When your favorite band/s lost it

[Personatech]

The Who, when Keith quit.

It's not like he had a choice, but yeah...

 

[Personatech]

how about a positive take on the topic by mentioning the great bands that quit BEFORE they lost it! go out on a good note and not ruin their good reputation by being greedy and beating a dead horse.
1. The Police
2. The Replacements
3. The Clash

Apparently, you never listened to "Cut the Crap".

I would add The Jam to this list of great bands who kept it coming until the very end.

 

[Personatech]

David Bowie--after Aladdin Sane
Pink Floyd-- after Dark Side of the Moon
The Who--after Quadrophenia
Led Zepplin--after Houses of the Holy (although not as much as the first ones)
the Stones-- from @ 1975 on, say Goat's Head Soup
The Moody Blues--after Seventh Sojourn
Yes--after Close to the Edge

i'm sure i'll think of others

Great list. I would modify David Bowie (after Let's Dance), Pink Floyd (after Barrett was fired), then add

the Pogues (after Shane was fired),
the Clash (after Mick was fired),
the Kinks (after Preservation Act 1),
Creedence (Mardi Gras?),
the Beach Boys (when they became a nostalgia act)

 

[ronlitz]

Rush - Signals was the beginning of the end for me
Van Halen - lost it when DLR split
RHCP - lost is on One Hot Minute
Black Sabbath - lost it when they fired Ozzy
Pink Floyd - lost it on The Final Cut
ZZ Top - lost it on Afterburner

 

[Aasmund]

Emerson Lake & Palmer after "Brain Salad Surgery"
10cc after "How Dare You!" (Godley and Creme left)
Deep Purple after "Come Taste the Band"
Rainbow after "Long Live Rock'n'Roll" (Dio left. But I do like "Spotlight Kid")
AC/DC after "Highway to Hell" (they had something after, but they lost a lot of it with Ben Scott)
The Doors after "L.A. Woman" (why even try to continue after losing Jim?)
The Mars Volta after "Octahedron"? That album is terrible, I hope they get back in shape!

 

[LiquidMidnight]

I guess I might as well say it: GnR when they came out with the Use Your Illusion albums. There are some downright awesome cuts between the two albums...but the key words are "between the two albums." There is so much pretentious filler between the two that neither album is solid on its own nor taken together as a gestalt. Did we really need a second version of Don't Cry with alternate lyrics? Did we really need a song with Axl. whining about every self-important music critic who wrote a bad review of Guns? Grow some balls, dude. You're Axl. freakin' Rose, man! They definitely jumped the shark with that one.

This was when Axl. was trying to become an "artiste" rather than the screamer in a dangerous hard rock band. Of course, we all know what happened post UYI: the instrumentalists went on to do other things and create relevant music in the late 90s and 2000s. Axl. took twice as long as Boston to release a follow-up album that sunk like the Titantic.

 

[That Sustain]

RUSH can still play their butts off. But Geddy's lost the screech he once had.

Van Halen actually got better last year..except Dave only sings part of the lyrics now and tells the same jokes/stories every night.

Cream should have stayed together. All three of 'em went downhill after that band.

 

[Jack Butler]

I love iron maiden & quite honestly they are the reason i am a musician today but everything after "fear of the dark" left me disappointed with the exception of "a matter of life & death".

I'm in the same boat, although that "benjamin brieg" song, or whatever it was called, kinda grew on me.

 

[Jack Butler]

Hold it right there.....Floyd? after Dark Side? Dude Animals is an amazing album, far more dark than the Wall ever was, with the stand out cut Sheep still an all time fave...

+1 on Animals. Just listened to the whole thing for the first time in a few years last week on a road trip. Awesome.

 

[dls59]

how about a positive take on the topic by mentioning the great bands that quit BEFORE they lost it! go out on a good note and not ruin their good reputation by being greedy and beating a dead horse.
1. The Police
2. The Replacements
3. The Clash

Contrary to a previous post, I'd put the Beatles in this category.

 

[dls59]

Rush - after Moving Pictures (Feb 1981, sorry, but when the synthesized intro to Subdivisions starts up I tune them out almost totally for decades. )
Queen - after "Jazz" (Nov. 1978)
Renaissance - after "Azure D'Or" (1979)
Genesis - after "Duke" album (1979)
Jethro Tull - after "Stormwatch" (1979)
Kansas - after "Audio Visions" (1980)
Yes - after "Drama" (1980)
Heart - "Bebe le Strange" (1980)
Supertramp - "Breakfast in America" (1979)
Cheap Trick - "Dream Police" (1979)

Yeah... something horrible happened around 1979-1980 that RUINED a number of great bands. My friend and I call it "The BUS WRECK." At some point in late 1979, early 1980, (New Years' Eve 1979 maybe) Rush, Queen, Yes, and all the other above bands were on a bus that drove off a cliff somewhere. The record companies were screwed and had to bring in look-a-likes for all of these bands, but the replacements, while looking like the original members, were not as talented and the quality of music fell off sharply with the very next releases and with an occasional exception, stayed low). The "Bus Wreck of Sometime in either 1979-1980" theory explains the "musical cliff" of these bands and their near-simultaneous fall from musical grace.

How else to explain the shift from effin' greatness to ewwww at the same time for so many bands in the span of one album?

Meh, it's a theory, anyways.

I would suggest that Renaissance lost it after "A Song for all Seasons", which, by the way, is a killer album.

 

[mellowinman]

The early eighties were tough years.

Kansas - Vinyl Confessions "Play the Game Tonight"
April Wine - Power Play "Enough is Enough"
Foghat - Tight Shoes "Stranger in my Hometown"
The Clash - Combat Rock "Should I Stay or Should I Go?"
REO Speedwagon - High Infidelity "Tale it on the Run," "Tough Guys"
Pat Benatar -Get Nervous "Shadows of the Night"
J. Geils Band - Freeze Frame "Centerfold," "Freeze Frame"

I could go on and on with bands who I had always looked forward to their next album; always CRANKED my radio when their songs came on, who suddenly sounded silly and dated. Even the legendary RUSH disappointed me with Signals and Grace Under Pressure, which, in retrospect aren't bad albums, but they sure don't hold up to Hemispheres.

Music changed, and I stopped listening to the radio. I started investing heavily in a format I knew would last forever.

Cassette tapes.

 

[dougazbass]

Great list. I would modify David Bowie (after Let's Dance), Pink Floyd (after Barrett was fired), then add

the Pogues (after Shane was fired),
the Clash (after Mick was fired),
the Kinks (after Preservation Act 1),
Creedence (Mardi Gras?),
the Beach Boys (when they became a nostalgia act)

Try to imagine the Beach Boys as new and no one had heard of them before. They were amazing for thier time. Even hard for me to recall that feeling.

Pink Floyd...Dark Side was so amazing in its time setting that if you were there then you might see how it was tough to top it. So any thing after it was great but not Dark Side...

 

[PWRL]

Music changed, and I stopped listening to the radio. I started investing heavily in a format I knew would last forever.

Cassette tapes.

LOL (and I don't say that much)

 

[bass_lord_mutha]

Surprised this band hasn't been mentioned yet, but I'm sad to say that I think 311 has been on the decline since Soundsystem (though Uplifter a few years back was a damn good album). I could play any album from Music to the Blue Album to Soundsystem and jam out the entire time (Grassroots and Transistor are still my faves), then starting with From Chaos the intensity and quality of writing is just more watered down for me. I'll still always be a fan, but I hope they can pick it back up soon...

 

[scoopscallahan]

I guess I might as well say it: GnR when they came out with the Use Your Illusion albums. There are some downright awesome cuts between the two albums...but the key words are "between the two albums." There is so much pretentious filler between the two that neither album is solid on its own nor taken together as a gestalt. Did we really need a second version of Don't Cry with alternate lyrics? Did we really need a song with Axl. whining about every self-important music critic who wrote a bad review of Guns? Grow some balls, dude. You're Axl. freakin' Rose, man! They definitely jumped the shark with that one.

This was when Axl. was trying to become an "artiste" rather than the screamer in a dangerous hard rock band. Of course, we all know what happened post UYI: the instrumentalists went on to do other things and create relevant music in the late 90s and 2000s. Axl. took twice as long as Boston to release a follow-up album that sunk like the Titantic.

Absolutely true. If there had been 1 Illusion album GnR might have had 3 of the greatest albums ever back to back. Instead they looked bloated, ridiculous, and an example of everything the opposite of Appetite. Saw Slash with Myles Kennedy recently. He's still a giant. Axl, well he's just a bloated version of his former self. Duff, still greatness. And long live Izzy, the coolest rock star of my generation. Steven? Poor Steven.

 

[Arial Bender]

Alice Cooper, after Billion Dollar Babies

 

[ronlitz]

RUSH can still play their butts off. But Geddy's lost the screech he once had.

I don't think "losing it" means the band can't play their instruments well - I think it means the point when the quality of their new music took a nosedive.

 

[dalahorse]

Haven't read the whole thread. But I have to add Queensryche after Empire. What the heck happened? The band still rocks! But what happened to the lyrics and singing?

 

[JTE]

The Eagles when Bernie Leadon finally had too much of the Henley & Frey show.

Jefferson Airplane when Dreyden and Balin left. And Jefferson Starship as soon as "Red Octopus" was released.

Poco when Richie left.

The Byrds when McGuinn and Hillman fired Crosby.

Southern, Hillman, Furay the day the band was conceived.

Yes with "Tales Of The Topographic Oceans".

John