Originally Posted by Merrycaaant

It often perplexes me how competent musicians who gel together well in a band and have produced incredible albums in their lifetimes can also churn out sub-par albums.

It isn't for lack of talent, this much is evident in the fact that they can make good albums and have done so.
An unwillingness, a lack of enthusiasm? Perhaps.
Relentless touring and publicity which affects the most popular of musicians is bound to take a toll on musical output.
I then ponder if that is the case. Why put out a record at all?
If your heart's not in it and you're suffering from tour dates, media attention and playing the fame game, why thrust yourself back into the limelight with a new record.

Especially major label releases. Think of the touring; the promotion, the interviews, the marketing of a major artists upcoming record.
It's a lot to try and shove down the consumers throat to assure people buy the record.
But if it's not worthy of the hype that's inevitably going to precede its release, why bother releasing it at all?

If the records born out of frustration, exhaustion, why bother taking the time to record it at all. The idea of quitting whilst ahead, keeping a favourable image of your music in the eyes of the listener would seem like a better option.
Perhaps that's what the deliberate inductees of the 27 forever club had in mind.
They didn't want to reach the stage where they were releasing meaningless records for the sake of it and didn't think that they could ever recapture the fire and passion of their early works. Deciding to bow out whilst still ahead of mediocrity.

It seems like an extreme. But every artist must suffer from it at some point.
A creative blockage, once where the ideology of creating music was enough to drive them to success, merely sustaining their position within the industry and adding to the ever depleting quality of their discography has replaced what led them to success in the first place.

One need only look at Greenday for an example of this. It's not that Billie Joe Armstrong and co are not capable of putting out good records, they have done so.
Years ago, when rising up the ranks they were seen my many as a symbol of alienated youth. An angst ridden group of young men who wore their hearts on their sleeves and created music to express themselves.

Fast forward to 2012 and Greenday are releasing three records in one year (which unless you're The Weeknd is almost certainly setting yourself up to fall) and Billie Joe has had what for me was a toss up between on stage breakdown and cheap publicity attempt by losing his bearings during a live performance and slamming industry scapegoat Justin Bieber.

I don't think exhaustion is the key here. If one were to truly love music. To love their art, they'd know when to release records.
If you were growing distant from your passion, any right thinking individual would assume time away from said passion would be the best remedy to try and recapture a passion in it or to find that you no longer can connect with it, and move away completely.
It beggars belief that if you became so disengaged from music that you would continue to keep with it, whilst beginning to resent it.
Unless it was for financial reasons. I get that people have families, bills to pay, mouths to feed, rent to pay, etc. Lots of people work jobs they hate.
However I fail to believe this extends to artists such as Greenday who surely cannot be in any financial troubles.

Therefore, I introduce my theory. Why can an artist like Weezer produce a masterpiece of an album like Pinkerton and then go onto release an album like Raditude.
Simple. A change in circumstance.

Think about how many artists produced their best works in their early career and fell off the more they kept prolonging their careers.
When most of the songs from Pinkerton were written, it's to the best of my understanding they were written by an emotional teenager who channelled their true to life feelings into songs.
Songs such as Across The Sea and The Good Life are simple in topic yet have a genuineness unmatched in later releases.
Why is this?
Could it be, that when they were written, the artist was in a genuine state of mind. They were just expressing their true to life, everyday feelings about run-of-the-mill activities that many could relate to.

Everyone can relate to feelings of confusion about love, depression and a teenage anxiety of confusion.
This likely lead many people to begin supporting the artists, knowing that they could relate their feelings to that of the artist.
Because at the time, when Weezer wrote Pinkerton they were alike many of those who gained solace in the record.
They were average joes with a passion for music speaking about things that mattered to them, things that they cared for.
They weren't superstars. They weren't millionaires. Their problems were the same as many of their fans. They could be related to.

When a person has it all; money, fame, legions of fans, as many woman as they want...how can the average person relate to them?
Try as they might to repeat past successes, it can not escape the feeling of falseness attached to the new material.
How can they embrace the same angst, the same emotion they had when they were teenagers questioning their place in life and high school status when they don't have those concerns any more.
They're successful, they're not like us any more. They made it. They grew up and regrettably they didn't allow their music to grow with them.
In trying to retain, trying to pretend they were the same angsty teenagers, they produced records of illegitimate emotions and subject matter which was no longer relevant to them which just ended up sounding forced, phony and immature.
It's Blink 182 syndrome. How can one take 40 year old men singing about first dates and skateboards seriously.

Weezer are a talented band despite what may be popular opinion, but they are not showcasing themselves as much with a reluctance or perhaps ignorance in adapting to the times.
Not that the world has changed. It hasn't. I guarantee as many young people can relate with Pinkerton now as they did in 1996.
The world hasn't changed, Weezer have.
They have not changed with their circumstances. Sure they can still sell records, but can their new material really match Pinkerton in terms of quality no.
Until they quit becoming a parody of their former selves they won't be able to make another Pinkerton.
Actually, they never will. They will never be those angst ridden teenagers again. Try as they might they will never capture those feelings, those emotions again.

People often ponder on here why emo is dead. It isn't. it is survived with every generation of young emotional people who come up through their teenage years and enter adult life.
Emo isn't dead, the artists just grew up.
Not to say emo is immature. It isn't. In my humble opinion it is the most open, brutally honest genre of them all.
However when a person settles into happy adult life with children and a secure job they can no longer relate with the scene.
Which is a hard but true reality. How can one who is perfectly content channel the raw emotion and misery within themselves to make an emo record?
Oh, they can try and you get albums like Raditude. They're just ****.