Biggest Evolution of Musical Artist

[Kruton]

Almost every band worth listening to has evolved over the course of their albums into a new and somewhat separate identity. Which ones that you know of have changed the most?

An obvious one would of course be Metallica.

Underground rapper Aesop Rock has done a fairly large amount of evolution. He started as an MC with an unusual delivery and lush samples provided by his producer Blockhead. With his latest two releases, he's begun to take over the producing himself and has added tons of crazy samples, with his latest album almost sounding like a techno album on some tracks. I know a lot of people are down on his latest two albums, but I like them just as much as his earlier ones.

The Killers, started out as a kinda post-revival band (or at least that's how most people described them) and each subsequent album they've added a little bit more electronica/techno to their sound.

And Mastodon, they started out as a take no prisoners balls to the wall metal band, and have added a little bit of prog to each album, their latest one (Crack the Skye) sounding a decent amount like Pink Floyd.

[-Lithium-]

Beck...

[Head Detective Aaron Enigma]

I think Green Day has done a fair amount of evolution. Dookie and 21st Century Breakdown each have their own completely different sound. Old school Green Day was very heavily punk rock, but I think that's changed a lot since American Idiot.

[The_Punisher]

Start of Beatlemania:


After Beatlemania:

[sunwukong]

The remnants of Joy Division forming New Order after Ian Curtis killed himself marked a pretty radical shift in both style and content, despite it mostly being the same guys in both bands.

[The_Punisher]

I'll argue that John Lennon actually regressed after the John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band. That stuff was heavy and, IMO, his best work as a solo artist. It's like Mick Foley after leaving ECW. He could never go back to that Cactus Jack again.

[The Line]

Franz Ferdinand started as a poppy band that used a couple guitar and vocal effects to a band that has 4 minute synthesizer solos(I like all the stops on their musical journey so far)

[Kruton]

I guess Zappa could count, but his wasn't really an evolution as much as it was just doing different things.


Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds have evolved from writing brilliant, brutal 5+ minute songs about murdering people to Dig Lazarus! DIG!!! which is a collection of brilliant, alternative-esq shorter songs not about murdering people.

Tool has gotten much more artsy since their heavy debut EP Opiate.

[khali]

The Flaming Lips pretty much completely changed their sound, thanks to a couple changes in guitarists. Just compare any of their 80s albums to The Soft Bulletin, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and At War With The Mystics.

[Ass Dan]

Radiohead went from being a Britpop band to alternative rockers to experamentalist jazz-rockers to electronica to God knows what.

[Deleted]

Metallica. The actual quality of the music will always be debated, but every single album feels like it's own entity, for better or for worse.

The amazing thing is that they can somehow bring it all together live and make it flow.

David Bowie also had quite an evolution musically.

[Brother Coyote]

Bad Religion they've always been the same type of band but in my opinion they've refined their sound incredibly over the years.

Look at the difference between Suffer and Process of Belief for instance.

[livetowin]

Marky Mark.

[Ultimo Chocula]

Mr. Bungle. Their first album was heavy metal circus music with lyrics about sex with food. Their second album was an avante guarde jazz/noise album that made people wonder what the hell is going on. The third album was a pop record that make the Beach Boys look like Raffi.

[Paul Servo]

Van Halen?
With Dave they had a good rock sound, but seemed like a party band, with Sammy, they just seemed like a typical Sammy Haggar back-up band

[thuschongswing]

This topic begins and ends with Ulver.

They started as a generic black metal band (first EP), then added folk elements to their sound (first album), then decided to release a pure folk album (second album) followed by one of the harshest black metal albums ever created (third album).

After that, they simply became weird-ass avant-garde metal (fourth album), released an ambient EP, and then turned to jazzy electronic/trip hop (fifth album), and then afterwards released a group of ambient EPs (including some movie soundtracks).

Their fifth album is very experimental rock, and their last album takes a more ethereal, soothing approach to their current avant-garde rock sound.

So there you go.

[Paul Servo]

Gwen Stefani/No Doubt. Started out Skaish. Then became bubblegum pop

[Nacho STAYS Hyped]

Beastie Boys:

License To Ill - Pure old school hip-hop, with hints of rock here and there. (Fight for your Right, No Sleep 'Till Brooklyn)

Paul's Boutique - Sample crazy, critically acclaimed, lyrically smart hip hop record produced by the Dust Brothers.

Check Your Head - More of the same hip-hop wise...and a few hardcore rock songs, harkening back to the bands early days...as well as some instrumental jazz/soul.

Ill Communication - See Check Your Head

Hello Nasty - Spacey hip hop, with hints of techno here and there, with groovy instrumental new age jazz.

To The Five Boroughs - Pure early 2000's hip hop, with hints of techno. No jazz, no rock, just hip hop.

The Mix-Up - Nothing but groovy jazz/soul instrumentals and such.

Hot Sauce Committee Pt. 1 - ?

[default]

hed pe

I hate to pigeonhole them as they're my favorite band but they've definitely changed styles a good bit over the past almost 15 years. They were more of heavy metal in the beginning, then changed to more alternative and then into different eras of punk... (with hip hop/rap influences throughout their span).

Then again, they've gone through quite a few guitarists and drummers over the years.

I expect the next album to be different, but I'm almost positive I'll like it as I've liked everything they've done so far.

[Janitor From Mars]

Jul 26, 2009 1:46:35 GMT -5 Brother Coyote said:

Bad Religion they've always been the same type of band but in my opinion they've refined their sound incredibly over the years.

Look at the difference between Suffer and Process of Belief for instance.

Sometimes, their songs all sound the same. Not to knock them or anything but it's a bit debatable.