Well it looks like another one of my heroes has broken my heart by staying in the game too long.

Honestly, when will they learn?

I'm of the mind that aging rockers should have to pass some sort of Rock N Roll test, like some seniors need to do for a driver's license. It just ain't right I tell ya.

Listen to the same old (diminishing) stuff, or embrace the new. I choose the latter.

(It could've been Cheer-Accident and the Von Herzen Brothers.) And then there is Pendragon: I swear Ol' Nick Barrett just keeps getting better and better with age.

 I've seen a lot of shows... a lot (I am an aging rocker)... and much of the time, often after long tours or just long careers, the performers sound much like this.  Sometimes not as good.  Yes there is a time to retire, but if Daltry can do this at his age and sound about as good as Robert Plant did circa 1985 ~ which he kinda does here, BTW ~ then I say have at it.

Which is to say I've heard much, much worse from people half the Who's age.

On the other hand, I saw Robin Trower pre-Covid and he tore down the house. He sounded just as good as he did in 1975. The same with Al Di Meola. Fortunately, neither sing.

No, for me, this was painful to watch.

Hi,

I think that it goes both ways ... there are some folks that don't seem to get older ... like Peter Hammill ... who still cranks things out non stop ... but at least, he adjusts to his ability which is not likely to be as strong as his younger days ... but still just as emotionally strong.

I've stopped hoping that the older folks "deliver" either in performance, or on album ... their time, seems to have gone away ... and seeing/hearing things like this, hurts my eyes and ears with the notion that what was once, can no longer be today. AND WORSE ... that it's value is diluted and gone!

But accepting that, and not getting some money for it when they can pull it? Well, at least the Rolling Stones don't seem to age a whole lot by comparison, but then Mick was not about vocal gymnastics either while you are a teen (so to speak!).

Man With Hat wrote: No.

That's the only correct answer. Poor ageing rockers. What else are they supposed to do? But I've stopped going to (most of) their concerts long ago. I couldn't listen to the clip for more than 30 seconds. Truly awful. If they were playing at my local pub I would have left.

I believe Love Over Fear (2020) is Pendragon's best album so far, but I Won't Get Fooled Again into thinking The Who are still as good as they were in their heyday. 

You people haven't listened to enough bootlegs from the '70s.

It is rare for rock musicians to actually sound good, like how we imagine them, like how they sound on records.   It isn't real or within normal human means to perform at any level of greatness except under fleeting circumstances and at the height of an artist's powers.   You know why we have Band of Gypsys and The Song Remains the Same and Bursting Out ?   Because those were acceptable performances that, with a little enhancement, sounded golden.   But they weren't golden.   No performance ever is.   It show business, smoke and mirrors.

That Who clip is full of soul, sadness and loss.   It's human, which is what rock was supposed to be, what 'Behind Blue Eyes' is all about, and it is a moving rendition.

Atavachron wrote: That Who clip is full of soul, sadness and loss.   It's human, which is what rock was supposed to be, what 'Behind Blue Eyes' is all about, and it is a moving rendition.

Good for you. I definitely feel something too, but not in a good way. I react similarily to this as to when a good text ruined by bad acting. I look the other way, wan't to turn it of - or leave. Your example with Robert Plant is interesting because (much like Peter Hammill) my impression of him is that he understand his current voice' limitations - and managed to stay artistically relevant (not that I listen to it myself) singing new material that he suits him and that he can handle. The voice of an old man can be beautiful and moving. But it's not beautiful or moving to me when the ageing voice trying and failing to perform his old material when he is not longer is capable of it. 

I must say that I have mixed feelings in this matter. On one hand, why should age be a barrier, but on the other hand,

I don't like to see some of my teenage idols from the 70's looking like mummies and being shadows of their past greatness.

- But whatever, I'm fully content with enjoying their great albums from the 70's, or 60's. 

I agree--that's why they created smoke and mirrors! (and lasers and dry ice and face paint... ) 

Another problem we often have is that we are biased by the original, studio versions. As a kid, I wanted concert performances to provide perfect renditions of each band's studio versions. Some bands/artists were good at this, others not. Eventually, I got good at learning to engage with the artist at their current level, that day, expressing the music they felt like performing on the terms that inspired them. I think listening to jazz and learning about improvisation in music helped in this regard. Still, I have never acquired a love of live recordings--I'd much rather be present at the live performance as the energy of the whole is so important in order to feel and enjoy the full impact of the concert.

An artist is an artist even in the grave. Of course Roger's voice is not the same as when that song was released, but nobody can force him to stop singing. I've seen Ted Neeley singing JCS several times and he's still able to scream "Get Out" in Getsehemani. Ian Gillan's is another great voice gone forever, Ian Anderson has found a guy with his same voice to support him in tour. However they do, I think I won't stop listening. My ears have grown old too, as much as their voices.

Hi,

The issue was not always that they did not sound good ... for example, I never heard an ELP bootleg that did not sound ... "poor" ... comparing to their albums or other performances on an album. 

The "BEST" of all these bootlegs were not about the performances at all ... and if you got the album for it, you ended up missing out on anything else. Here are some of the bigger examples of bootlegs, and most famous!

1. Led Zeppelin bootlegs were not super great, performance wise. But the energy of the show shined right off the plastic and it was addictive. It is what made LZ so big and famous!

2. Grateful Dead. The shows were all different, and the amount of length on a lot of things was something that fans enjoyed. EVEN TODAY, you can pick up and trade these shows, and the band has NEVER worried about it, and many of the shows were taken directly from the sound board!

3. Pink Floyd. The early stuff, before DSOTM, was fantastic, and varied. There are some 10 different versions of "Set The Controls ... " and it is neat. There are various versions of ATM, and one of them is the dancing version used in Paris for the ballet that rock fans trashed senselessly. Sad event in my mind. I would love to see the ballet on video and there isn't one. Tells you how much appreciation for MUSIC and the ARTS, most rock fans have ... about NONE.

4. Tangerine Dream. In those early days until about 1975 or 1976, there are a lot of bootlegs from the band. The issue? The coffee got very cold before TD, or Christopher Franke could get the machinery attuned properly to re-create the same sounds on the album. Thus things are very different, and the bootlegs are worth having for a true lover of the music. The band's website has done its best in attempting to release as many of these bootlegs as possible, however, for some reason they always chose the worst of them! Go figure!

5. The Rolling Stones. The only concern in these was, if they were in tune and on time. Sometimes the loudness was more important than the quality of their work, and I never went to see them, because the bootlegs were really poor and the band did not show itself as clean. Forward 40 to 50 years, and the band is much tighter and better than they ever were! Bootlegs no longer needed!

6. The Beatles. A lot of the material that was available in many of the bootlegs centered on their last few years together, and a lot of that stuff is STILL not visible or heard. Not to mention that the BBC will not release THE BEATLES CHRISTMAS SHOWS of which there are 7 of them. They are fun, and OK, but nothing super. The outtakes from Let It Be, and The White Album were usually the best part, but it seems no one wants to hear Paul sing "Besame Mucho" and realize that they still had some fun left in them! We would rather be jerks and say that Yoko broke the band!

Saperlipopette! wrote:   ... Good for you. I definitely feel something too, but not in a good way. I react similarly to this as to when a good text ruined by bad acting. I look the other way ... or leave.  ...

The only comment I will make about this is that we need to be careful, because sometimes the design is to shake up the institution of tradition, and this was a huge point in theater in the 50's in England (the angry young men) and then America (the Actor's Studio) when all of a sudden the theatrical style is to be more emotional and thus, stronger, something that was not "allowed" in the older versions of it. The same for Shakespeare, all of a sudden being acted WITHOUT THE POETRY, which drove English Professors at your local University into so much anger, that they still hate the Theater Departments for it! AND teach against it! The Iambic Pentcrapinches is more important than the words! 

I guess we don't really know what it all means, right?

I love The Daily Mash and this is one of their articles which is highly pertinent:

https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/arts-entertainment/six-tired-wizened-old-singers-who-really-need-to-knock-it-on-the-fking-head-20220422220101

Looks like you can add Daltrey to the list.

"but I would happily sign a petition to have them retire or make a contribution to crowd funding their assassination"

Personally, I'd have done that in about 1965, to be honest.

This.

Mm-hm, it's a big step to accept an artist on their own terms.   And except in a few cases, I'd agree about being present at a live show.   The energy is incredible, and if the players are on that night and the sound guy knows what he/she is doing, there's nothing like it.   I've had whole musical epiphanies & conversions based on seeing one great gig.

Completely agree here. While I do think there are certain artists who should hang it up at some point (looking at you, Yes), to me this cover of Behind Blue Eyes was a nice choice for the band members' ages. It actually recontextualizes the song into something sadder and more melancholic than the original tune, which Roger's now-withering voice only compliments further.

And hey, let's just be glad we didn't get an updated version of the Limp Bizkit cover 

Many musicians played well into seniority, including Andres Segovia (I saw him in concert in his 80s, he was amazing) and so forth.  

The artists and fans have to adapt to the passing of time.  Ripples never come back.  

Really?  I'm nearly 67, I see nothing at all wrong with this performance!  Roger & Company aren't the kids they were at Woodstock, but neither am I.  

I've heard MUCH worse from far younger artists. 

It gets embarrassing when aging rock musicians try to act like they are still 25 (The Rolling Stones), or if they try to sing the same way, but can't.

But then there are also artists who have stood by their age and managed to make something genuine out of it. Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen and Johnny Cash are good examples of that. I might go as far as to say that Johnny Cash peaked in his final years.

Completely agreed. I think one of the best examples is Johnny Cash's cover of Hurt, which wouldn't be nearly as impactful if he was younger 

 That being said I have been pleasantly surprised on a few occasions. I saw a version of Jefferson Airplane/ Starship in the early 90's. Papa John Creach came out on stage for a few songs. He could barley walk on to the stage & I thought "this is not going to go well. " Then he raised his bow & started to play & it was pure magic! The man could barley walk but he could still play. It was the highlight of the show for me. 

I'm honestly more annoyed when artists keep releasing albums way past their prime. How many artists exist that had like a decade or so of great albums followed by like 4 or 5 more decades of albums that nobody gives a crap about? Like, who will still be listening to the last three decades' worth of Yes albums (all with identical album covers) 50 years from now? Nobody, whereas I'm sure their classics of the 70's will still live on. 99 times out of 100 I don't want anything to do with an album by an artist that's been active for over 25 years, much less twice that long.

Again, it doesn't hurt anybody (though you could say that these artists mostly get by on name recognition alone and it would be nice if they stopped hogging the spotlight and let newer, promising artists have their time), but it just annoys me. Just like how it annoys me when an old band's page on Wikipedia uses a picture from the last ten years instead of their classic period. Agh!

No, you're never too old to rock'n'roll, if you're too young to die you've passed the test. 

agree

I was thinking of something funny and weird. 

The test should be to see how many chords they have forgotten and can't play anymore as arthritis slows down your fingers and hands and singers, how many notes they can't find in their voice anymore!

Oh, not to mention how much music you can read when your eyes start going left, right and fuzzy!

If musicians wish to perform past their prime and put out crappy music, who are we to tell them not to?  Fans can vote with their wallets and feet.  I've walked out of lousy concerts before (The Tubes and Marillion), I wouldn't hesitate to do it again.  

Of course, vocalists will lose their ability to perform first, but many have brought up excellent examples of vocalists who continue to amaze, even into their 70s.  

I was saddened when Keith Emerson ended his own life, depressed that he could no longer meet fans' expectations.  I would have been happy to visit with him and hear him play a Mini-Moog with one finger, I bet it would have been amazing! 

As we tell our school children over here, "Be kind." 

That, there, is the bottom line. I'll never understand how a whiny fan gets through the day. Tull and Yes haven't made a great album since forever? Don't buy any. Don't go to the shows. There's so much great music, complaining should be moot. Some people try to make an art out of fretting (the wrong kind) and it seems they're less than able to enjoy anything. What a waste of energy.

cstack3 wrote: I was saddened when Keith Emerson ended his own life, depressed that he could no longer meet fans' expectations.  I would have been happy to visit with him and hear him play a Mini-Moog with one finger, I bet it would have been amazing!

I'll never get over that. Keith ended his life because he was bullied online by losers. He was already depressed, and that just made it worse. 

Keith could have continued to compose great music (I love his film scores), and the Keith Emerson Band's album was fantastic, the best one since Emerson, Lake and Powell's one-off.

Saperlipopette! wrote: Man With Hat wrote: No.  That's the only correct answer. Poor ageing rockers. What else are they supposed to do? But I've stopped going to (most of) their concerts long ago. I couldn't listen to the clip for more than 30 seconds. Truly awful. If they were playing at my local pub I would have left.

A little harsh maybe, but I attend to plenty concerts with (mostly) guys in their mid-70's.But if they feature vocals, I do my research first.

The discussion made me think of this: It seems to be a consensus, that for most rock musicians, their "classic period" is usually their early years. This is when they made their best and most important albums and songs, and their later output often pales in comparison. This is not always the case (again: Cohen, Cash...), but very often.

But if we take the classical music world, things are slightly different. Composers often write great music until their final days, and for people like Brahms, Wagner and Verdi, they made some of their most important works at a very old age. Verdi, f.e., was in his 80's when he composed his final (and best?) opera Falstaff.

It is obvious that you can't go on doing the same thing over and over again, so to stay relevant, you have to do something else. I think that for many rock bands, they are so caught in their "classic period" that they can't escape it. As a result, they almost become a parody of themselves. Plus, it turns into a vicious circle if the audience just shows up to hear the classic songs.

Another factor might be the youth-fixation in rock music, and in popular music more generally.

Hi,

I was thinking that this is more of a media thing than it is a reality, although I think that too many of these rockers live in a fantasy world that is just asking to die and fall apart. You can not live in the past, and even Ian is having a hard time dealing with that, and should.

Unlike classical music and your wonderful example, rock music has NEVER BEEN about the music itself, but about the hit song, and this has been my greatest complaint all along ... and see folks complaint about this person or that not sounding right or whatever is the perfect example ... that person is NOT INTO MUSIC ... they are into a fan driven process that needs to die. It did not hurt classical music for the longest time and it is about time that it fall off the pier into the ocean.

There is a reason why I rarely pop in on charts and polls ... that process may be "fun" for many folks but in the end, it is not a good thing ... most folks participating have not even heard half of the stuff to make a decent decision and yet they vote for the one or two they know ... it tells you what the poll is for ... NOTHING but another commercial adventure into nowhere Ville.

We have no one to blame but ourselves. We are not smart enough to raise the music itself past the SONG routine into something more solid and valuable as music history has shown us ... and then we get disappointed because Joe Schmoe sound like total chit!

Well deserved punishment if you ask me for the "fan". They couldn't careless about the music and think their God is the only one around in this world.

If there's one mainstream rocker a prog fan should check out, it's probably Ronnie Montrose. He recorded a number of excellent solo albums that showcase his range as an instrumentalist. He's easily one of the most underrated guitarists the wide world of rock music has ever hosted.

Ronnie's three best are his debut, Open Fire, and perhaps The Speed of Sound (a sentimental favorite), and either The Diva Station or Bearings, where he flexes a bit on acoustic.

Ronnie also has a killer instrumental live album, Roll Over and Play Live!

Be forewarned: Apart from a recent Japanese SHM CD reissue of Open Fire, all of Ronnie's solo albums are OOP. It took me some time to track down a copy of the live CD.

Hi,

Honestly?

I have NONE for heroes. There are a lot of them that were valuable and nice along the way, but it is all a minor thing in the history of a life reaching 71. I find it weird, and even bizarre, that some folks are calling many of those folks "heroes" when they aren't!

I'll beg to differ, M!  Jon Anderson's lyrics on "Tales" were hugely influential to me in college, where I transitioned from pursuing medicine to becoming an environmental scientist.  "Let them rape the forest..." over my dead body!  

I actually told this to Jon in person after the 35th Anniversary show in Chicago, and he gave me such a sweet smile...I'll always carry his smile with me.  Jon with my wife Ginny, 4 April, 2004.  

They do every single show.

If people don't buy tickets to the show, they fail the test. Just like in school, you can only fail so many tests until you're "done"