What's the story behind the name "Smashing Pumpkins"?

Question

Haven't been able to find anything about the source of the band's name except for that fictional MTV commercial depicting a young Billy Corgan getting tripped in class on show-and-tell day (thus dropping and smashing his prize pumpkin).

Answer 1

On a KROQ Radio Interview:

Caller: "Ok, my name is Tyla. Hi BIlly, I'm a really big fan. Ok, my friend told me that she heard the Smashing Pumpkins, the name of your band was based on a joke."

Billy: "Um."

Caller: "I want to know... what is the joke?"

*a few people laugh*

Billy: "Well, I mean thats a slight misrepresentation. The joke was like...I came up with the name, kind of like a... telling some jokes with some friends & I thought oh that would be a stupid band name to have. There was no band, I hadn't even met anybody in the band and people would say, I would say, 'Oh I'm going to start a band.' And they would say, 'Oh what's the name oh it?' I'd say, 'Oh, The Smashing Pumpkins, ha ha.' There was no band. Then when I met the band, they were like, 'What are we going to call it, I was like, 'Why don't we just call it this funny name for a while and we'll just figure out a real name eventually.' Then people would come up, 6 months later. 'Hey how is your band, The Smashing Pumpkins?' It just... people wouldn't forget it. So that was the #1 thing to happen, which is recognition."

KROQ: "Do you plan on changing it to a real one? Or does it suit you just find."

Billy: "On a interesting side note, there was a women in Chicago who used to be like a booker, and she used to book some of our very first shows, and she pulled me to the side and said, 'You know I really like you guys, I think you really need to change the name, because your never going to get anywhere with it.' " [???]

Answer 2

It is definitely NOT a metaphor for sex. Remember, God had told Adam and Eve to "multiply" and to "fill the earth," a task that would be quite difficult if they could not have sex. I would also point out that when Satan was tempting Eve, both of them compared the forbidden fruit to the rest of the fruit in the Garden of Eden. Eve said they could eat the other fruit, but the fruit of this tree was not to be touched. While that does not absolutely guarantee that the fruit was not metaphorical, logic says that it was fruit similar to the rest of the fruit in the Garden of Eden and that its only real difference was that it was a symbol for the right to choose for one's self what was right and what was wrong. And since Adam and Eve were not expected to survive on metaphors, presumably all the fruit in the Garden of Eden was real, and so was the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Answer 3

I think it's a reference to how they say "smashing" in the UK as a form of saying outstanding or fantastic. Why the pumpkins are smashing, I'm not sure.

Answer 4

TRY NOT TO STRESS to much over it..they are in fact a bunch of wanna be artists..thus its probrobly some hidden meaning known only to them...probrobly thought it was cool to have a name noone in their right mind would use ...hence smashing(rebel)pumpkins(scary ,halloween).

Answer 5

It might be a reference to the halloween prank, thats all I can think of.

Answer 6

they go GISH when ya hit them
get it?