Fave band/singer changing their music genre

[Marsyas]

Btw, I'm not saying simpler music is bad.
I listen to and write simple tunes all the time so please don't yell at me ;____;

 

[Oddisee]

Radiohead and Kanye (though he basically just jumped on what could've been "the hot new thing" at the time) have already been mentioned.

I'll go with mother♥♥♥♥ing Talk Talk. They started out making Synth Pop and well... that turned into Spirit Of Eden and Laughing Stock. Surely there's few more drastic changes in sound?

 

[Livewire]

I actually like 30 Seconds to Mars' transition to their more syth-heavy, prog rock, (As opposed to their earlier, more emo outings) especially on the last album. Although This is War is my favorite album of theirs. I've still always loved their sound, though.

 

[PetalDanceD]

Gwen Stefani of No Doubt and Gwen Stefani of Gwen Stefani.

Makes transition as easy as you like from a Ska Punk/reggae flavour to Rnb/pop/hip-hop

 

[Mark Kamill]

In the metal world, this is often called "selling out." Just look at Metallica. They haven't produced anything good in 24 years that wasn't ruined by clipping.

Machine Head did this when the band fired Logan Mader and were subsequently kidnapped by this evil alien named Ahrue Luster. Luster held the remaining member's families at gunpoint to force them to collaborate with him to make a couple of stupid nu-metal albums (they were originally groove/thrash metal), which they did. Then they broke free when Ahrue put the gun down for a second and the band, along with new recruit Phil Demmell, subsequently told Ahrue to go ♥♥♥♥ himself with Through The Ashes Of Empires and The Blackening (where they returned to their old style).

The only band I know of that achieved the opposite of this was Pantera. They were originally a hair rock band, so already they were sell-outs. Then they hired Phil Anselmo, changed their style to Groove Metal, and proceeded to dominate all things that rock.

Also, My Chemical Romance was never punk and I hate you.

Whoa whoa whoa. Changing sound is not selling out. You're telling me after 25 great years of black metal darkthrone going punk was selling out? How bout Anathema? There really is a major difference in the two.

 

[Sir Codin]

Whoa whoa whoa. Changing sound is not selling out. You're telling me after 25 great years of black metal darkthrone going punk was selling out? How bout Anathema? There really is a major difference in the two.

My post was more or less a tongue-in-cheek stab at the mindset amongst metalheads that changing sound is selling out, with me giving some examples of bands where fans have reacted this way.

Of course it doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen.