In a recent chat with NME, Moby revealed how he once made Billy Corgan angry with his joke.
When the interviewer asked if he discussed working together with Corgan after jokingly calling him a ‘deadbeat’ in a 1997 MTV chat about owing him a remix, the singer replied:
“That was one of the many times I thought I was being funny – which speaks to a massive shortcoming in my comedy! Clearly that happened with Eminem as well [thinking] ‘I’m being funny!’ and then he hated me. With Billy, we were supposed to trade remixes and I jokingly called him a deadbeat because he never did a remix for me and he got mad. But later, I went on tour with New Order in 2000 and he was their guitar player, so we became friends.”
Moby feels a connection with Billy as he added:
“There are many individual music nerds that go on to have success that they never expected, and I feel a kinship with all of them. Whether it’s Billy or Beck, none of us expected this. We felt we were going to be nerds listening to records in our bedroom and then suddenly you’re on the cover of Rolling Stone, thinking: ‘OK, what do I do now?’”
The Rocker’s Earlier Words On The Incident With Corgan
In 1997, Moby called Corgan a ‘deadbeat’ on MTV, saying Corgan owed him a remix while at the Q101 Jamboree near Chicago, Corgan’s hometown. The musician later apologized. In another interview, he said:
“A lot of times when I do remixes, rather than get the artist to pay me, I work on a barter system. Right now my debtors, people who owe me, are Soundgarden and the Smashing Pumpkins, I did remixes for them and they didn’t pay me anything for them.”
He continued:
“We did it with the understanding that they were supposed to do a remix for me, but unfortunately…with the Smashing Pumpkins I did a year and a half ago, and every time I see Billy I ask him where my remix is, but I can understand he’s kind of busy.”
Moby’s latest album, ‘Always Centered at Night,’ arrived last month on June 14. The singer is also back on tour to play his album ‘Play’ across Europe. It will be Moby’s first European tour in over a decade, starting on September 19 in London at The O2 and concluding on September 24 in Paris at Le Zenith.