I saw Blue Rose Code about 4 or 5 years ago at the Kitchen Garden Cafe. He played earnest Celtic leaning folk/jazz/chamber music that was good but very serious.
I just saw him at Black Deer and he was virtually unrecognisable – fun, funky, energetic and hugely entertaining. One of the highlights of the festival but a complete surprise.
Who else has completely changed direction? (Excluding Rod and Bob with their crooning)
Talking Heads come to mind. Byrne had his rather serious, nervy persona, his angst, and then they added a ten piece soul band and got funky and he seemed to lighten up. OK it wasn’t that simple. Chris Frantz has told the story, well his version. And then they were never quite as good again somehow. Remain In Light had it’s moments of course. Artists deal with their neuroses and lose the muse. It can happen.
Having read Remain In Love I must admit that I agree with Mr Frantz, in that he and his Mrs (Tina Weymouth) were a hugh part of the overall sound of Talking Heads and (IMHO) that was where the funk came from…not from Mr Byrne. Both sides did other things of merit, such as Tom Tom Club and soundtracks, but I think they’ll be the first to admit that none of it amounts to the Heads at their peak (with the possible exception of My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts)
Apologies, double post
Two of my favourite artists in 1996 were DJ Shadow (Endtroducing) and Beck (Odelay), and I awaited their next albums with baited breath, looking for some more soulful retro-tinged instrumental trip hop (from the former) and slacker folk rap (from the latter). Little did I know that neither would revisit the same well of inspiration again. Shadow has since gone off all sorts of hip hop and electronic tangents, and Beck has swung from Prince-style funk hipster to earnest singer-songwriter (neither of which really interest me).
Thanks for telling us which DJ Shadow album you meant 😉
Nothing wrong with precision! 🙂
Beck is a very good example although I disagree with your timings. Odelay was the pinnacle but Mutations and Sea Change were both excellent. His later releases were less impressive and unrecognisable from the artist that released Odelay.
I like Midnite Vultures and Sea Change. The last Beck album I ought was Modern Guilt, which I didn’t like apart from a couple of songs. If he’s now making albums that sound nothing like the records he did when he started out, I think that’s something in his favour, even if he sheds casual fans like me along the way.
I gave Midnite Vultures a go but it just didn’t do it for me. Then I just thought he had lost it and gone soft with his acoustic ballad stuff. Other opinions, etc….
I still love Mellow Gold and Stereopathic Soul Manure as well! I’m a real Beck snob.
Paul Weller has done it a couple of times. The Jam to the Style Council was one leap (albeit he was gently steering The Jam that way) and then solo was another left turn
Kevin Rowlands whims saw Dexys change for each album
I’ve done sound for Blue Rose Code three or four times, and each was different. Angtsy solo folkie, country (with MG Boulter on pedal steel), Caledonian folk revue, pile-driving death metal*. So it comes as no surprise, frankly. And next time will be different again.
(*) one of these is not strictly true
Elvis Costello as gone through a variety of genres over the years. Rock, Soul, Country, Jazz, Orchestral.
In more recent times, it’s hard to recognise the output of Self Esteem as the creation of one half of Slow Club.
Scott Walker from MOR crooning “moon in June” stuff to tuneless, avant garde and frightening offerings with impenetrable lyrics (and occasionally) meat based percussion equipment
It was all there in “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore”, if you’d listened closely!
I’m going to state an obvious one, which is Radiohead between OK Computer and Kid A. It all seems like a logical progression now, but at the time Kid A was a radical departure. “For those listeners who thought that the best thing on OK Computer was ‘Fitter, Happier'”, as one reviewer put it.
A double u-turn in three albums (which would technically mean a return to the original direction!) was Wilco moving from country/roots rock on Being There to warm psychedelia on Summer Teeth to disappearing up their own arses on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.
……and now, suddenly and gloriously, back to country hues for Cruel Country. Let’s have a hard copy soon, mind. Happy with a cd.
There was a limited CD release for RSD. Waiting for vinyl myself
And YHF is a great great album (and their biggest seller) with follow up A Ghost is Born almost as good. Then another change of direction with Sky Blue Sky
I do like YHF, but me sweet spot for Wilco is somewhere between the previous two albums.
Has any artist done two consecutive albums as different as Lines and Nite Flights?
Bimley!
How about three in a row, from Thievery Corporation: Culture of Fear (hiphop), Saudade (bossanova), The Temple of I & I (roots reggae).
@Gary and they are all bloody brilliant. The Temple of I and I was my most played album last year.
I’m very much agree.
I concur.
Is anyone else there a fan of Lloyd Cole’s ambient electronica album Plastic Wood?
The use of the word “else” above may be somewhat inaccurate.
All About Eve’s thid album (with Marty Willson-Piper on gtr) wasn’t great, but their fourth – and last – Ultraviolet, when they turned into a proto-Garbage industrial goth unit, was fab. It sold about three copies, and I bought two of them.
It’s rather good, though admittedly I think I like the fact that he did it much more than I like listening to it.
Tim Buckley – folk with a bit of jazz into skronky avant garde vocalise then another 90 degree turn towards funky rnb
Talk Talk?
It’s my Life to The Colour of Spring?
Ritchie Blackmore – Rock God to fey minstrel.
Good call.
Along the same lines, Dee Dee Ramone, punk rocker, to Dee Dee King, rap visionary: