The purpose of this thread is to talk about bands, musicians, and anyone in the music industry who you feel sold out, and to argue with others about whether or not they actually did sell out, or that they genuinely changed with the times and still wholeheartedly believed in the music they were making and loved it.
To begin, I’d like to start out with one of my favorite bands, Heart. I remember an old coworker talking about how he liked Heart, but how sad it was that they sold out in the 80’s and became a very commercialized glamour/pop band and totally lost their hard-rockin’ roots. This kind of surprised me but on reflection, maybe he had something. That being said, I really like Heart from Magic Man to their 80’s hits like All I Wanna Do Is Make Love To You.
So, did Heart sell out? Obviously their music and image changed drastically from when they started… but was this a genuine change because it’s what they wanted to do, or did they do it just to stay relevant, stay on the charts, and keep making money.
And beyond Heart, feel free to discuss your own candidates for who sold out as time progressed, and how upset it made you, or how you couldn’t care less and enjoy all of their music!
I seem to remember that Foreigner became famous and sold out simultaneously – somehow.
But I’m thinking the epitome of a sellout is Jefferson Starship – a ghost of Airplane that should have gone quietly into the grave but was kept alive for commercial reasons. Something very much like Dick Cheney.
Heck - it would be easier to discuss who didn’t sell out.
Yes, Heart sold out for a while there - during the MTV/Hair Metal era. Look at Nancy complaining about how she was objectified in videos while the newly-heavier Anne was visually shunted aside. And the music was much more polished and packaged vs. their earlier period.
No slam - and they sure as heck recovered nicely, stepping back, stripping down and focusing on their music and legacy. It’s part of the business. And music is a business.
Hmm - who is an act/artist that had a reputation for not selling out, that either had not shown their true colors, or ended up selling out later?
I would go with Metallica. Getting up to the Black album, fans would take a bullet for Metallica because of their integrity. Much past the Black album, it has not been nearly as pretty. The Napster issue got some bad press - even though they had a legitimate complaint. But the movie Some Kind of Monster? Eeeash. Lars selling multi-million modern art? Group Therapy? I think James even cried - or at least wore glasses Sigh.
Speaking of Jim Steinman - it was considered a huge sellout by Andrew Eldritch to go with a Steinman production for the Sisters of Mercy “reboot” album Floodland…a rejection of the punkier Goth roots for more bombast - and yet it’s my 2nd favourite Sisters album now.
Selling out is such a dubious, odd statement. One of my favorite bands of all time, the Clash, famously signed to a major label and had no problem selling their music to sell all kinds of stuff. I mean, that’s selling out in some regard, right? But I agree with WordMan, it’s a business. Someone is getting paid and it might as well be the artist.
I agree that Metallica probably wears the crown here. They were part of a movement that was all about authenticity and being close to the fans, and then you see pictures of James Hetfield with a Prada bag in Beverly Hills. I’m not a fan of the band but I don’t see the big deal.
The Police’s career had much to do with selling out, I guess. The band bleached their hair blond for a Wrigley’s commercial, shamelessly rode the punk bandwagon when in fact the band were all unfashionably accomplished musicians, and the many commercial tie-ins to their music. Again, doesn’t affect my feelings for the band. And on the other hand, Miles Copeland’s management brought the band to places where there hadn’t been much exposure to Western rock, like Egypt and India.
1980s/90s Heart were pretty sold out. But even Pretenders went that route, with the Tom Kelly/Billy Steinberg penned “I’ll Stand By You.” To be fair Chrissie Hynde has a writing credit and it’s a great song.
Heart didn’t sell out as much as they bought out.
With the classic line-up gone. The Mike/Roger Fisher and Ann/Nancy Wilson romantic relationships were done, Steve Fossen was voted out, and others members quit. I honestly believe they should have changed the band name at this point to the The Wilson Sisters or something, since it wasn’t Heart anymore.
They struggled with songwriting and their new sound for two pretty awful albums until Ann recorded the duet with Mike Reno “Almost Paradise” for the *Footloose *soundtrack written by Eric Carmen. This apparently convinced them to use other accomplished songwriters such as Jim Valance, Holly Knight, Bernie Taupin/Martin Page, Mark Mueller,Tom Kelly/Billy Steinberg, Dianne Warren, etc…
What they really sold out on was their image. They had worked so hard to prove themselves as serious musicians only to turn into the MTV pop-song poster girls they hated being labelled as a few years earlier.
Back in the day, Metallica fans saw the first sell-out as the song “One” and the subsequent video. For a band that had built it’s fan-base and reputation without radio airtime or MTV, it raised alot of eyebrows.
I deleted a big, long, name-dropping post because it boils down to this question for me:
What makes a musician a sell out? Is it when they treat their music as a day job? Or, is it something that we can only tell after a musician has success?
There was this AOL commercial back in the day with a suburban white-bread couple going on about their newfound ability to get online. Then, out of nowhere Snoop Dog (or P. Diddy… not too sure which) shows up and says something like “for schnizzle” (or whatever his tagline was back in 1997.)
(Shit, I found it. WTF! Ben Stiller is in this? Was everybody high? (And it’s Snoop, not Diddy.))
Anyway, I started a discussion about whether Snoop Dogg was “selling out” by being in this commercial, and most people said “No” - that there was no sellout because one of the main goals of Rap/Hip-Hop/etc culture was to get as much money as possible… so no sell out was possible.
Regardless, the obvious answer to this question is The Beatles, who changed their entire look and stage manner in 1962 specifically so they would be more accessible.
Def Leppard are seen as pretty much the epitome of '80s hair-metal.
Their first two albums were very different to the bubblegum hard rock they are remembered for. If anyone even remembers them.
The first album was like really heavy Led Zeppelin, and their second album was like AC/DC with more than three chords and a basic blues scale. They weren’t original, but they were very, very good at what they did.
Then they fired a young alcoholic guitarist called Pete Willis and went all out chasing the $$$.
IIRC, at one stage in their early career they were opening for the Sex Pistols. A few years later they were releasing generic '80s power-ballads.
Liz Phair should be on this list somewhere. She was an indie rock darling for her first couple of albums and then took a hard right turn into radio-friendly pop.
Nuts. Nobody in rock has sold out since Dylan forever mocked it to death at Newport in 1965.
Have people and bands changed to become more popular or keep a career going after their initial popularity or tried to keep up with the fickleness of the younger buyers? Sure. As WordMan said, only like, you know, everyone.
Rod Stewart’s earliest solo albums were singer-songwriter classics. That was in the heyday of the singer-songwriter. When that era faded, he did anything and everything, from disco to classic pop. Did he sell out or did he insure himself a career doing what he loved - making music and performing?
Neil Young has a reputation of not selling out. He always made the albums he wanted in the style he wanted and never cared whether his fans were zagging when he was zigging. Is that not selling out or insuring himself a career doing what he loved - making music and performing? And if so what exactly is the difference between him and Rod Stewart?
KTRU, Rice University Radio had their own definition of selling out back in the 80’s-90’s, basically if anyone knew about the band besides the staff, they had sold out and were promptly dropped from rotation. This IMHO is what makes this question, pointless.
The Sex Pistols were invented to sell clothes from Malcolm’s store.
The Clash signed with a Major Label.
Mike Watt does session work for Pop Singers.
Who cares? Not me. Musicians have to eat, so sell records or go to work at Dimmu Burger.
Just the opinion of an old punk who has figured out he likes to play Jazz and Funk.
Thanks for the interesting opinions here everyone. It seems a lot of folks like me are confused a bit by the selling out accusation, and even if we agree that someone sold out, it doesn’t always mean we like them less. Very interesting!
Who here would say that they are extremely bitter, angry or otherwise disappointed about their favorites who sold out?
Creating music that is intentionally not what they want to do, or believe is the best music they can make, but that they believe will sell more.
The problem is that it’s easy to state, but hard to identify in the wild. When a band changes direction entirely, is it because they were after something new artistically, or because they want to cash in?
I graduated high school in 1983, so my nominees are affected by when I was in high school/college -
The **Bangles **recorded Manic Monday because it was by Prince, and even though it was terrible, would make a lot of money.
They then recorded* Eternal Flame* to coincide with prom season because hey, credibility’s already ruined.
The Tubes’ One in a Million. Same band that did White Punks on Dope. Was this the first time they were able to come up with something catchy, or was it an ironic wink at pop with a good payday?
Liz Phair, with her 4th album, relentlessly sold her sexiness over the music, and a production team that had worked on Avril Lavigne and Britney Spears’ songs slicked up the sound.
I’ll think of more later, but it’s always hard to say if it was a sincere artistic decision or a cynical one when you run into these.
I’m not sure if Heart sold out in the 80s, even though none of their 80s stuff is in my top 10 Heart favorite songs and their style changed.
Conversely, I think that Panic! at the Disco’s latest album is a sell out, because pop punk has been going in an electronic direction since the mid 2000s and the latest album is very electronic. Granted, it is a trend which they helped to start, but if you concentrate on things that people expect of you that you have done before, even if it is not at the core of your music, it can still be a sellout (cf: Sugar Ray.)
I say conversely because despite the band going in a calculatedly expected direction, there are still a few classic songs on the album. Girls/Girls/Boys ranks up there with anything on Fever.
But some shifts seems a bit more jarring. Rod Stewart always seemed a bit of an opportunist; it’s a bit of a waste, IMHO, but only somewhat of a surprise. Watching Phil Collins / Genesis go full Pop Song was a bit gob-smacking at first, then just a bit sad. Especially when Peter Gabriel seemed to be going commercial, but in a way that seemed to retain integrity, with the World Beat/Amnesty stuff in context…
I dunno. Except for a few really, really egregious cases, where do you draw the line between a band known to a small handful of fans that grows up, gets professional assistance at every level, and develops their sound into something more powerful and polished, with a wider appeal… and a “sell out”?
Remember the manta of the early 80s (chant with me now) - “I’ve grown. You’ve changed. He’s sold out.”
