If you go to the second link I cite above, you’ll see that Nick Massi got into painting, too.
John Rutsey was the original drummer for Rush. He left after recording their first album in 1974.
There have been a few reasons stating why he left - health reasons and musical differences - but I think the most likely one is that he just wasn’t mentally in a place to pursue something as chaotic as music. He wrote lyrics and tore them up, he had trouble concentrating and various other things. Honestly, from 50 years on it seems more like depression than anything else.
Peter Best was the original drummer in the Beatles. After being kicked out he spent 20 years as a Civil Servant (employed by the Government) before returning to music.
**David Fenton **was lead singer in The Vapors (of Turning Japanese fame) and became a solicitor.
Pete Willis was an original member of Def Leppard. Kicked out for alcohol abuse he is now in property management.
K K Downing was a part of Judas Priest for decades. After leaving / being kicked out he seemed to be aiming for property management and running a golf course but according to Wiki it didn’t go well and he was forced to sell everything (including his rights to Judas Priest royalties) and he is now suing his advisors.
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Not sure that he ever really left music completely but Graham Fellows is mainly a comedian and actor but possibly still best known for the song Jilted John recorded under the name of Jilted John. The famous refrain going ‘Gordon is a moron…’
Perhaps a better example would be shipyard welder Billy Connolly who started as a musician in the Humblebums with Gerry Rafferty. Was doing increasingly longer and longer comedic song introductions before moving over to just doing stand up comedy… And then having his greatest musical success with a couple of novelty comedy records. Then continuing as a comedian, TV presenter and actor - He was in one of the X Files films!
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She went back to school and got her J.D from Harvard.
How about Eric Stefani, who along with his sister Gwen founded the band No Doubt? He left the band right after the recording of their 1995 breakthrough, Tragic Kingdom, in order to pursue a career in animation.
He’s been in another band the last couple years: Giants in the Trees. They have two albums on Spotify if you are interested.
Another one that slipped my mind - bizarrely one of my all time faves. It’s another of those sabbatical-but-drawn-back examples.
Howard Devoto, after Magazine (Shot By Both Sides etc) and Luxuria, disappeared from view for about a decade, apparently working for a photo agency, before starting to dabble again/get into reunions etc in the early 2000s.
I’m pretty sure he also had a sabbatical of sorts in the early years, leaving the Buzzcocks to go back to school and take his A-levels (exams) before starting Magazine.
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Todd Rundgren’s band Utopia may have been the most geeky band ever.
Keyboard player Rodger Powell developed one of the very first midi sequencers while still on the band. After they broke up, he became a professional software engineer working for Silicon Graphics, Waveframe and Apple, developing the audio systems of Final Cut Pro.
Drummer Willie Wilcox also got into software development and works for Bally, and does audio development for their state-of-the-art gaming machines.
Previous drummer Kevin Ellman quit to run the family business *Beefsteak Charlie’s *and eventually became a “wealth management consultant” and certified financial planner appearing on CNBC on a regular basis.
In the Rush bio-documentary thing from some years back, Geddy said that they basically had to replace Rutsey because his diabetes would prevent him from touring. Sounded like it was a tough decision and a sad thing for everyone involved.
As I’m responding to a post by Jonathan Chance, it is not without irony that I note that an original member of Styx, John Curulewski, departed the band under very similar circumstances to the departure of Gregg Rolie from Journey noted above. Band was just getting big, and he felt he had to choose between it and a young family. Family it was. I see from Wikipedia that he didn’t quite leave the industry entirely- he apparently continued to play in a couple of bands that just stayed local in Chicago- but he certainly deliberately chose to leave the fame-and-fortune part of the industry. Eventually became a guitar teacher and, sadly, died at 37.
Krist might be out of music, as a business, but he still plays and also DJs at our local community radio station KMUN.
Here is playing accordion with Giants in the Trees.
Pete Best, who was already mentioned here, is probably the archetype of this person. Yeah, he was kicked out of the Beatles - and he could have easily regrouped, practiced rock drumming and improved his abilities, and then gotten back at it. He was already a known musician with an existing fan base and, hell, he was the former drummer of the Beatles. He simply decided not to.
The official explanation is that Rutsey left due to health issues. But many have speculated Lifeson & Lee viewed him as a good but not a “great” drummer, they wanted the latter, and so were looking to replace him without his feelings being too hurt. His health issues may have been a convenient excuse. At any rate, it undoubtedly had a negative impact on Rutsey’s mental wellbeing. A sad situation.
Great responses so far! Thanks!
Just wanted to clarify that I didn’t intend in my OP to include musicians who dropped out due to injuries, mental health problems, drug problems, or reasons other than “I don’t want to do this anymore.” I also didn’t mean to include musicians who got kicked out by the other members. My thinking about Robinson was, “Man…you were a member of a (couple) very financially successful group(s). Why not ride that for a few years? Do some guesting on other albums. Form ‘The David Robinson Group’ or something. Teach other drummers. Whatever.”
Shouldn’t be quoting myself, but I am.
Krist Novoselic is now just a local dude. I met him about 10 years ago when I was working in the office of a window/door installation company. This tall dude comes in with a job bid for a large window in a house across the river. Totally normal average rural guy driving a Ford F150, until I looked at the name on the job bid, and I said, “There can’t be two of you.” And he just smiled.
Sometimes people make enough money and they want to do something other than all the touring, traveling, and crap that goes with the fame.
Andrew Ridgely of Wham! pretty much did that. It helped that his old friend and bandmate George Michael was exceedingly generous with splitting songwriting royalties, enabling Andrew to go off to live in Cornwall with Keren from Bananarama.
Curulewski was considerably taller than the rest of the band, and I wonder if the aneurysm that killed him might have been related to Marfan Syndrome, which can also lead to extreme height.
For that matter, their bassist, Chuck Panozzo, has battled AIDS for nearly 30 years, and is a fairly well-known activist and his autobiography is on recommended-reading lists for GLBT teenagers and their friends and families. He does talk about Styx only because it’s the main reason the book exists, and it’s mostly about what it was like for him growing up gay in an Italian Catholic family in the 50s and 60s, and later being that way in the world of 70s arena rock.
He did leave the band in the early 1990s and has since rejoined a few times for short tours. Last I heard, he’s still in OK health for a man with AIDS who is about 70 years old.
Would Billy Joel count? He was a hugely successful recording star who walked away from recording after the release of his album River of Dreams in 1993. Although he continues to tour, his only other release was a classical album in 2001, Fantasies and Delusions, which was performed by Richard Hyung-ki Joo. But he has basically called it quits on the music recording business.
No, I don’t think so. With tix at $200+ for his recent tours, I consider him to still be in the business. Failing to record new albums is a different thing.
Thanks for this post gaffa. I was going to mention John “Willie” Wilcox earlier but I was kinda sketchy on the details and his Wikipedia page wasn’t a lot of help. I recall that he also worked for Bell Labs at one time, but honestly don’t remember if that was before or after Utopia.