“We went up to the lady employee with my mother and my $25 cash ready to buy my first Smashing Pumpkins concert ticket. It was that day that I first learned of what I later referred to as the evil surcharge..”
“I found out that a touring keyboardist, whom I had never heard of, had died of a drug overdose. My parents started to question whether I should ever see such a band. It wasn’t until a few days later that I learned about the firing of Jimmy Chamberlin and this put my parents at ease.”
“Also the singer was hecka fine. She was wearing a 2 piece dress and had short red hair.”
“It was 1997 and I was choosing my AOL ‘screen name’ It was between MonteLDS or MonteSP at the time. I had thought to myself, well I might not always be a Smashing Pumpkin fan but I will always be LDS. Little did I know that I would also always be a Smashing Pumpkin fan.”
“‘alt.music.smash-pumpkins’ It was full of fans who were talking about the band and giving away copies of bootlegs on tapes. I found a lot of interesting topics and I learned just how rude online Smashing Pumpkins fans were.”
“I never had heard songs played live by the band before a studio release, so I was unable to process the songs.”
“I however had grown such love for being in line from the week before I chose to stay in line.”
“These good people who I met in line were so kind that they did something really touching. Even as I type this it chocks me up a bit. The fans who went had gotten back in line a 2nd time for my behalf to get the band to sign a poster for me. They told Billy how I was such a big fan that I wouldn’t even leave the line. *There kindness and care will always remain with me.”
“and then we heard for the first time, the song Waiting. We were all stun by its beauty. For myself I was in gulfed by the song.”
“The Smashing Pumpkins would later return to Berkley on May 24th the day after the Billy announced on KROQ that the band was calling it quit. *I started to feel lost and the Machina mystery wasn’t helping as it was hard to understand at the time.”
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