The recent retirements of Richie McGaw and Dan Carter, together with the anniversary of George Best’s death got me musing about the phrase ‘going out at the top’, and how this seems to be more difficult in music than sport. Best’s CV (in)famously included Fulham and several US soccer teams in a long tail. Surely today he would have been a shoe-in as a pundit and walked away at the top in the early seventies.
In music – where age does not tap you in the shoulder in the same way as sport – it seems to be extra-ordinarily difficult to go out at the top never to announce a comeback tour or have that 3-star ‘return to form’ review after a decade away. So, your bands or solo artists who have done exactly that. No reforming, no comeback albums. And you have to have some kind of ‘top’ to get out of. This doesn’t mean that your last album was your best, but a clear sense that your powers are undimmed. Here’s my three for starters, or starters for three:
ABBA – surely the ultimate ‘going out at the top’ , as the tide of music and their own lives took them away from the group. Yes, The Visitors did not shift as many units as Arrival, but The Day Before You Came was their last single. Powers undimmed I say.
THE JAM – The Gift is rather unloved, but the late singles as good as anything they did, and its lead single was the Billy Elliott-soundtracking Town Called Malice. One final tour then gone.
THE SMITHS – Strangeways… is by no means their worst album, and the legacy is unblemished.
So your ‘Getting Out At The Top’ artists please. We can of course then endlessly debate whether they got to ‘the top’ wherever that is and if indeed they did get out at it. The Top being the stop on the Northern Line before Finchley.
First that comes to mind is Talk Talk – reached their peak with final two albums (Spirit Of Eden and Laughing Stock) and then disappeared with just a low key solo album to follow.
I guess if you assume Abbey Road as the real final album rather than Let It Be, then the Beatles would also count.
LEAVE Let It Be ALONE!!!
Free come to mind, and while “Heartbreaker” wasn’t their finest it certainly didn’t sound like a band out of ideas.
May I suggest Roxy Music. Twice:
1971-1975 – No way can Siren be described as anything but (at least) great.
Although technically “reformed”, it was with a significantly different line-up/personnel, so:
1979-1982 – As it appears to be their last studio album, Avalon is a mighty fine album to go out on.
Now @biggles I would say that while recording-wise you are absolutely on the money and Avalon is a great full stop, does not the quite frequent touring they did in the noughties mean they somewhat spluttered away. Or was that touring still a band at their peak even though they’d had no new material for over 20 years?
But @moseleymoles I was focussing on the albums; and that touring band seemed to get consistently good reviews…
However I do concede your point and, now having read the OP again, acknowledge that perhaps I should RTBQ!
Simon & Garfunkel.
Does My Little Town and the 1981 concert disqualify them?
I would also say Galaxie 500 but in their case the top wasn’t even glimpsed.
Surely S and G are the very definition of not letting it lie. Fractious re-unions, mooted new recordings, splits and so on – all very unbecoming. Morrissey and Marr spar at each other from safe distances…
But “No reforming, no comeback albums”. Ticks the box despite the constant whinging at each other.
Talking Heads agree The Heads muddies the water, but I’m allowing them as I don’t think anyone thought they were seeing TH themselves. Rather like ‘From The Jam’
Rilo Kiley are a good call. Great last album, no reunions to date. A feeling there was more and better to come even.
Oops wrong place. S and G surely fail the ‘never to announce a comeback tour’. Ok they’ve been, like Roxy, pretty nakedly just touring the legacy. But still just shows how difficult it is to resist the comeback dollar and leave it be. Did Simon do them just to help Art’s finances? Can’t help feeling that like Benny and Bjorn he is not short of a bob or two.
Simon & Garfunkel – My little town.
I think MLT is a great song & is a worthy entry to their back catalogue. It wont knock the likes of BOTW, Mrs Robinson or the Boxer from the podium, but an honourable & worthy addition nonetheless.
I was going to suggest The Band but then Wikied and found out that they had reformed, recorded and toured without Robbie.
A similar scenario for Talking Heads. The other three toured as The Heads after the split in 1992. But I’ll nominate them anyway. Naked, their last album, was not their most memorable but before that they’d done the marvelous True Stories.
A somewhat younger band, Rilo Kiley, fit the bill. Last real album was 2007 Under the Blacklight, which was by no means a stinker. Not officially declared dead until 2014 but it was a mere formality.
Hardly the same band without Byrne. I thought Naked was way better than True Stories (their worst?) and Little Creatures came in-between I believe.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience? Only 3 albums and Electric Ladyland was excellent.
The Grim Reaper prevented any reunions.
Ah I thought that enforced splits: Nirvana, JH Experience, The Doors (though they surely spoilt their legacy with Ian Astbury) etc didn’t really count.
Japan kind of count. Each album better than its predecessor before bowing out with the perfect swan song of Tin Drum. Then a final tour, fine live album to document it, Mick’s girlfriend shacked up with Dave and it was all over. Apart from Rain Tree Crow, which doesn’t count as it was a different moniker, a different sound and pretty darn brill anyways.
Great one. I saw the Tin Drum tour – fantastic live show, not least for Mick Karn’s crabwise stage moves.
Casts new doubt on that old adage “once you’ve tried a bloke who can expertly finger a fretless bass, you don’t go back”…
Captain Beefheart. No new music at all in the 28 years between the unimpeachable Ice Cream For Crow and his passing.
I have to say the Guillemots without knowing for certain that they have split up. All the indicators are that they have but pretty impossible to get any info on them. So, on the basis that they have split then Hello Land being their last and also best album was a pretty good way to end it.
Very much depends on which end of their career you love the most.
Apple Venus is my fave XTC album; the subsequent and final Wasp Star came from the same sessions and showed Gregory and Partridge still not slacking in the Catchy Tunes department.
The Specials
Depends where you draw the line?
More Specials is “officially” that last album by the band with that name, the must count as “leaving them wanting more”.
“In The Studio” was officially credited to The Special AKA (albeit with many of the same members) and is therefore a different band
I was going to suggest the Specials, but the 3rd album/change of name thingy slightly muddied the waters for me.
Sparklehorse. Each album as beautiful, mysterious and haunting as the last.
Muddy Waters
“There are no recordings of Muddy Waters in decline, because he never had one” – Charles Shaar Murray.
The White Stripes surely worthy of a nomination. The albums may have seen a slight decline in quality but still extremely popular at the time they called it a day (obviously plenty of time ahead for the dreaded re-union)
More recently The Walkmen called it a day (maybe a hiatus but who knows). IMHO their last two albums were there best two.
A couple of days ago I might have added the Coral to this but happily they’ve just announce a new album. Hope it’s aas good as their last, Butterfly House , which was a cracker
Thin Lizzy – Thunder & Lightning is a corker
The Police – Synchronicity is the best album the band released
Thin Lizzy 2004 –
Their Wikipedia entry sad to day
the police – mega cash-in reunion tour 2007-8
In my defence – Thin Lizzy ain’t Thin Lizzy without Phil Lynott, hence Black Star Riders (who are very good, by the way). But I take your point.
The Police? Forgot about the Reunion
REM. Signed off with a very good album, Collapse Into Now. Some of their later albums have been perhaps slightly less than stellar, but in truth they’ve never made a really bad one – and yes, that does include the much-maligned Around The Sun.
Have to disagree @black-type . The getting out was good, and so far not a sniff of a reunion or comeback album. However, every album from -oh Up – onwards had the wiff of ‘return to form’. I think their powers were at the very least somewhat diminished and though they are not truly bad they are a tailing off. Did they really get out at the top?
Stone Roses. Oh I forgot they made The Second Coming
Was going to say the Small Faces, until I checked my facts and found the dreaded words 1975 reunion, of which I wasn’t aware.
How about Cream?
Cream reformed for an appearance at their Rock’n’Roll Hall of Fame induction in 1993 and subsequently played a few dates in 2005.
Well 24 hours into this thread and we have a goodly list and some controversial candidates – rem, the specials etc.
But only one individual artist – the good Captain B – who went out at the top. No comeback albums, no reunion tours. Clearly individual artists find it harder to really retire than bands do to really split. Some digging has found Bill Withers and Linda Rondstadt. We’d have like to add Phil Collins to the list, but he’s found that there’s still an appetite for the Sussudio hitmakers work.
If you’re having Beefheart, then I’m calling his good buddy Frank Zappa who only got better toward the end of his life.
But hardly walked away, still working after being diagnosed with terminal cancer.
Screaming Trees.
Dust is a favourite with many fans and was their chart peak, although Sweet Oblivion sold more (and IMHO just pips it). There was an “unreleased demos” album a few years back but there have been no signs of the band reforming so I think they can be included.
how about Pavlov’s Dog
Just did those 2 pretty good albums that I know of…..*sits back waits to be shot down*
well scratch that
Pavlov’s Dog put out an album in 2010…Echo and Boo what an awful name.
I got one, I got one
Free
Last album Heartbreaker in 1973
Heartbreaker was OK-ish in parts but Tetsu had relaced Andy Fraser and Kossoff was so strung out he only appears on half the album (the bloke from Osibisa filled in). It’s by no means their finest hour.
“replaced”
It’s my favourite Free album. Go figure!
BTW whoever plays guitar, plays it really well.
Wendell Richardson from Osibisa stood in for Koss on the contract fulfilling Japanese tour.
Paul Rodgers also played a bit of guitar.
On the Heartbreaker album Koss was replaced by W.G. “Snuffy” Walden, who has since gone on to fame and fortune as a TV soundtrack composer (Roseanne and The West Wing to name two).
I agree it is less than their finest hour – Travellin’ In Style for instance belied its title and was less than stylish.
Orange Juice: self-sleeve-folding cottage industry origins, simply thrilling joygasm of a debut, horizon broadening popchart-troubling secondary adventure, fan’s favourite deepcut delivering extended e.p. topped of with emphatically titled final statement and then mic drop.
The Smiths definitely count, seeing as Strangeways is easily their best LP.
apart from the others.
It’s the only Smiths album that’s any good. It’s the one where the Marr:Morrissey ratio is heavily weighted to Marr.
Their most consistent album yes, but devoid of a killer track that makes us forgive the duffers (Meat Is Murder hello) on the other albums. Hence its somewhat obscured reputation.
This is crazy talk.
That was for tigger. Tigger is talking crazy.
Never!!
Pffftt. Strangeways is the most professional and competent of their albums but probably the dullest. Hatful Of Hollow and The Queen Is Dead are the two peaks.
Strangeways has Stop me if you think that you’ve heard this one before – if that’s not a killer track, then I am a banana.
Hatful Of Hollow is a compilation and, therefore, is disqualified.
Hatful’s a rare case of a compilation that feels like a proper album release. Anyway who cares, it’s brilliant.
Strangeways is very good, just not as good as the two I mentioned. It’s rather too conventional. Decent indie rock but not extraordinary. Somewhat by numbers.
Agreed.
Also, Strangeways has, ‘At the record company meeting…’ which is a tragic way to open a boring song.
Hmmm, I think ‘Paint A Vulgar Picture’ is one of Morrissey’s most astute lyrics. Pity he hasn’t taken heed during his solo career – “reissue, repackage, repackage” indeed.
This is the correct answer. I feel a bit like anyone arguing otherwise is trying a bit to hard to avoid being obvious – can we call it Deep Cut Syndrome? TQID and Hatful, absolutely. And Hatful does count for the same reason that Full House is the best J. Geils Band album – namely it’s got the best performances of the best songs and sod where it was recorded.
Re Free yeah well I guess
Making the benchmark pretty tough.
Well he wasn’t quite at the top as such, but Fred Neil retired from music and basically stayed retired. Think he did a few gigs to raise money for his marine biology but that hardly counts…
OP gets it spot on with Abba. Almost uniquely got better as they went on, and left us with The Visitors (surely the only song by a major pop act about East European dissidents raided by the secret police), and their greatest song The Day Before You Came.
TDBYC is indeed a great, great song, but I would have TWTIA and SOS as greater ones.
And The Name of the Game and Take a Chance on Me and Knowing Me Knowing You (aha) etc
I can’t believe they weren’t asked for Live Aid, and Live 8 – resisted both if they were; and unlike many others who also clearly didn’t need the money have never reformed. Strange that a band who at the time were seen as a plastic pop band have been able to leave a better legacy than many much more serious rock acts.
I was going to put forward Cocteau Twins, but had forgotten the actual final album (“Milk and Kisses”, which wasn’t that bad, but a definite tailing off) and was thinking that they’d signed off with “Four-Calendar Café”.
Actually, I just realised Siouxsie and the Banshees probably fit, though I haven’t listened to “The Rapture” in a long while admittedly…