Phoenix Careers

The trajectory of a musical artist's career tends to follow one of a couple of patterns: if the artist has gifts of a limited nature, they might enjoy success with a memorable song as a young person or band, then falter after a few lesser attempts at the brass ring; if the artist is unusually gifted, they might continue their ascendency through a series of hits. But once in a while, an artist or band can power through after the first decline and reinvent themselves for a second chance.

Of course, there are numerous variations on this theme, for example, the artist whose initial career is unknown outside a small geographic circle but hits it big with the reinvention. Think Alanis Morissette, whose dance-pop first release went platinum in Canada, or Katy Perry, who put out a gospel album as Katy Hudson before connecting with Morissette's old co-writer, Glen Ballard, and becoming an international pop-star.

David Bowie made a career of reinventing himself for every album, but it felt more like restlessness, and applied more to his visual image and less to the music, which still sounded like Bowie each time.

And some bands were forced to reinvent themselves when they lost a key band member: AC/DC, Chicago, Pink Floyd, Yes, Genesis and The Doobie Brothers all changed their sound to greater or lesser degrees when a founding member quit, was sidelined or died. For Floyd it was the launch of the most successful part of their careers, for AC/DC it just changed the sound of the vocals, and for the rest it led to a slicker, more radio-friendly sound that won new fans as it alienated old ones.

The reinventions that interest me, though, are the carefully mapped-out intentional ones: for example, the Beastie Boys were once a hard-core punk band, but after cobbling together a hip-hop song out of a prank phone call, they threw themselves into rock-flavoured rap and made hits. Or, after a series of bubblegum pop hits as The Turtles, the principal members of that band adopted the moniker Flo & Eddie and continued their careers as respected members of Zappa's Mothers of Invention (conspicuously remote from bubblegum pop) as well as providing session vocals on many other radio hits.

And then there are the artists who just stopped for a few years or decades, disappeared to relax, maybe write some more, maybe live a peaceful life out of the public eye, then dropped back into the scene, as strong as they ever were, no reinvention necessary. Here's an example of that: