Lately, the Smashing Pumpkins' Billy Corgan has been laying it all out there in his interviews, most recently calling out journalist Anderson Cooper.

Now, during a chat with the U.K.'s the Independent, he ranked himself next to Kurt Cobain as one of "the top two scribes." Corgan also says he's not too old or washed up to be putting out new music, as some have suggested in past interviews.

Although he claims that he and the departed Nirvana frontman were not pals, he had a profound respect for him. "In the purest sense of the word, we were competitors," says Corgan. "He and I were the top two scribes, and everybody else was a distant third."

He also made mention of how Cobain's death affected him and the music industry (just like Death Cab for Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard recently did).

I found it devastating because, whether we wanted to admit it or not, he was the quarterback of the football team, leading the aesthetic and integrity charge ... He knew how to navigate those things.

You Think You Know Nirvana?

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