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Styx has few original members. Lynyrd Skynyrd has … none? When is a band still a band?
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The Band of Theseus
this post was submitted on 23 Jul 2024
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Ship Of Theseus does completely sound like an album title that fits the band name of Styx.
Good question...
I'd argue this...
Let's say you have 4 band members:
John, Paul, George, and Ringo
John drops out, is replaced by George^2.
Ringo drops out, replaced by Pete.
Paul drops out, replaced by Brian.
George drops out, replaced by Billy.
George^2, Pete, Brian, Billy.
You could argue they are still the same band as 3/4 of them each played with original members. Billy is the first to have never played with any of them.
Now... if George^2, Pete, and Brian get replaced, no, it's not the same band.
I would add that also there should also be a connection between the art/music for them to be considered the same band
For example: Black Sabbath only changed their vocalist and they sound like two, quite, different bands. On the other hand, Iron Maiden also changed their vocalist and they sound like the same band with both Dickinson and Di'anno.
Or you look at Pink Floyd, Syd Barret, Roger Waters, Dave Gilmour, all vastly different sounds, yet all Floyd.
Are they really? Im not too familiar with pink floyd but they dont sound that different to me I even have trouble telling which "era" their songs are.
Listen to some truly old albums like Atom Heart Mother. You won't recognize Pink Floyd.
Syd Barret Era:
Roger Waters Era:
David Gilmour Era:
Ok, I see what you mean now. Then I dont know what makes a band "the same band" but I stand with what I said: Ozzy's Sabbath is a different band than Dio's Sabbath lol
Thanks for sharing I have never heard the Sid Barret songs.
But you have a pot of soup and at the end of the day you have a little left and so you add more ingredients and fill the pot back up. You do this for years. Is it still the same pot of soup?
Sure, it's just evolved.
Art is a conversation, and a study of choice. It's hard to see how treating a band as something fixed or essential rather than a collective voice or viewpoint that can change over time can add clarity to anything.
So then as a band are they a perpetual band? Are there any famous bands that basically did that? Like from the start just randomly changing members including the vocals? Something like the band is the lyrics and music not the performers, just like a symphony.
That soup is going to develop bacteria and make everyone ill.
No joke, it's probably a fair analogy for replacing band members after the original band members have all died over the past 50 years.
I saw them for free last year and it was pretty whack with so much flag waiving super the troops patriotism shit and none of the members. Time to wrap it up
Napalm Death has been playing this game for years.
What about when they split and multiply? Like Saliva.
Reminds me of that time in the early-70s when David Bowie was swooning backstage while meeting The Velvet Underground, only to be informed a little later that he'd been talking to Doug Yule, who replaced John Cale then took over as frontman when Lou Reed quit the band, and if I'm not mistaken with the timeline, even guitarist Sterling Morrison and drummer Moe Tucker had already also split.
What counts as an original member? By the time the first recording is released there may have been multiple line up changes
Yes added another layer: can the same guys be a different band? Because they did that twice.
The original Yes shed members throughout the 70s before splitting entirely in 1980. Drummer Bill Bruford was replaced by Alan White, guitarist Peter Banks was replaced by Steve Howe, keyboard wizard Rick Wakeman joined and left and joined and left. The only constant member had been bassist Chris Squire. Right at the end, they briefly pulled in Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes, of the Buggles... who were the entirety of the Buggles... long enough for Horn to replace lead singer Jon Anderson on exactly one album.
A few years later, after supergroup Asia earned precisely the reputation you just thought of, Squire was pulling together a project called Cinema, and basically fell ass-backwards into a reunion with Anderson and White. Their record label asked why they weren't just Yes again and they didn't have a good answer. If you've ever wondered why 90125 is so different from all the noodly prog rock albums, there you go.
A few more years later, Anderson was tired of Squire's shit, again, and fucked off to record with Bruford, Wakeman, and Howe. They called this project Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe. Together they released one album, Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe. Perhaps not the best sales pitch to say this was a revival of their creative freedom independent of the only guy who never quit Yes. During this period, Yes only existed on paper. Squire had two keyboardists who quietly hated each other and a guitarist who was just happy to be there. A lot of people asked why ABWH wasn't just Yes again, and in a drastically different sense, they didn't have a good answer.
Philosophically complicating the question while pragmatically simplifying it, both projects were smooshed together for the album Union.