Benjamin Jones
The Smashing Pumpkins have been an iconic alternative rock ban for decades. And now the group has added a new member to help them continue for decades more.
“The news you’ve been waiting for has finally arrived,” the band announced on social media last week. “SP is excited to officially welcome highly skilled veteran guitarist Kiki Wong. Kiki joins the band’s touring lineup of Billy Corgan, Jimmy Chamberlin and James Iha, along with mainstays Jack Bates and Katie Cole.”
The band said in January that it was looking for a new guitarist after Jeff Schroeder announced his departure of the group in October.
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The Smashing Pumpkins put out a public call for an additional guitarist in January, and in less than two weeks announced they had received more than 10,000 submissions for work – so many that eight people were “working full time to review each one.”
Wong’s arrival in the group comes after she played guitar in the Los Angeles rock band Vigil of War. Her passion for music began when she was just 6 years old, she says in her website, when he started taking classical piano lessons. At age 13 he got his first guitar that his father bought at Costco, and over the next few years he joined “countless garage bands” and also learned to play the drums.
After earning her bachelor’s degree in biological sciences at the University of California, Irvine, Wong says she decided to pursue music full time with the Asian-American girl band Nylon Pink. Her career has only blossomed since then.
“It’s never too early or too late to follow your dreams,” says Wong on his website. “…With music, I want to break down the barriers of genres and stereotypes. I want to confront styles and make them one. After all, we only have one world. We could very well unite it with music.”
Her music became so popular that Smashing Pumpkins co-founder and lead singer Billy Corgan says he was a fan of hers “before she submitted her name for consideration.”
“It’s great to have someone with his insight be part of our touring family,” Corgan said. “I can’t wait to hit the road with Kiki as part of our crazy circus.”
The band is leaving on a international tour this summer, starting in the UK in June, before arriving in the US and Canada from July to September.
Wong said the process of joining the band was “an absolutely wild ride.”
“I am so humbled and humbled to have been chosen to perform alongside some of the greatest and most influential rock musicians of all time,” she said. “I never thought that I, the little 15-year-old, playing metal guitar in my room, would reach this moment. It goes to show that hard work and perseverance really pays off if you’re willing to get through the hard things, so never miss hope out there.”
Wong, who is of Korean and Chinese descent, joins The Smashing Pumpkins as Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month kicks off.
“Being in the rock and roll/heavy metal industry as an Asian-American woman is not easy,” she said in a 2021 interview with Asian-American Pacific Islander musicians. “I received a lot of hate from people who judge me for who I am. Although it may seem like a setback, there has been much more positive feedback and support than negative.”
“I grew up in a community that was 92% Caucasian, with very little exposure to Asians other than my own family. It was difficult to understand my identity and where I fit in at such a young age,” she added. “I hope to see more young emerging AAPI musicians who want to keep rock and roll alive. I hope I can help inspire them to go against the grain of what we’re told we should do and feel safe to express ourselves creatively through music and not feel judged.”
Li Cohen
