Chamberlin's In For Pumpkins Reunion... To Nobody's Surprise

According to MTV.com, Pumpkin's drummer Jimmy Chamberlin has accepted singer Billy Corgan's offer for a reunion.

"All I can say is that the Smashing Pumpkins are Billy, James, myself and D'Arcy," Chamberlin told the Chicago Tribune. "In an ideal world, that's what it will end up being. The hope is that everybody will come to the table, but I can only speak for myself in saying that I'm in, and I'm excited."

The two hope to convince remaining bandmates, bassist D'Arcy Wretzky and guitarist James Iha, to join in on the band's resurrection.

Now, the drummer's willingness to accept the singer's offer comes as little to no surprise. The two have been very close since the split. Chamberlin was the drummer for Corgan's Zwan project and does some of the tracks on his new solo record, TheFutureEmbrace. It seems they've been contemplating a reunion for some time. Corgan's been so desperate to get his band back together he took out a full page ad in a Chicago newspaper pleading for the group to reform.

"It's still all very new, and I don't know if anybody really knows what's going on," Chamberlin said. "We really haven't sat down at the table and figured out the nuts and bolts."

Corgan worked with a number of artists after the original line-up of the Pumpkins deteriorated, including Hole and latter day Pumpkins bassist Melissa Auf Der Maur, Chamberlin in the post-Pumpkins project Zwan and he briefly played guitar for New Order. In addition, he's released a book of poetry and is currently touring in support of his solo LP.

The Pumpkins disbanded in 2000 after the departure of manager Sharon Osbourne, who stated her relations with Corgan were terrible.

At the time of the band's break up, Corgan declared said the band's end was due to the popularity of boy bands like the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC, who made it difficult to compete in the music industry.Throughout their music career, the Pumpkins earned two Grammys and sold millions of records worldwide.

Billy Corgan has a couple of Canadian dates in the next two weeks:
July 2 Toronto, ON @ The Carlu
July 19 Vancouver, BC @ Commodore Ballroom