Billy Corgan Selling Off More Than 150 Pieces of Smashing Pumpkins Music Equipment

Billy Corgan is selling off more than 150 pieces of musical equipment he’s used over the years with Smashing Pumpkins via Reverb, the online music gear marketplace.

“Of all the artist-owned gear we’ve been fortunate to sell on Reverb, this collection of gear from Billy Corgan has arguably the most historic prominence,” Reverb’s Jim Tuerk says in a statement. “You can feel it when you pick up any one piece. These are the tools that not only defined one of the all-time greats, but an entire generation of music.”

Corgan is selling amps, heads, combos, guitars, basses, and more for sale. Most of the sounds heard on albums spanning from the Smashing Pumpkin’s 1991 debut, Gish through 2014’s Monuments to an Elegy, are represented in some form.

In a statement, Corgan told the stories behind some of the equipment he will be selling in the Official Billy Corgan Reverb Shop which opens Wednesday, Aug. 16.

“I used this on everything from Mellon Collie to Machina,” he says of a 1969 Gibson EB-3 Bass. “It’s one of those secret-weapon recording basses.”

“The band laughed at me when I bought [a 1950s accordion and autoharp], so they challenged me to write a song,” Corgan says of the instruments he used on Mellon Collie’s “We Only Come Out at Night.”
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Here are just a few of the items up which will be up for sale in Corgan’s store:

• Corgan’s #2 Stratocaster. A modified, star–covered 1988 Fender AVRI Strat that recorded most of Siamese Dream and Mellon Collie, including “Today,” the solo of “Cherub Rock,” and many more.
• A pair of Marshall JMP-1s that were the main preamps for Mellon Collie album and the tour.
• Two Alesis drum machines, one used for the loops on “1979” and another that was used to record many early Pumpkins’ demos before Jimmy Chamberlin joined the band.
• The modified 1990s Les Paul Special used to record much of the Machina album and played regularly on that tour, and the two backup LP Specials from the tours.
• The rackmount ADA MP-1 preamps used to record Gish.
• A Fender Subsonic Stratocaster in Sonic Blue from the Zeitgeist era signed “This is what true freedom looks like. Billy Corgan.” One of the few items in the shop signed by the guitarist, it was originally set to go to auction in 2008 before Corgan decided against it.
• The Fernandes sustainer guitar used in the studio and on tour for most of Adore.
  A 1969 Gibson EB–3 Bass in Walnut dubbed the Mountain Bass used as a “secret weapon” on everything from Mellon Collie to Machina.
• The small Crate combo amps used to get the distortion sounds on Machina.
• The arsenal of Diezel and Bogner amps used to record and tour for Zeitgeist.
• Dozens of collector–grade vintage guitars, including two ’58 Strats, a ’63 Candy Apple Red Strat, a 1953 Gibson Super 400, and a ’66 Rickenbacker 360.
• A vintage 1950s accordion and an autoharp used on the Mellon Collie tune “We Only Come Out at Night.”