There’s a scene in “The Simpsons” in which a group of children is brought in to serve as a focus group to give their opinions on the long-running cartoon “Itchy and Scratchy.” Naturally, the kids want the show to remain true to its origins, but they also want the…

Cherie Currie, Courtesy: Robert Sebree. Cherie Currie is a badass. The former frontwoman for The Runaways burst onto the scene in the mid-1970s with an outsized attitude, an undersized corset, hellbent on injecting some estrogen into the rock and roll patriarchy. Even over the phone from her house in…

“I’ll bet Billy Corgan would sound great singing bluegrass tunes!” Cotillions William Patrick Corgan Martha’s Music, Nov. 22 That’s not a sentence that has been uttered out loud by many—even diehard fans of the Smashing Pumpkins. And yet, here we are. Cotillions is the second solo album released under Corgan’s…

Twenty-two years ago, in the legendary “Homerpalooza” episode of The Simpsons, Bart, listening to The Smashing Pumpkins, remarks, “Making teenagers depressed is like shooting fish in a barrel.” The question before Billy Corgan and three-quarters of the original Pumpkins is whether Shiny and Oh So Bright, Vol. 1 / LP:…

Photos: Alessio Neri OAKLAND — Nineties alt-rock superstars Smashing Pumpkins brought their Shiny Oh So Bright quasi-reunion tour to the Oracle Arena on Monday, with a marathon three-hour setlist that mined the band’s hits, deeps cuts and frontman Billy Corgan’s often idiosyncratic cover song selections. The Pumpkins’ set began with…