Music: When did your favorite band fall off?

[CokenoPepsi]

Queen- Hot Space

 

[Habsfunk]

Tattoo You (1981) was the last great Stones album.

I'd go with Goat's Head Soup, with an interlude with Some Girls. I've never gotten into It's Only Rock n Roll and Black & Blue.

 

[tardigrade81]

Eric Clapton. And he hasn’t fallen off. Not even close dammit.

 

[Tawnos]

Endgame is a top 5 Megadeth album imo. Super Collider seems to be the breaking point for me.

Eh. I'd rate all of their first 5 albums ahead of it, followed by The System Has Failed which I largely really liked aside from a couple of serious duds. Besides that, all their other albums are highlight albums. As in, mostly bad, but 2-4 real bangers. Example: Cryptic Writings... Trust, She-Wolf, and Vortex are GREAT songs... the rest of the album is meh. Then there's The World Needs A Hero, which has Dread and the Fugitive Mind, Return to Hanger, Recipe for Hate... then a couple of meh songs and a few that are outright crap.

I never got much into Megadeth until some of those later releases. Whatever it is that changed about them (production, Dave's less snarly voice, a fuller sound, all of the above?) definitely helped me become a fan. I love Endgame and Dystopia.

Production is a big thing, in particular for their debut and their 3rd album. I'd be curious to hear a complete re-recording of Killing Is My Business. But for me, Dave's voice is a big part of the problem on the later stuff. His voice still isn't very good, but it's missing a lot of the attitude that fit his music so well in earlier times. That makes everything seem so much flatter, to me.

By the way, I'll tell you where I approach this from. I first became a fan of theirs in the 90s around when Youthanasia came out. I went to probably 30 or so shows between 1999 and 2004. I own one of Dave Ellefson's old practice amps. Was an absolutely huge fan. Still am really.

One crazy thing... I've heard the original recordings for Youthanasia. That album had a totally different feel originally, but for some reason they decided to even out the tempos to a smaller range (trying to broaden their appeal). For example, the original version of Reckoning Day was 15-20 BPM faster.

 

[BrockLobster]

Fave band: Iron Maiden
Fall off date: Never

 

[Tawnos]

Fave band: Iron Maiden
Fall off date: Never

Personally, I thought they fell off with Seventh Son and then have been strong again since Brave New World.

Not that they were ever "bad"

 

[Nemesis Prime]

Metallica, still waiting for the fall off. Likely won't ever happen because everything they put out is awesome.

 

[Shareefruck]

Personally, I feel like every band falls off, and usually pretty quickly too (ignoring those that disband before it happens)-- That includes my favorites. Most of the bands that supposedly last a long time seem to only be mediocre for a long time, for my tastes.

 

[BrockLobster]

Personally, I thought they fell off with Seventh Son and then have been strong again since Brave New World.

Not that they were ever "bad"

2000 on is as good or even better than their early stuff. Aside from SSOASS and powerslave of course.

 

[Tawnos]

2000 on is as good or even better than their early stuff. Aside from SSOASS and powerslave of course.

I think it's all better that SSOASS, since that's my absolute least favorite album of theirs. I've never really understood the love for it. That being said, I think their heights are just as good as early stuff, but front-to-back they haven't put out anything as good as Powerslave or Number of the Beast and rarely as good as Somewhere in Time.

 

[Frankie Blueberries]

Blink 182 - anything after 2004 after the first breakup. It's a shame because their true peak was 2003-2004, once Tom started trying to experiment more with their sound and Travis was really hitting his stride. Their energy on stage and improvs were awesome, love the new solos that Tom adds to the Rock Show and Stay Together For the Kids in this concert:

 

[Aladyyn]

Metallica, still waiting for the fall off. Likely won't ever happen because everything they put out is awesome.

They've been on a steady downward trajectory since the beginning imo...

 

[MetalheadPenguinsFan]

Down - after their debut album “NOLA”

 

[MetalheadPenguinsFan]

“Severed Survival” is the best Autopsy album.

 

[Stylizer1]

Personally, I feel like every band falls off, and usually pretty quickly too (ignoring those that disband before it happens)-- That includes my favorites. Most of the bands that supposedly last a long time seem to only be mediocre for a long time, for my tastes.

I think bands fall off for many reasons. I think music executives really hope for that 1 great album seeing as that's where the bulk of their profits are going to come from and at that point the band is not on the best of contracts. After that bands get less guidance/support but get bigger budgets and it's on them to make it work. If every album a band puts out sells 10-20 million copies it really gives the record company less leverage in negotiating the terms of new contracts. That's why when a band gets signed they always are for 2,3,4 records. the industry knows that's where the money is to be made.

 

[Burnoutboi]

My favorite band Teenage Fanclub lost its mojo after Songs From Northern Britain. I've had a very hard time listening to anything they've done since.

 

[Metroid]

Amon Amarth - Surtur Rising. Interesting that they are becoming more and more popular. They're one of those bands were NOTHING is bad, but much may not stand above the rest. Every album since and including Surtur Rising has had this mix, but no incredible anthems like Death in Fire or Twilight of the Thunder God had. That said, every album is still very enjoyable.

Children of Bodom - Easy call, Are You Dead yet? was the last banger. After that was very hit or miss, although Halo of Blood and Hexed are great.

Thing with Amon amarth and the popularity is the "Viking" gimmick finally caught on, I have some friends that don't like metal, but will jam out to them and Alestorm. Won't do anything else...

Bodom for me was Hatecrew Deathroll. I didn't hate that album when it first came out but because Follow the Reaper was such a masterpiece, I was a bit disappointed and knew anything after wouldn't do it for me at all. Which ended up true. They've become a band that has lots of filler for me.


My choices:
AFI - heard Sing the Sorrow and knew it was over lol

Rise Against - Siren song. Same as above. Solid album but listening to it, I knew they moving on and then eventually just became the Nickelback of punkrock.

Fear Factory - Digimortal was a joke of an album.
They made a comeback with Archetype, but then after that it all just seemed to sound on and the same and bland. Maybe due to the long time between the shit era of "numetal" faze.

 

[sigma six]

At the time it was Metallica, and the decent began in 1991.

They've been on a steady downward trajectory since the beginning imo...

I wouldn't go that far, although I understand the love for Kill Em All.

 

[ichabod13]

Motorhead dropped like a rock in water after "1916". And that record wasn't anything to write home about.
UFO.....I don't like anything after Michael Schenker left ( obsession ) .

 

[Ozz]

Thing with Amon amarth and the popularity is the "Viking" gimmick finally caught on, I have some friends that don't like metal, but will jam out to them and Alestorm. Won't do anything else...

Bodom for me was Hatecrew Deathroll. I didn't hate that album when it first came out but because Follow the Reaper was such a masterpiece, I was a bit disappointed and knew anything after wouldn't do it for me at all. Which ended up true. They've become a band that has lots of filler for me.

I agree. Alestorm is cool; different overall these days but the lasting power of the songs is better.

I can see what you mean about Bodom. While I consider that album one of the "classic originals", there are only a few songs I still listen to these days. I can listen to Hatebreeder & FTR straight through endlessly. Something Wild, I'll overlook mostly :p

 

[Metroid]

I agree. Alestorm is cool; different overall these days but the lasting power of the songs is better.

I can see what you mean about Bodom. While I consider that album one of the "classic originals", there are only a few songs I still listen to these days. I can listen to Hatebreeder & FTR straight through endlessly. Something Wild, I'll overlook mostly :p

Something Wild def could have used some more fine tuning, but everything was there and they had the right idea, just all over the place.
Lake Bodom to this day is my favorite song of theirs. It also was the first song of theirs I heard and it blew me away.

 

[Ozz]

Something Wild def could have used some more fine tuning, but everything was there and they had the right idea, just all over the place.
Lake Bodom to this day is my favorite song of theirs. It also was the first song of theirs I heard and it blew me away.

Best song off there by far. I've had the pleasure of hearing it live a few times, it still holds up. I think it was last year they did an all-HCDR-and-earlier tour, and they played a bunch from SW. They were great live but like you said, and I think everyone can agree, it's all over the place. Still enjoyable though! Every Time I Die was the first song I heard of theirs, right when FTR was released. That grabbed me immediately.

 

[Habsfunk]

Metallica, still waiting for the fall off. Likely won't ever happen because everything they put out is awesome.

Even Lulu?

 

[Nemesis Prime]

Even Lulu?

Ah, yes, Pitchfork. The pinnacle of music journalism. But yes, even Lulu. If anything it's a Lou Reed album and even then instrumentals are awesome.

 

[Metroid]

Best song off there by far. I've had the pleasure of hearing it live a few times, it still holds up. I think it was last year they did an all-HCDR-and-earlier tour, and they played a bunch from SW. They were great live but like you said, and I think everyone can agree, it's all over the place. Still enjoyable though! Every Time I Die was the first song I heard of theirs, right when FTR was released. That grabbed me immediately.

Yup, I was at that tour, was amazing to hear lots of the older tunes again!