I was about to make some joke about JPJ being dead, but apparently, he’s still alive.
Have super groups fallen out of favor or am I just out of touch?
Yes.
Next question.
What about Silk Sonic, with Anderson .Paak and Bruno Mars? Both stars in their own right, and that album is amazing.
Well, that’s the thing. The first draft of my earlier post included the comment that they should do it while they still can because Jonesey’s been around for, like, a pretty long time.
Do today’s supergroups qualify if they don’t get any airplay? Probably, but it seems to put an asterisk by their name for me. I’ve seen a couple of The Hollywood Vampires videos on YouTube but I don’t recall hearing their music on other venues. Same for Chickenfoot. But I’m probably just out of the loop.
The Traveling Wilburys, were a true supergroup, imo.
Velvet Revolver got airplay, and Silk Sonic still does. By airplay, I assume you mean “played on the radio”, which is not really how young people listen to music anyway.
Traveling Wilburys were definitely a supergroup. I have never heard of Chickenfoot, although I kmow all the people in it.
Chickenfoot seems to have many millions of streams on Spotify, with their largest song at about 10mm.
I am old and out of touch. Get off my lawn while I go spin up the Victrola.
Yeah, that’s indeed how the kids listen these days. boygenius has more than 500 million song streams, with their top song at about 63 million streams.
Yeah, my impression is that supergroups have not “fallen out of favor” except to the extent that groups, in general, have fallen out of favor.
“Hootchie-mama outfits” Come on… you sound like Grampa Simpson.
Speaking of that… the 2001 “Lady Marmalade” song for Moulin Rouge was a sort of girl pop supergroup, considering that it was Pink, Mya, Christina Aguilera, and Lil’ Kim, although I think it was a one song thing, not anything more long-lived.
Yeah, I’ve always had the impression that supergroups are more for fun than musical perfection or commercial success.
Per wikipedia’s Supergroup page:
More recent groups formed are:
Elegant Weapons - a collaboration of former Judas Priest, Pantera, and Rainbow band members.
El7z Up - a Girl K-Pop collaboration
Maybe in general, but I doubt that Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce were feeling the warm fuzzies of a fun friendship.
This group is still touring after 30+ years, the supergroup has lasted longer than all of the bands the individuals have come from
IMHO, they’re not a particularly good example of what I think of as a supergroup. They tick some of the boxes, but not others. When I think of a supergroup, I think of a group that…
- Has a name of its own (not just named after one of the members)
- Has released at least one album under that name
- A significant portion of their output is original material (they’re not just a cover band)
- Has a specific set of members, which may change a little over the group’s lifetime (e.g. the death of Roy Orbison in The Travelimg Wilburys) but is not just a revolving door membership
The New Pornographers have put out about a dozen albums as a Canadian indie supergroup. I thought they qualified as recent but they actually started in 1999. Their last album came out this year, though.
Sadly, they just lost too many members. After Petty passed, someone was asked if the group would continue and the answer was “never say never”. but it’s gonna be tough.
And “Y” more often than not is “Coldplay”.
Given that most of the super group references are several decades old (including Lady Marmalade), I would say that super groups have fallen out of favor, as has the sort of guitar and drums-driven rock music that these groups typically played.
I kind of feel like even with current rock band, people tend to know the band or its songs, not individual musicians. I don’t imagine people getting excited for a supergroup made up of Chris Martin from Coldplay, the guy from Imagine Dragons, the drummer from twenty one pilots (assuming they use drums) and some other guy from some other band that sounds like Imagine Dragons (maybe OneRepublic).
Pop singers get featured on each other’s music all the time. But a supergroup containing Ariana Grande, Charlie XCX, Dua Lipa, and Ice Spice might be confused with the new seasonal specials menu at your local Starbucks.
They can always redo “Lady Marmalade”. I’d listen.