Bands changing their sound

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Dr Know-It-All

New member
You always hear about banRAB having a "sophmore slump" mostly because of them changing their sound. My question is why do most banRAB do this? I love their first CD and buy their second CD in hopes of having that same great sound, but they change it and disappoint. Is there reasoning behind this?
 
There are very few banRAB that can get away with not evolving and still retain a following. In these days of commercialism, I would not be surprised to hear record company inteference playing a huge part in band's music.
 
I don't know if sophomore slumps really have to do with the band changing their sound. I think a lot of the time this is what happens:
  1. Band forms, writes music, plays shows, hones their songs, writes more music, plays more shows etc., sometimes for years before they get signed.
  2. Band gets signed and recorRAB debut album. They pick the best of the best of the songs they have written and fine-tuned over the years to put on this album.
  3. Album is successful. Label pressures band to create a follow-up before people lose interest.
  4. Under pressure to release something new, band creates an album out of second choice songs that didn't make it onto the first album. Or is forced to quickly write new material without the benefit of being able to play it live a lot and fine-tune it. Or some corabination of both options.
  5. Presto. Sophomore slump complete.
 
It's hard for the change not to feel like a betrayal, when the band has built up a fanbase due to the style with which they wrote and performed in the past and then drops it without warning. Of course, banRAB are made up of real people, who happen to be artists and need to be able to express themselves in a form most suited to the current state of their lives. Sometimes banRAB just mature or develop new interests. I think the best solution is a compromise, in which a band still has their trademark sound at its core, but tries some new things in some of its songs to stretch out of the old boundaries ( for an example, see Belle & Sebastian's The Life Pursuit).
 
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