Concerts · Las Vegas
Smashing Pumpkins
Bring Rats in a Cage Tour
to MGM Grand
May 18, 2026 · Vegas Sidekick Editorial · 4 min read
The Smashing Pumpkins have announced The Rats in a Cage Tour, and Las Vegas is on the list. The band plays MGM Grand Garden Arena on Friday, October 30, 2026 — Halloween weekend — with a two-set show unlike anything they've brought to this city before. Tickets go on general sale Thursday, May 21 at 10 a.m. PT at AXS.com.
The Rats in a Cage Tour is built around a format the Pumpkins have never done before. Set one is dedicated entirely to Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness — the RIAA Diamond-certified 1995 double album celebrating its 30th anniversary — played in a theatrical setting designed around the record's world. Set two draws from nearly four decades of catalog: from Gish through their most recent album Aghori Mhori Mei, with the setlist varying night to night.
As Billy Corgan put it when announcing the tour:
"Staging a Mellon Collie-themed show is something we've discussed for over a decade, and finally the stars have aligned and exactly on the terms I'd set: which was to build a special night around its most enduring aspirations and ideas. With set 1 of the Rats in a Cage tour exclusively featuring Mellon Collie songs in a highly theatrical setting, and set 2 drawing from the rest of our canon so that there's a decent amount of variance as to what songs we'll play from night to night: from our first in 'Gish' to our last in 'Aghori Mhori Mei.'"Billy Corgan — The Smashing Pumpkins
The Las Vegas date lands on October 30 — the night before Halloween — which isn't an accident. MGM Grand Garden Arena holds around 17,000 people, and the Pumpkins have always filled rooms at that scale on the strength of live performances known for raw intensity. The Mellon Collie set alone is a significant event: the album includes "Bullet with Butterfly Wings," "1979," "Tonight, Tonight," "Zero," and "Thru the Eyes of Ruby" — songs that defined a generation of alternative listeners and have never been performed together in a dedicated theatrical context until now.
The tour follows a big 2025 for the Pumpkins: a deluxe vinyl reissue of Mellon Collie with previously unheard live recordings, a special performance of the album with the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the announcement that the band will headline Lollapalooza in their hometown of Chicago on July 31 — their first appearance at the festival since its touring iteration in 1994.
"MGM Grand Garden Arena on Halloween weekend with two full sets from the Pumpkins — one dedicated entirely to Mellon Collie. That's not a nostalgia play. That's Billy Corgan treating a 30-year-old album like it still has something to say, because it does. Vegas has had the Pumpkins in arenas before. This one is going to be categorically different."Kris Kidd — Founder, Vegas Sidekick. Entertainment industry veteran.
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