Minneapolitans don’t seem to completely get the Pumpkins. Maybe it’s the
thinner air (but someone once told me of Minneapolitans holding a prejudice
against people who bathe too much, and I also seem to recall a similar remark
in a local fanzine of theirs called \"Cake.\" And yet I feel that shouldn’t have
been a problem with us on that particular day.) Who knows?

I hope you enjoyed these experiences as much as we didn’t. God bless the tired
and the weary- and watch for our show on New Year’s Eve, we think it will come
together- dig?!

xxxx&$$$$
Billy Pumpkin
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, there it is. Certainly a Billy work. Hope you all had fun reading.
Ciao.

~*BeKKa*~

[Anonymous]

I think Billy should do an August tours diary

[bullettwoutbutterflywings]

that would be awesome. he should, but he is probably to busy with other stuffs.

[Author]

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