Musicians who completely switched genres [Archive]

Ludovic

02-10-2009, 01:16 PM

Do bands count? Pink Floyd changed from somewhat happy, somewhat creepy british invasion-sounding psychedelic music to angry progressive rock. While I like both, the only similarity I can tell is the drums have the same sound to them at least until Division Bell (and I only exclude that cause I can't remember it musically in my mind.)

pulykamell

02-10-2009, 01:18 PM

Alanis Morisette used to be dance-pop Debbie Gibson-type music before becoming more alternative and aggressive.

Ministry used to be melodic synth pop before going industrial/metal.

You can make an argument for Radiohead, which started as melodic Brit Pop (see Pablo Honey and The Bends) before transitioning into the more abstract and electronic stuff like Kid A and Amnesiac.

David Bowie and Tom Waits straddle a number of genres, but I'm not sure they fit exactly what you're looking for.

The Beastie Boys started as a punk band before transitioning over to hip hop (and you can hear the transition-in-progress in License to Ill), but I don't think they ever released anything as a purely punk band.

Depeche Mode went from cheesy, dancey synth pop to some much darker (but still danceable).

Tori Amos headed an 80s synth pop band called Y Kant Tori Read (check it on Youtube) that had echoes perhaps of Kate Bush in it, but then moved to her chick-with-a-piano sound.

Genesis went from expansive prog rock to basically a backing band for Phil Collins pop rock.

HoboStew

02-10-2009, 01:21 PM

Ministry is exactly the kind of thing I was thinking, can't believe I forgot them. Yes bands count, although I would argue pink floyd was more of an evolution than an outright commercial style-grab.

pulykamell

02-10-2009, 01:24 PM

One more: New Kids on the Block who tried to remold themselves as a rap outfit in NKOTB.

JThunder

02-10-2009, 01:24 PM

The Osmonds have reinvented themselves as a country and western act in Bronson, Missouri.

jayjay

02-10-2009, 01:26 PM

The Osmonds have reinvented themselves as a country and western act in Bronson, Missouri.

Does that really count? Branson is where musicians who haven't recorded a new album in 30 years go to die.

Snowboarder Bo

02-10-2009, 01:29 PM

Neil Young has switched genres a number of times: folk rock, hard rock, rockabilly, big band swing, etc.

Frank Zappa wrote crazy doo-wop songs, then wrote whacked out rock tunes, then wrote even crazier jazz compositions and symphonies.

Brian Setzer went from a 3-piece rockabilly band to a 30 piece orchestra doing swing tunes.

Garth Brooks released a solo rock album (under the pseudonym Chris Gaines; it was related to a film project he was working on).

Many artists switch genres. Some are even successful at it.

Drain Bead

02-10-2009, 01:30 PM

Liz Phair went from edgy alt-rock to non-edgy pop rock recently.

jk1245

02-10-2009, 01:31 PM

Jewel went from folkie poet chick, to dance pop to country.

Pantera was a glam rock band before becoming metal. True, they wern't famous until after they made the switch, but it's still pretty dramatic.

Shodan

02-10-2009, 01:32 PM

Pat Boone (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_a_Metal_Mood).

Neil Sedaka studied at Julliard, if that counts.

Regards,
Shodan

Saintly Loser

02-10-2009, 01:37 PM

Brian Setzer went from a 3-piece rockabilly band to a 30 piece orchestra doing swing tunes.

Not applicable. What Setzer and the other practitioners of this genre call "swing" isn't, really. It's basically a rockabilly beat with arrangements for horns. Setzer is doing the same thing he's always done, just with more backup musicians.

No slam at Setzer intended -- I've loved his music since he was the front man for a local Long Island bar band known as the Tomcats, which went on to gain fame and fortune as the Stray Cats.

MrSquishy

02-10-2009, 01:45 PM

The Beastie Boys started as a punk band before transitioning over to hip hop (and you can hear the transition-in-progress in License to Ill), but I don't think they ever released anything as a purely punk band.
Hijack: Some Old Bullshit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Some_Old_Bullshit) was released in 1994, but it's all hardcore stuff from the 80's.

RealityChuck

02-10-2009, 01:50 PM

The Bee Gees. They went from melodic and lush pop rock to out and out disco. When they released "Jive Talking," the record company played it for DJs without identifying the group so as not to have them automatically turn it down.

Bob Dylan changes genres every couple of years -- from folk, to folk rock, to rock, to country, to gospel, to whatever strikes his fancy.

Simmerdown

02-10-2009, 01:52 PM

Nelly Furtado went from folk-rock to hip-hop/dance/r&b.

II Gyan II

02-10-2009, 01:56 PM

Does Beethoven pre- and post-Eroica count as a "genre" change? If so, maybe the very first one to do so.

silenus

02-10-2009, 01:57 PM

Richie Blackmore - went from Deep Purple and Rainbow to Blackmore's Night. Hard rock to Renaissance music.

Diogenes the Cynic

02-10-2009, 02:14 PM

Tommy Lee tried to form some kind of lame hip hop band a few years ago. "Masters of Mayhem" or something like that. He brought them to some kind of metal festival in Italy. They looked and acted like complete tools. They had to cut the set short because people were booing and throwing garbage at them.

ToeJam

02-10-2009, 02:17 PM

Kid Rock started out a Rapper, learned to play instruments and switched up to Nu-Metal/Rap-Rock before then going almost full out Southern Rock, and then sort of came back to a Hard Rock/ Americana Rocker.

rooostra

02-10-2009, 02:44 PM

10,000 Maniacs began as a Joy Division cover band

Miss Woodhouse

02-10-2009, 02:47 PM

Darius Rucker, lead singer for Hootie and the Blowfish, recently released a country solo album.

Le Ministre de l'au-delà

02-10-2009, 03:05 PM

I'm mistrustful of 'genre' as the CDDB defines it, but still...

Benny Goodman not only led a fantastic jazz big band, but he also recorded with Bela Bartok (http://www.amazon.com/Bartók-Contrasts-Mikrokosmos-Excerpts/dp/B0000027PE).

Then there's Wynton Marsalis' success as both a jazz and a classical trumpeter in the Haydn, Hummell and Leopold Mozart trumpet concerti (http://www.amazon.com/Haydn-Hummel-L-Mozart-Concertos/dp/B00077F95M/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1234299555&sr=1-1)

John McLaughlin's guitar styles have always straddled many genres - there's a tremendous difference between his work with Mahavishnu Orchestra, Paco de Lucia/Al DiMeola, Shakti and with Herbie Hancock on the 'Round Midnight' soundtrack.

Starving Artist

02-10-2009, 03:30 PM

Rick Derringer has gone from full-blown rock and roll to smooth jazz and Christian music.

tdn

02-10-2009, 03:42 PM

Jan Akkerman went from progressive jazz/rock to more or less classical.

Chefguy

02-10-2009, 03:46 PM

Fleetwood Mac went from blues to pop.

David Benoit went from jazz to smooth jazz. Yes, it's a complete switch.

Fats Domino went from blues/jazz to pop.

Nat King Cole went from jazz to pop.

Cannonball Adderly: ditto

Krokodil

02-10-2009, 03:53 PM

Kenny Rogers started off with a Doo Wop group, then a jazz band, then the New Christy Minstrels, then a lame rocker who flirted with drug references before striking paydirt as a country artist.

Lyle Lovett and k. d. lang started out as fairly mainstream country artists. He flirted with jazz and big band, she drifted towards lounge and standards. I love them both.

What single genre description could describe the careers of Ray Charles, Michelle Shocked, Elvis Costello or Wynton Marsalis?

Manduck

02-10-2009, 03:54 PM

I think Elvis Costello is jazz now.

Fiddle Peghead

02-10-2009, 03:57 PM

There was quite a distance between the Replacments' first album, the post-punk "Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash", and their last album, the pop classic "All Shook Down".

Claptree

02-10-2009, 04:04 PM

Metallica went from being good to .. something else.

astorian

02-10-2009, 05:08 PM

Exile went from scoring a #1 single ("Kiss You All Over") as a soul band to playing almost nothing but country music.

Tamerlane

02-10-2009, 05:11 PM

Penelope Houston - punk chanteuse with The Avengers to neo-folkie.

criminey.jicket

02-10-2009, 05:20 PM

Robert Plant! Led Zeppelin to The Honeydrippers to...to I'm not sure how to describe his collaboration with Allison Krauss on Raising Sand. It's all good, anyways.

eleanorigby

02-10-2009, 05:51 PM

Alanis Morrisette started off as bubble gum pop, no? What is she now? adult pop?

I came in here to say that Dennis DeYoung from Styx was classically trained, but Wikipedia says I'm wrong, thus ending a 20+ year bit of "knowledge" for me. He was a music teacher, does that count? He had a helluva voice.

Linda Ronstadt went from folk/bluegrass to standards to Spanish something.

Leif Garret went from teeny bopper icon to washed up wannabe that appears on some cop show on cable. He used to be cute, believe it or not.

Freudian Slit

02-10-2009, 05:54 PM

Depeche Mode went from cheesy, dancey synth pop to some much darker (but still danceable).

Oh yeah. They did "I Just Can't Get Enough." I have it on my iTunes, and I figured whoever I got it from must have mislabeled it, because there's no way the band that did "Policy of Truth" and "Strangelove" did that.

interface2x

02-10-2009, 06:15 PM

That's partially because Vince Clarke was their primary songwriter in the beginning while Martin Gore took over duties later. Some fun examples of Depeche Mode's style change (although, to be fair, "I Like It" was a cover) ...

I Like It (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpwVndh4Xpk) vs. A Pain that I'm Used To (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=visw9EoB3M8)
What's Your Name? (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5XieuteEaY) vs. Better Days (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwN_hzlxpxA)

ChockFullOfHeadyGoodness

02-10-2009, 06:16 PM

Smashmouth went from an average mid-90s third-wave ska/punk band to a retro-60s pop act and ubiquitous movie soundtrack fixture after "Walking on the Sun" became a huge hit.

Green Day released a new wave album under the name The Network, and a garage rock album under the name Foxboro Hot Tubs, although the latter was more of an evolution of the sound they explored on "Warning" rather than an abrupt switch.

JohnT

02-10-2009, 06:28 PM

There's, of course, the Beatles. They didn't exactly "switch" genres as so much moved between them, while creating a few of their own.

Knowed Out

02-10-2009, 06:32 PM

Vanilla Ice went from rap to numetal, which raced his 15 minutes of fame closer to the end.

Chefguy

02-10-2009, 07:38 PM

Sting has evolved to essentially a jazz singer, although it's something more than that. When Herbie Hancock played for one of his numbers, he had difficulty figuring out exactly what the hell Sting was doing. It's all about complex structures and rhythm changeups that defy classification.

Conway Twitty went from rockabilly to country pretty quickly, as did Carl Perkins.

gaffa

02-10-2009, 08:11 PM

I'm a big Todd Rundgren fan, and we've had to be very nimble. Started in a blues band, Woody's Truck Stop, then formed the American "English Invasion" pop band pop band The Nazz, then Laura Nyro-ish balladeer, psychedelic rock, prog rock, pretty much invented glam rock (http://pro.corbis.com/images/BE079435.jpg?size=67&uid={80DD3A23-0329-430D-9AC7-046135F40111}) and has had excursions into rap and re-recorded an album of his hits in bossa nova style and toured the album with a tiki bar (http://trconnection.com/pictures/gallery/usf.jpg). His most recent album is arena rock and called "Arena".

Apparently, he gets bored easily.

Charger

02-10-2009, 08:48 PM

The Osmonds have reinvented themselves as a country and western act in Bronson, Missouri.

Which made me think of this little video clip. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPpIkskxueU)

Eman Resu

02-10-2009, 08:57 PM

How about Miles Davis? Sure, he was always "jazz," but he was consistently on the ground floor of each major development in jazz from the mid-1940s on. I would say the difference between, say, Birth of the Cool and Bitches Brew is by order of magnitude greater than genre changes of most rock or pop bands that simply switched to a different flavor of rock or pop.

kunilou

02-10-2009, 09:13 PM

Aretha Franklin went from singing gospel at her church to Queen of Soul, to a short attempt at disco to being, well, Aretha Franklin.

Crafter_Man

02-10-2009, 09:26 PM

Cat Stevens?

Windwalker

02-10-2009, 09:46 PM

Billy Joel has to be the ultimate example of this. From a piano-driven pop rocker to a classical music composer is about as drastic a change as you can get.

pulykamell

02-10-2009, 09:54 PM

Billy Joel has to be the ultimate example of this. From a piano-driven pop rocker to a classical music composer is about as drastic a change as you can get.

Well, you can also add Paul McCartney and Joe Jackson to the list, too, for the pop-to-classical switch.

edit: Oh, and David Byrne and Stewart Copeland (drummer for the Police) also have written classical pieces.

edit2: And, of course, Frank Zappa.

Askance

02-10-2009, 09:55 PM

AC/DC started off as a glam rock outfit (hence the name).

Ultravox! went from fairly edgy rock to synth-pop (with a substantial change in personnel at the time of course).

And I consider King Crimson's sound of the Red/Lark's Tongues in Aspic era to be a quite different genre from the later Discipline/Three of a Perfect Pair era, although I'd find it hard to put the difference in words.

I think Elvis Costello is jazz now.I think you think wrongly. Jazz? Jeez.

pulykamell

02-10-2009, 10:00 PM

Ah, Elvis Costello is another one who ventured into the realm of classical music with his orchestral Il Sogno.

Sir T-Cups

02-10-2009, 10:20 PM

It wasn't a total switch, or even for an album...but Metallica released a cover of "Tuesday's Gone" and another song "Mama Says" that are very country.

So for two songs Metallica went from metal to country (and succeeded IMO).

astorian

02-10-2009, 11:21 PM

I came in here to say that Dennis DeYoung from Styx was classically trained, but Wikipedia says I'm wrong, thus ending a 20+ year bit of "knowledge" for me. He was a music teacher, does that count? He had a helluva voice.

Dennis has always been a huge fan of Broadway show tunes. He released an album of show tunes, and actually played Pontius Pilate in a touring company of "Jesus Christ Superstar" in the Nineties.

Terminus Est

02-10-2009, 11:33 PM

Michael Bolton - yes, that Michael Bolton - used to sing in a heavy metal band.

Hunter Hawk

02-10-2009, 11:48 PM

Nik Turner went from spacerock to jazz.

Robert Calvert issued several concept albums in various genres (folk-rock, proto-punk, and deliberately-cheesy pop)

Not really switching genres, but Jesse Sykes (country noir) has collaborated with Boris and Earth.

The Supersuckers and Hank III alternate between country and punk.

panache45

02-11-2009, 12:27 AM

Many opera singers have done pop albums . . . and I sincerely wish they would stop. And the Vienna Boys' Choir have done pop, with equal success. And of course there's Leonard Bernstein, with one foot in classical and the other on Broadway. And Yo-Yo Ma has done lots of non-classical.

And oh yeah, Ethel Merman did a disco album.

Windwalker

02-11-2009, 02:38 AM

Many opera singers have done pop albums . . . and I sincerely wish they would stop.

Who in particular are you referencing? I don't mind Andrea Bocelli's and Sarah Brightman's pop efforts, but those are the only two that come to mind.

footballisplayedwithyourfeet

02-11-2009, 02:49 AM

Queen started out as a seventies (hard) rock band and changes in the eighties to, well...something different. Also in the song Bohemian Rhapsody alone they change genres about three times.

Toxylon

02-11-2009, 03:02 AM

Almost any non-American artist / group with a succesful career spanning several decades would qualify here, it seems (save for AC/DC).

Compare Queen of '74 to Queen of '84, for instance. From piano-driven, falsetto-sung, multi-layered art rock to straight-ahead guitar rock with standard rock vocalization. Take Rush songs from the same years - nothing similar between 'em. Genre-switching abounds where careers last long enough.

Buford was no angel

02-11-2009, 06:37 AM

Michael Nesmith went from teen idol with the Monkees to become one of the fathers of what is often called "Americana" music with his First National Band.

unwashed brain

02-11-2009, 07:29 AM

Mike Patton is a living, breathing genre switch in progress.

Le Ministre de l'au-delà

02-11-2009, 08:24 AM

Who in particular are you referencing? I don't mind Andrea Bocelli's and Sarah Brightman's pop efforts, but those are the only two that come to mind.

I may get myself accused of snobbery, but neither Andrea Bocelli nor Sarah Brightman are opera singers, any more that Celine Dion is.

Saintly Loser

02-11-2009, 09:45 AM

Well, you can also add Paul McCartney and Joe Jackson to the list, too, for the pop-to-classical switch.

edit: Oh, and David Byrne and Stewart Copeland (drummer for the Police) also have written classical pieces.

edit2: And, of course, Frank Zappa.

Quibble: by the standards of the classical music world, Paul McCartney is not a classical composer. He has help (at least) with the orchestration. Certainly he writes the melodies, but he has a collaborator (Carl Davis) who does the orchestration.

This may be true of Copeland and Byrne as well.

Since the classical world considers orchestration to be as much a part of composition as melody (perhaps even more so, in some cases), a composer who doesn't orchestrate is, at most, a collaborator.

There's a (perhaps apocryphal) story that's told about Igor Stravinsky that illustrates my point. At some point in the 50s or 60s, when he was living in California, he was approached by someone at a major studio to score a film. He was intrigued by the idea, and mentioned a fee of $1 million. The studio was shocked at the amount, and said that they couldn't possibly pay that much, since they'd also have to pay the arranger and the conductor. Stravinsky was hugely insulted by the implication that he could not orchestrate his own work (after all, Stravinksy was and is recognized as one of the grerat orchestrators), and walked away from the deal.

If you want an example of a genre-switching musician who moved to classical music, check out Mark O'Connor. A brillian violinist who made his name in country music, then went beyond that to classical (much as Bela Fleck moved beyond country to jazz, or whatever he calls his highly idiosyncratic music).

Spoke

02-11-2009, 10:13 AM

Ray Charles - from the top of the R&B charts to the top of the Country charts.

Chefguy

02-11-2009, 10:15 AM

Ah, Elvis Costello is another one who ventured into the realm of classical music with his orchestral Il Sogno.

I believe he also wrote some of the numbers on his wife's (Diana Krall) most recent jazz album.

tripletaker

02-11-2009, 10:48 AM

Rodrigo y Gabriela (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodrigo_y_Gabriela) went from thrash metal to acoustic guitar. And they sound amazing.

tds1273

02-11-2009, 11:44 AM

Mike Patton is a living, breathing genre switch in progress.

Heh, good one.

Beck is another one like that. Name any genre, he's done it; often, a few different ones in the same song even.

Gwen Stefani went from pure, third-wave ska with No Doubt, to whatever shits-and-bananas she does now.

Omar Rodríguez-López and Cedric Bixler-Zavala went from punk legends At The Drive In, and have, album by album as The Mars Volta, unraveled into an increasingly incoherent mix of prog, jazz, and noise. (Deloused is still my all time favorite album though)

Incubus has gone from funk and a slight nod to hiphop(Fungus/Science), to pop-rock with a slight nod to prog(Halo2 soundtrack). Their all instrumental side project, Time Lapse Consortium, is a nice blend of jazz and funk.

Tom Morello went from Rage Against the Machine to his solo, acoustic, folk project of The Nightwatchman(very, very good btw)

cjepson

02-11-2009, 04:46 PM

Is it possible that no one has mentioned Little Richard? He went from being the most depraved rock & roller of the 50s to pure gospel (with some backsliding since).

Jerry Lee Lewis went from rockabilly to pure country.

Dion DeMucci went from doo-wop to Christian music, and recently to blues/country/classic rock.

David Johansen went from the pre-punk of the New York Dolls to lounge music as Buster Poindexter.

Jonathan Richman went from the surly punk of the Modern Lovers to his happy, childlike solo stuff.

John Lydon -- from punk (Sex Pistols) to very different postpunk (Public Image Ltd).

Brian Eno went from the twisted avant-pop of Roxy Music (and his first couple of solo albums) to ambient music.

Van Morrison went from British Invasion to Celtic soul.

The Moody Blues' first album was very much British Invasion style bluesy pop, after which they switched to cosmic chamber-folk-pop.

Donovan went from imitation Dylan to Celtic raga pop.

Jethro Tull started out as a quirky blues band before switching to cerebral prog rock.

Ají de Gallina

02-11-2009, 05:25 PM

eleanorigby

02-11-2009, 05:42 PM

Dennis has always been a huge fan of Broadway show tunes. He released an album of show tunes, and actually played Pontius Pilate in a touring company of "Jesus Christ Superstar" in the Nineties.

They used to play at the Friday night dances (very casual) at my HS in the early 70s. I was not yet in HS, but my older sister was. She remembers seeing them. :)

Simmerdown

02-11-2009, 08:45 PM

They used to play at the Friday night dances (very casual) at my HS in the early 70s. I was not yet in HS, but my older sister was. She remembers seeing them. :)

I distinctly remember people talking about them playing school auditoriums and gyms where I grew up. I was elementary school in the early 70's.

HoboStew

02-11-2009, 09:47 PM

Sorry to nitpick, but going from rock to pop or form heavy rock to death metal isn't "completely switched".
Also a gradual change in a long carrer is not the same.

A hypothetical example would be Cannibal Corpse doing country-western.Yeah that was pretty much the intent of the OP, but people seemed to be enjoying themselves so I let it go. Although to be fair my examples in the OP weren't the best. Ministry is who I really should have thrown out there. Their early albums sound every little like their later work.

LC Strawhouse

02-11-2009, 09:48 PM

How about Bobby Darin - he switched to folk/protest music in the Sixties.

The woman who does musical accompaniment on Whose Line Is It Anyway

Also, a whole slew of movie soundtrack composers (but that doesn't really count does it?)

Moirai

02-11-2009, 10:51 PM

Also, a whole slew of movie soundtrack composers (but that doesn't really count does it?)

I came in to mention one- Danny Elfman. As a young man, he had quite the punk edge (Perfect System, Capitalism... hell, the whole Only A Lad EP, I suppose), then progressed to more mainstream pop (although still smarter than most), and now he composes soundtracks almost exclusively. Remember, that doesn't mean "got a song on a soundtrack"- scoring a film takes time and talent- I think he says it take him a 6 hour day to score two minutes of film...

And he's been nominated for lots of awards for his scores.

:cool:

Sam Stone

02-12-2009, 12:12 AM

Colin James went from being a Stevie-Ray Vaughan style guitar rocker to being the leader of a big band.

The Eagles started off almost pure country, and evolved through country-rock to the occasional harder rock like "Life in the Fast Lane".

Le Ministre de l'au-delà

02-12-2009, 08:54 AM

What about session musicians like Michael Brecker (discography (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Brecker_Discography)), Tony Levin (discography (http://www.tonylevin.com/discography.html)) or Jay Graydon (discography - M; the complete discography is a 122 page pdf! (http://www.jaygraydon.net/Disco_M.htm)) They don't get to stick with one genre or they're out of work!