Most improved/evolved band or artist.

[Benjamin Strange]

This post is for people that go deep with their favorite bands. Who do you feel is the most improved/evolved band or artist as they have gone along? We all know that many get worse and/or regurtitate past successes - we don't want to hear about them.

My votes go to:

-King Crimson - these guys are the master of the evolutionary leap. Lots of bands are still trying to catch up to them.
-Pink Floyd - listen to Arnold Layne, and then listen to Comforably Numb. Both are great, but man are they different!
-Ministry - the difference between "With Sympathy" and "Psalm 69" - Whoa!
-Miles Davis - there's a guy who didn't know how to sit on his ass.
-Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine and The Fragile are miles apart; The Fragile was brilliantly subtle. Too bad nobody cared.
-Pantera - these guys used to be a glam band, for crying out loud! Ever heard their album, "Proud to be Loud"? Ouch!

[Eyescream]

Originally Posted by Benjamin Strange

Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine and The Fragile are miles apart; The Fragile was brilliantly subtle. Too bad nobody cared.

Yeah, it really is a shame. That's one of my all-time favorite albums.

Originally Posted by Benjamin Strange

Pantera - these guys used to be a glam band, for crying out loud! Ever heard their album, "Proud to be Loud"? Ouch!

Very luckily for me, I got into Pantera well past their glam days. I didn't start listening to them until after Far Beyond Driven had come out, and all I've ever heard was that and Vulgar Display of Power. Kinda feel like I lucked out.

[Mark Latimour]

Blink 182 - did you ever see them in their avante-garde jazz trio days?

[Mark Latimour]

Originally Posted by SMASH

Anethema

+1

Paradise Lost have gone through some pretty drastic changes too!

The Gathering

[I-Love-Ratm]

Radiohead!!!
Inucubus

[Wrong Robot]

Definitely Radiohead is one of them, they have matured and evolved so much in the past 3 albums it's pretty amazing.

[bryan bailey]

Zappa. Although he was always awesome. He did cover almost every genre of music there was.

[NJL]

ARU....too bad they are not around any more

[JimK]

Really? They did put out a record last Summer?
BTW, not sure how they 'evolved'...the early stuff was quite happenin'.
Not so sure we've heard the last of them.


Anyway-
The Beatles?
They 'evolved' from "She Loves You(Yeah, Yeah, Yeah)" to tunes like "Tomorrow Never Knows" to Sgt. Peppers & stuff like "Strawberry Fields" & "A Day In The Life" onto Abbey Road...

[JimK]

Originally Posted by Benjamin Strange

-Miles Davis - there's a guy who didn't know how to sit on his ass.

Agree...but he de-evolved towards the end. I mean, covering "Time After Time" & "Human Nature"?

Coltrane evolved from being ridiculed/scorned(crappy tone, too many notes, etc) & playing in R&B bar bands to what you hear on Ascension.

[NJL]

[quote=JimK]Really? They did put out a record last Summer?
BTW, not sure how they 'evolved'...the early stuff was quite happenin'.
Not so sure we've heard the last of them.


[quote]to my understanding, although the album was released last summer, it was recorded a while back.

while i liked the earlier stuff, the new (still old) was more of my bag.

[Funkize you]

Id say that Metallica "Evolved" the most, IMHO not for the better, But none the less, Listen to... Call of the Ktulu, Then something off of St. Anger, and they are VERY different, Some would dissagree but they dont sound the same at all anymore to me...

[dee rob]

Prince!

[Mark Latimour]

Originally Posted by Funkize you

Id say that Metallica "Evolved" the most, IMHO not for the better, But none the less, Listen to... Call of the Ktulu, Then something off of St. Anger, and they are VERY different, Some would dissagree but they dont sound the same at all anymore to me...

You have obviously never heard the difference between Paradise Losts "As I Die" and their later work on the Host album.

Death/Doom metal -=> Dark Dance music!

[Muzique Fann]

haha, I think somebody mentioned avante-garde and Blink 182 in the same sentence. But umm, Prince was a great call -you can't stop that guy. How about David Byrne! From the Heads to his strange "solo" projects, nothing but quality. On the flipside I'd say Carlos Santana has progressed into a big stinky pile of cheese.

[Sonorous]

Michael Jackson.


(Radiohead.)

[Bad Brains]

i will also add Primus to the list

I love this trippy psycadelic erie thing they do nowadays. They did it in the past too, but not like this.

[Josh Ryan]

Steve Coleman, that guy is all about pushing the frontiers of composition.

Slayer, Hell Awaits to God Hates Us All are night and day.

[jenderfazz]

King Crimson keeps evolving with each new album, for example, their 80s stuff was more technical and experimental than the Wetton years, which were a little harder and darker than the first few albums, and so on. Rush also keeps on pushing the envelope and releasing new and different stuff every album, kudos to them.

AFI is a weirdly changing band, going from punky stuff to hardcore to gothic hard whatever they played and now with Sing the Sorrow. They change noticeably with every album, and one has to only look at the success they had with StS to see that it was a progression.

[vbass]

Originally Posted by Blisshead

Slayer, Hell Awaits to God Hates Us All are night and day.

Yes, but both are good.