Bands or artists that completely changed genre

[anton pulisov]

I was listening to an entire album of some interesting atmospheric kind of ambient stuff on an American college radio station the other week. Thought it was quite good and I was curious who it was. DJ said, "You've been listening to Nine Inch Nails." I nearly fell off my chair. Nine Inch Nails, the 90s nu-metal shite? Apparently so.

[Sean of the Shed]

Moody indie trio Doves started life as electronic dance act Sub Sub.

[Hot Pepsi]

I was listening to an entire album of some interesting atmospheric kind of ambient stuff on an American college radio station the other week. Thought it was quite good and I was curious who it was. DJ said, "You've been listening to Nine Inch Nails." I nearly fell off my chair. Nine Inch Nails, the 90s nu-metal shite? Apparently so.

Nine Inch Nails are not "nu-metal shite," although they certainly influenced a lot of it for better or worse.

I believe he/they are generally regarded as "Industrial," especially the earlier hits. Nu-Metal generally implies some element of hip-hop or funk. I don't think NIN ever really did that.

But it is relevant to this thread in that Trent Reznor has now shifted very successfully into doing film scores, often with Atticus Ross. They've won two Oscars (Social Network and Soul) and an Emmy (Watchmen).

[diggedy derek]

The 'completely' of the thread title makes this quite a hard bar to pass. As HP notes above, Nine Inch Nails moving from doomy industrial songs to ambient mood music isn't so unlikely.

There's quite a big move between the abrasive bedroom experimentation of Cabaret Voltaire in the mid-70s

to the smooth Chicago house of the late 1980s

[G-Man]

Status Quo: Psychedelic merchants in the '60s; boogie rockers in the '70s.

Bee Gees: Songwriting popsters in the '60s and early '70s; disco merchants as of 1975.

Kool & The Gang: Serious funksters in the '70s; disco-popsters and soul balladeers in the '80s.

And then there were The Beatles...

[diggedy derek]

Bee Gees maybe gets over the 'completely' qualification there, that's a good shout.

Tyrannosaurus Rex's trajectory from hippy folk to glam rock chart toppers is an interesting one.

[delicatemoth]

Bee Gees also had a psychedelic prog phase with their album 'Odessa'.

Norman Cook's move from The Housemartins to dance music warrants inclusion.

The Shamen were originally psychedelic indie poppers who sounded nothing like 'Ebeneezer Goode'.

[gjw100]

Herbie Hancock probably wins this one - he hasn't so much changed genres as moved though and occasionally returned to a good dozen of them since the early 60's. If you just compare 'Maiden Voyage' to 'Rockit', that's some transition.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Captain Sensible certainly raised a few eyebrows among my 'punk' friends at school when he released "Happy Talk".

[Satchmo Distel]

Isley Brothers: from gospel to R&B to psychedelic soul to smooth soul to a collaboration with Beyonce.

But a lot of acts with that background had to adapt to big changes in the predominant genre of black music or become a nostalgia act. Commodores, Earth Wind & Fire, Bar-Kays.

What is truly revolutionary is to switch genres for entirely self-driven artistic reasons, like John Coltrane going from hard bop to modal jazz to free jazz, even when commercially very risky. The Beatles were perhaps taking a risk but were hardly in danger of falling off the charts like the Beach Boys did.

[steveeeeeeeee]

Primal Scream: Jingle Jangle indie-pop to Heartbreakers tribute act to encapsulators of the Acid House summer of love to Rolling Stones tribute act to something a bit more original and theirs

The Byrds: Jingle Jangle pop to Sweethearts of the Rodeo

[Gangster Octopus]

Adam And The Ants - underground to pop. Just like T Rex.

[Etienne]

Scott Walker.

[Plodder]

Ministry, The Stranglers, Bad Brains.

[Sporting]

How about Genesis?

[Sits]

If individual artists are permitted then Midge Ure is a great candidate, from teen pop with Slik, punk with The Rich Kids onto electro with Ultravox. Who themselves morphed into something a lot more stadiumy.

And Mick Hucknall, from the punkish Frantic Elevators to the, well, to Simply Red.

[Jah Womble]

Nine Inch Nails were/are primarily an industrial rock act who predated nu-metal by about a dozen years.

I’ll just go with some of the examples I used when we did this last time:

Roxy Music
Glam artisans to lounge-lizardy pop sophisticates.

Human League
Kraftwerk-inspired synth outsiders to sparkly, all-conquering chart royalty.

The Beloved
Peel-favoured guitar also-rans to trip-hoppy Top 40-botherers.

David Bowie
Well, you know…

[G-Man]

The Beatles were perhaps taking a risk but were hardly in danger of falling off the charts like the Beach Boys did.

That gave them freedom to experiment, but it still took artistic courage to move from "You're Gonna Lose That Girl" to "Tomorrow Never Knows" in the space of only a year, never mind the madness of inflicting "Revolution #9" upon the people who came for "Obladi-Oblada".

Between "I Want To Hold Your Hand" topping the charts and "Strawberry Fields" was three years. Even if three years then culturally lasted longer than they do today, and even given that "Strawberry Fields" was just a stage in an evolution rather than an abrupt re-invention, that is a remarkable change of genre (within the broader pop genre, of course).

[diggedy derek]

Genesis and Roxy Music didn't really change genre though

[diggedy derek]

That's an interesting point about The Beatles not risking their chart position. I'd argue that at that time the idea of making a living from being a rock star was a lot vaguer and uncertain than it was now. There must have been a very strong push to do something sensible and expected, or they might have reasonably expected that in five years time they would be out of a job again, even if they'd all managed to buy nice houses in the country

[Sporting]

Genesis and Roxy Music didn't really change genre though

Genesis' debut album maybe different to what followed?

[Sits]

Genesis' debut album maybe different to what followed?

Certainly by the time you get to We Can’t Dance and all the guff.

[gjw100]

I would argue that with Genesis the biggest transition (which had already begun to take shape post-Gabriel) occurred with the departure of Steve Hackett. Their subsequent material was more pop/AOR than Prog, and there was very little that bore even a passing resemblance to the early-70's albums. When they occasionally played a few of the old songs live it was only as a sop to the diehard fans of a certain age, and Tony Banks in particular doesn't seem to have a great deal of love for the Gabriel era.

[Antepli Ejderha]

If individual artists are permitted then Midge Ure is a great candidate, from teen pop with Slik, punk with The Rich Kids onto electro with Ultravox. Who themselves morphed into something a lot more stadiumy.

And Mick Hucknall, from the punkish Frantic Elevators to the, well, to Simply Red.

Plus his spell with Thin Lizzy. Midge Ure that is.

[Gert from the Well]

Ministry is a good example, first couple of releases where an attempt at Howard Jones synth-pop. Then came the Adrian Sherwood produced Twitch then the the progression to industrial metal. Al Jourgensen also collaborated with Ian MacKaye (Pailhead) and Jello Biafra (Lard).