Smashing Pumpkin's Frontman Billy Corgan's Friends Demand DNA Test to Confirm Bill Burr Half-Brother Claim

Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan is once again bringing up the possibility of Bill Burr being his half brother.

Appearing on 'The Joe Rogan Experience' podcast, Corgan shared that his friends are so connived that he could be a half-sibling with Burr that they should do a DNA test to prove it.

"People I know for 20, 30 years have been asking me what I think. I said I don't know, but I don't think we're related. There's a resemblance but I don't think we're related. They're like, 'did you get a DNA test?', and I said there's no reason to but they'd say 'well I think he's your brother,'" Corgan told the host.

Speculation began that Burr and Corgan might be related last year and spilled over to when Mandel surprised Burr with an appearance from Corgan on his 'Howie Mandel Does Stuff' podcast.

In November 2024, Corgan told Mandel on the same podcast that he and Burr might be related.

"About 10 years ago, one of my brothers was having a birthday party, and my stepmother was there, who was obviously married to my father. And my stepmother said to me, 'Do you know who Bill Burr is? Now at that point, I had never heard of Bill Burr; I didn't know who he was. I didn't know he was a comedian or anything. He could have been the guy down the street," he said at the time.

"She said, 'Well, he's this comedian.' And I think I even somehow called up a picture on the phone, and I kind of noticed right away, 'Gee, he kind of looks like my father.' Bill Burr looks more like my father than Bill Burr looks like me or I look like Bill Burr. So I said to my mother, 'Why are you asking me this? She goes, 'I think it might be one of your father's illegitimate children. Bill Burr might be one of the children that your father sired in his days being a traveling musician," Corgan added.

After that, Burr addressed the speculation and became visibly upset with Mandel when Corgan made a surprise appearance on the podcast.

Corgan took the encounter in stride and mused that they could not be brothers due to Burr's lack of musical abilities.

"The fact that he said he can't sing, I think, disproves that we're related, 'cause I'm not funny. So... it goes both ways," he said.

Since the incident was made public, Mandel has gone on to apologize for the ambush. Burr has asserted that he has no issues with Corgan, only with Mandel and called him a "strange man," Entertainment Weekly reports.

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Billy Corgan, Smashing Pumpkins, News