Maturity. That tricky process that any rock musician is faced with at some point. A band that never matures, or grows in some way, ends up the worst type of charicature, the kind that give credence to each generation of parents who complain about “that racket” their kids are listening to. See The Ramones shortly following End of the Century and Rock ‘n Roll High School as Example A. They would go on to give “youth culture” a bad name for the next 10 years.
It’s rare that your favorite band matures at a rate that fans can keep up with. Sometimes the artist actually is going through “growing pains” that rightfully leave fans scratching their heads or storming out of concerts grumbling, “I didn’t come here to see #%@@&$^$@#$ing Mariah Carey!” (grumbled by Townsman Ken at Elvis Costello’s Mighty Like a Turd Tour). Other times the artist simply grows up before their audience can figure out exactly what’s going on. Bob Dylan plugging in may be the best example of this phenomenon; I wonder if old Tom Waits fans felt this way when Swordfishtrombones came out.
What’s been your experience with favorite artists “maturing” before your eyes? Have you kept pace with them, caught up with them later, decided you simply didn’t like what they were up to, pouted and sucked your thumb instead?
Forgive me if I misunderstood you here, but I don’t think that your example is a particularly good one. After End of the Century, The Ramones put out Pleasant Dreams, an album more new-wave and power-pop flavored than any of their previous work. Further into their career, albums like Too Tough to Die, Halfway to Sanity and Brain Drain incorporated more hard-rock and heavy metal elements into their sound and thehy even released a covers album called Acid Eaters that was a tribute to the Nuggets-era garage-rock of their youth, not to mention the psych rock late ’60s stuff on there as well.
Granted, they didn’t tinker with the formula anywhere near as much as say, Elvis Costello or somebody like that, but I’m just tired of this frankly lazy and overused idea that The Ramones made the same record over and over again.
I’ll say it again: the poster, uh, “child” for perfect Rock Aging is Nick Lowe. His three “comeback” albums starting with “The Impossible Bird” are absolutely brilliant and age-appropriate. The Stones could learn a thing or two from the Basher, for sure.
The maturity-leap Wilco/Jeff Tweedy made with Summerteeth was one for the ages. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anyone make such a dramatic improvement as a lyricist before or since.
Matt wrote:
I’m aware of that. I’m one of about 12 people who like that album and appreciate its rare change of pace. Not many folks cared about it, and it’s not loaded with Ramones schtick, so I count End of the Century as the last “real” Ramones album that anyone gives a damn about – even then, fans consider it “too slick.”
That’s like a former heavyweight champ boxer going back to fighting a local dives, claiming he’s “getting back to his roots.” The heavy metal influences were grabs at milking a little more out of their original dunderhead schtick. Their fans matured long before they did, and they had no makeup to remove. They just went looking for a new generation of actual dopes to buy their stuff.
Deal with it!
Good calls on Lowe and Tweedy/Wilco. Lowe had the distinction of being incredibly mediocre for years until he finally found a proper way to mature his sound.
Beefheart, Sly Stone, Bobbie Gentry, a lot of folks make “disappear” seem not a bad idea. Especially the way some people age. That Townsend “Barishnikov Caught On the Electrified Fence” pic hurts. If you are selling primarily youth and cuteness, you need a plan B. Even if that isn’t what you’re selling, but it’s what they’re buying, you need a plan B. Cale’s got his Aging Welsh Fisherman routine going well, Zappa tried politics, and naturally, it’s carcinogenic. Lou’s got his Mummified With Ennui Patches thing going, preventing the out and out mockery that could come to someone more vulnerable. I always admired (largely for their trajectory) Foghat. They played in bars, went all the way up the gauntlet to arenas, slid all the way back down to bars, and never stopped, and always did what they started out doing. Of course, now there’s only 2 of them left. Let’s see. Well, I guess one question is, how does the rest of the world do it? Plumbing? “Man that guy inVENted half the shit kids are doing. Then he comes around in ’82 with all PVC, the feed and the return are at, like, angles… And lines with valves that don’t even control anything all over them.” It’s hard to age gracefully in this culture, no matter what you’re doing. I don’t want to start a whole Dylan thing (who said “most arguments”?) here, but when did he start saying “baby” without irony? (“Vat is dis ‘bäby’? Der Führer never ses ‘bäby’!?”) Page and Plant both look like potatoes with eyes for a Zeppelin puppet-play. That’s just time and lack of surgery. What can you do? Can we get a comprehensive RTH Then and Now study? Embarassing photos and samples of whatever the hell you do from then and now? Not that it would be pleasing to see, exactly, but it could well be funnier than the musicians that get beat up here!