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Bands less than the sum of their parts?


odysseus

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Have you ever looked at the line up of musicians for a new project and thought, "Wow, this is going to be fantastic!" then when they release an album you end up quite disappointed?

Chickenfoot springs to mind, and also Gizmodrome (unpopular opinion alert!)  though I think that one was more down to my expectations than anything they were doing wrong.

Obviously, it will be subjective...

Any others?

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I was rather fond of Gizmodrome (front row at their Scala gig helped) but in a strange bit of overlap my suggestion would be Oysterhead - Stewart Copeland, Trey Anastasio and Les Claypool. Now I love the Police, Phish and Primus but Oysterhead just didn't click. They'vejust announced some reunion shows for some time in 2020, coincidentally.

 

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10 minutes ago, toneknob said:

Oysterhead - Stewart Copeland, Trey Anastasio and Les Claypool. Now I love the Police, Phish and Primus but Oysterhead just didn't click

 Gotta say I loved Oysterhead, I guess it just shows music is so subjective.

The one that probably missed the mark for me was the Transplants.

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38 minutes ago, Bassfinger said:

I'd disagree with Them Crooked Vultures.  Love their work.

Me too. And they were great live. I was sat directly behind JPJ at the Albert Hall when he was playing the keyboards. He plays better bass with his feet than many do with their hands!

Can anyone think of any 'supergroups' who exceeded expectations though?

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2 minutes ago, Heathy said:

Can anyone think of any 'supergroups' who exceeded expectations though?

Mad Season.

Cream

Bad Company

Down

Temple of the Dog

A Perfect Circle 

Also, guilty pleasure but I quite liked Billy Corgan’s Zwan side project...

 

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If you mean super groups formed by geezers from other successful bands then + 1 for Audioslave. RATM and Soundgarden are two of my fave bands from the 90s but I was well underwhelmed by Audioslave's albums. At least the ex RATM guys made amends with Prophets of Rage.

As for Chickenfoot, IMO it never looked that promising  on paper in the first place, not after the various dull G3 incarnations and woeful post DLR Van Halen output. Add the drummer from one of my least fave bands of all time and my expectations were low yet Chickenfoot still failed to live up to them

Edited by Barking Spiders
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13 hours ago, thodrik said:

The Winery Dogs

Audioslave

Queen + Paul Rogers

Them Crooked Vultures 

I don’t dislike the above bands or collaborations, but I was never blown away by their output compared to how technically brilliant each band member was as an individual.

I can't agree about The Winery Dogs I'm afraid.

For me, the 2 albums they've done so far are utterly fantastic.

I guess that's they great thing about music and it's complete subjectivity!

Good idea for a thread mind you!

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It seems quite common in lots of amateur  bands I watch. It’s quite a skill to play in a band and sound like a band rather than a bunch of individuals playing parts of a song in the same room. 
 

Supergroups would come under the same umbrella. Taking the most talented (and often egotistical) members of several different bands who have never worked together and putting them into one band is a recipe for disaster. 

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39 minutes ago, TimR said:

Supergroups would come under the same umbrella. Taking the most talented (and often egotistical) members of several different bands who have never worked together and putting them into one band is a recipe for disaster. 

I've long suspected the problem is that these groups just don't have a great writer among them. Your Billy Sheehans, Paul Gilberts, Steve Vais, etc.,  are incredibly accomplished instrumentalists, but are they necessarily the people you'd want writing the songs that your supergroup is going to play?

The Brian Wilsons, Pete Townshends, Ray Davieseses of the world weren't necessarily the best musicians in their groups, but they knew how to write a good tune and had groups who were prepared to let them lead on the writing.

I say this not to suggest that good writing is mutually exclusive from impressive musicianship; more to suggest that a lot of these supergroups overlook what made their original bands worth listening to in the first place.

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13 hours ago, Heathy said:

Can anyone think of any 'supergroups' who exceeded expectations though?

Not exactly a supergroup but certainly far in excess of the sum of their parts: The Postal Service.

Death Cab For Cutie have written and recorded a fair number of great songs, but when compared with their overall back catalogue the proportion of decent songs to filler is depressingly low.

DNTEL have yet to create anything memorable apart from  "(This Is) The Dream of Evan and Chan" which is The Postal Service in all but name.

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