Exploring Childhood Pain and Public Perception | 3min snip from Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

Speaker 2
your early childhood, when did that come into your story? When did you start making that public? Because that does sort of change the way that maybe people perceive you.
Speaker 1
Well, 93, when the Siamese Dream album came out, because people wanted to understand the subtextual language, and then there was this kind of rise of Latsky kids who suddenly were interested in what I was saying. And part of that lyrical change had a lot to do with Courtney because Courtney chided me for my hippie LSD inspired lyrics on our first album. And she said something and I'm paraphrasing, which went like, why can't the person I talked to on the phone write the lyrics for the next record or something?
Speaker 2
So
Speaker 1
I was like, OK, I'll take that on as a challenge. But when I opened the door, I found a lot of pain and a lot of denial and a lot of a lot of a lot of stuff in there. And the book The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron really helped me to claim this this voice in there that was sort of screaming to get out. But I was terrified because I knew I would be attacked. And dot, dot, dot, I was, including people accusing me of making up my childhood. I would routinely be asked in interviews to qualify my abuse, which is insane. Like on a scale of one 10, how much were you beaten? You know, it's like, what is it? Yeah. Oh, no, I not i'm not even making i'm not even close to dramatizing them i was asked at least 40 or 50 times in the 90s to qualify my abuse wow and i i i found a line eventually which kind of worked which was like am i in the abuse olympics like do i have to like qualify to have agency to talk about being abused? Meanwhile, behind the scenes, I was being poked on by my family for talking about the family secrets. Oh,
Speaker 2
yeah. So
Speaker 1
I was getting it from both ways. On one hand, I wasn't authentic enough. And the other side, the family side, they were mad for me talking about what had happened because you don't talk about that stuff in public. Yeah. We'll
Speaker 4
be back with more from Billy Corgan after the break. The
Speaker 3
Unshakables podcast is back for season two, and it's kicking off with an episode you absolutely won't want to miss. Host of the show and CEO of Chase for Business, Ben Walter, welcomes a very special guest, chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon. One of the world's most respected financial thought leaders, Jamie will connect the dots between the current challenges and opportunities facing small business owners and the broader financial landscape. And of course, it wouldn't be an episode of The Unshakeables if Jamie didn't share some of the uh-oh moments that he overcame to forge ahead in his own career. You can find this must-hear episode and the rest of the upcoming season of The Unshakeables wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more at chase.com/podcast. Chase mobile app is available for select mobile devices. MessagePMorgan Chase& Company.

Billy Corgan

Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

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