Living on an isolated group of islands at the edge of the Pacific Ocean, means it takes a lot of time and money to travel anywhere else in the world. It also means that a lot of overseas musicians have further to travel to these shores when they embark on their world tours. However, some do make that extra effort to perform live for their fans in far-flung countries, and Smashing Pumpkins are definitely one of those bands.
The first time the Pumpkins traveled to New Zealand was in 1994, to play at the first ever Big Day Out festival, held in Auckland. Other artists performing at the country's largest music festival were Bjork, Soundgarden and The Breeders. This would also be the first and only time Smashing Pumpkins played at this festival. On this trip they also played a show in Wellington, on 4th February 1994. These shows were played after the release of Siamese Dream, which had gone to number three on the NZ album charts, with Canada being the only other country where it had reached this high.
After the success of Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, the Pumpkins toured extensively around the world and returned to play shows in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. These shows were sell-outs. This was before the era of cellphone and digital cameras, and camera and audio recorders were strictly prohibited, so the audio recordings of these shows are limited - one audio recording from the Christchurch show exists and can be found on archive.org. At the Wellington show, the Pumpkins were supported by a local band called Breathe. A review of this 24th May 1996 show is here.
In 2005, 5 years after the band's break-up, Billy Corgan returned and played a solo show at Auckland's St James' Theatre.
It was a full 12 years after the 1996 Mellon Collie tour, that the Pumpkins would return to New Zealand, this time for the Zeitgeist tour, with Jimmy Chamberlin still on drums, new guitarist Jeff Schroeder, and bass player Ginger Reyes. This line-up played three shows in March 2008, in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. These shows proved hugely popular, not only because Zeitgeist had gone to number one on the album charts, but they were also supported by Queens of the Stone Age, a popular band in their own right. With the Wellington show happening just three days after Billy's birthday, he asked the crowd if they would sing Happy Birthday to him, and they did, twice!
After such a long time since the previous Pumpkins show in New Zealand, Billy promised to the crowd that they wouldn't leave it quite that long before they would return again.
And he kept his promise, as only two years later, on 19th October 2010, they returned to play one show in Auckland on the Teargarden by Kaleidyscope tour. This time Jimmy had been replaced by Mike Byrne, and Ginger Reyes was replaced by Nicole Fiorentino. At this show, they introduced a song which they had recorded in studio, Lonely is the Name, which has not yet been released.
And it was just another two years before they returned again, on the 2012 Oceania tour, playing one show in Auckland again (audio here). The new album Oceania was played in full, then a cover of David Bowie's Space Oddity, with the rest of the show being classic songs such as Bullet with Butterfly Wings, X.Y.U, and also Luna, which they had played only four times on their 2012 tour.
With a show every two years in the last five years, does this mean that the Pumpkins will return once again in 2014? Perhaps, with the new album they plan to release next year, a tour to these distant shores will follow.
Sources: spfc.org, wikipedia.org.
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