Who has gone the longest without jumping the shark?

Judas Priest
Brian Eno
Diamanda Galas

It's a tuff call. e.g. Oasis. Either you loved them or you did not.

abba smartly did all their shark jumping at the start of their career rather than at the end (i.e. anything with bjorn and/or benny on lead vocals).

derek bailey (but then i would say that)
leonard cohen (11 studio albums in 37 years and not a duff one among them)

I'm listening to the last track of the new album right now, a 13 and a half minute song called Loch Ness. I'd have to say this would stretch anyone's respect

Isn't that deliberate though, by and large?

also, a big second on Sonic Youth.

And Judas Preist? You mean someone is going to defend Ram It Down era stuff? Mentalists!

Mencap, you say a 13 minute track called 'Loch Ness'would stretch anyone's respect? Listen to yourself, man! It's a 13 minute track - called Loch Ness! What more could you possibly want? Some people are never satisfied.

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"times have changed" or whatever? he jumped the shark so hard that something something something.

P.S. What's the general feeling on when McCartney jumped the shark? I'd say "Spies Like Us" but I imagine others will point earlier.

Leonard Cohen may have kept it real, but his output has been the barest trickle, hasn't it?

McCartney jumped it with "Band on the Run" if not earlier (though I have a soft spot in my heart for "Take it Away").

I like Sonic Youth as an answer. And Tom Waits.

Having heard most of the Geffen releases I can say he ran aground 20 years ago. At some point he stopped drinking in time for Eldorado.

He's kind of a second-tier artist who's managed to remain in the second-tier though, isn't he? I think it's easier to do that than for someone in the top-tier to remain in or near the top-tier.

So I say again: Louis Armstrong.

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Pending her new work, Kate Bush might be a good example.

Brother was cool.

This is a good answer - though I gather the consensus is that he did start to fall off in the 80s, but that's still a good long run. Also, I'd nominate Ornette Coleman - though his output has grown scarce of late.

xpost to Mad Puffin:

I also like the duets he did with Ella Fitzgerald. Not sure when they were recorded but probably after 1935.

its pretty funny though.

(And those Armstrong/Fitzgerald duets were recorded in 1957. Great stuff.)

Or how about "Got a three-star review in RS?" Nah, I'm just kiddin'.

Incidentally, what the fuck is wrong with you people? Belle & Sebastian? Bob Dylan? Jesus. You keep throwing out people for whom repeatedly jumping the shark is part of their goddamn aesthetic.

So here's the definitive answer: Beethoven. There.

i mean, i know what it means but i don't know *why* it means that

john cale?

John Cale is not bad, but didn't he sort of submerge, then resurface?

Ray Charles--well, the ABC countrypolitan stuff is not as good as his previous work, but it's still quite listenable.

Howlin' Wolf, in whom I also believe implicitly, never really made a bad record--not even the psychedelic one on Chess. Was still great up until his last record "Back Door Wolf."

I'm not a huge Neil Young fan but he was pretty consistent thru the early '80s.

All the Byrds records up thru "Sweetheart" were pretty much classic. OK, three years, but three years back then = ten years now.

Also, I second Pavement--I do not understand why some folks dislike "Terror Twilight," that's a really fine piece of work.

George Jones. He did some silly stuff but even the '88 "Ya Ba Da Ba Do" song about Fred Flinstone is pretty moving. In fact, he'd get my vote for longest without doing the Fonzie jump--what, 50 years? Yes, I believe in the Possum, and his George Jones Smoked Sausage, available at finer Nashville-area grocery stores, is mighty fine artery-clog breakfast fare. He should have his own yogurt.

So let us say that he jumps when he starts doing Pepsi commercials in early- or mid-90s. Date his recording career from 1950 or so, and he got at least a good 40 years: impressive, but still falling short of Satchmo.

Prosecution rests.

Exhibit B: Barbra Streisand ... I don't think any of her career can be called shark-jumping.

I've got to question both of these on their disco moves: Wet/The Main Event for her and "I Ain't Got No Business Doing Business Today” for him (yes, the Possum did a disco move!). Also for Babs: that duet with Neil Diamond sure seemed like shark-jumping to me. And didn’t George do some treacle-y duet with his daughter Georgette?

Al Green really hasn't ever done anything terrible. The later Hi stuff is weaker than his prime material; I think his gospel music is really, really good. So give him almost 40 years of non-shark.

Whereas someone like Alex Chilton's *whole* career has been jumpin' the shark in various ways...good with Box Tops, brilliant with Big Star, then jump, back in stride with "Bangkok" and "Sherbert" (yeah, I think it's great), then jumping shark again as he becomes the Malaco Records version of some Vegas lounge act only hipper and with occasional great guitar.

Yes, Ken L--

"The King Is Gone (And So Are You)" aka "(Yabba Dabba Doo) The King Is Gone (And So Are You)"? Drinking whiskey poured from an Elvis-shaped decanter into a Flinstone "jellybean" jar? That IS a great song!

that's the one, and I don't know if you can even get it any more except on the first issues of that LP, "One Woman Man," '89--"Ya Ba Da Ba Do (So Are You)" is the actual title of the song. Jones, and yeah I guess Streisand and Green: "good taste" is so irrelevant to any discussion of their ouvre...

I'd say Neil Young had an exceptionally long run - from the mid-60s all the way up through the mid-90s. His last truly great album was "Ragged Glory", and there have been a smattering of good things since. I'm still not convinced he's *entirely* jumped the shark, as there are some really great tunes on Greendale (an interesting concept hobbled by its delivery, I think). But Neil's the kind of guy who's had dramatic ups and downs his whole career...

you can alao get it on the two-disc box set the essential george jones: the spirit of the country, which isn't much of an overview of jones' career (it tries to cover too much time in not nearly enough space) but does have lots of good songs on it. and on there it's titled "the king is gone (and so are you)," and if i'm not mistaken it was a legally mandated change because whoever owns the rights to the flintstones objected to "ya ba da ba do."

either way, it is a great fucking song, one of my all-time favorite country novelty songs, which i guess might sound like a backhanded compliment, but i mean it as a huge straight-up compliment. "i pulled the head off elvis/filled fred up to his pelvis..." i mean, come on, that's 100 percent classic.

and george jones is a perfect answer to this thread.

have you already done shortest time before jumping the shark? not including groups who were always crap obviously

my nomination would be ABC
they went crap with their fourth single ("all of my heart") (although at one point i would have said 'look of love' was crap too.) the track that follows 'all of my heart' on lexicon of love is really dire too. Beauty Stab = the pits

although 'sos' was quite sweet i suppose and there was another nice single around zillionaire

but i suppose it's fairly commonplace for bands to do one or two good things and then go rank...

from whenever they started to the last bars of Exile on Main street is an immense stretch of barely broken magnificence (even Satanic Majesties is pretty neat really)

and after Exile that they still did 'miss you', 'emotional rescue', 'shattered', 'beast of burden', and best of all 'start me up'

The guy has been at it since the late 70s. He's still at it and he's still awesome. He has yet to jump the shark.

Johnny Cash
Royal Trux
Derek Bailey
Mark Lanegan
Eric Bachmann
Art Ensemble of Chicago
Bjork
Residents
Sun City Girls

Why is it so difficult to agree on one from rock and roll, and why is the assumption so built in that rock acts must necessarily jump the shark at some point?

Is that perhaps something to do with the posture of rock as rebellion, as youth music? And the difficulty of sustaining its rebellious stance once it has become the mainstream that it used to be an antidote to?

Cue Roger Daltrey: "Hope I die before I get old... er."

This supports my thinking that death is a great career move: cf. Jimi, Janis, Marley, Lennon.... nobody has to watch you decline and become old and fat and bald and embarrassing.

Least factual statement ever on ILX.

No way--they jumped the shark in, like, 1987.

There's plenty of love for them on ILX, most eloquently put here.

(Ornette Coleman is a good answer too, though, probably. I was going to mention him, and then I noticed somebody else did.)

Rolling Stones working with what, the Dust Brothers? def. shark-jump. but Satanic Majesty's Hearts Band is bounds like a spring-heeled jack.

didn't Nurse with Wound just release three different CDs with 3 different folks? on the woeful 'art label' Beta-Lack-'um? Jim O'Rourke remixing you is an automatic shark-jump.

and Linda Rondstadt going salsa was you know...

Trux comic book?

tho Jon may be a tad biased, Keith Rowe is as good an answer as any.

Whoever nominated Louis Armstrong probably wins, though.

I'm biased, but it's not like Keith's my uncle. I sought him out in 1999 (blind e-mail, never met him before) to work with him (and, as it turned out, to build a large part of my then fledgling label around) simply because I was a huge fan of his music and wasn't sure why he never worked outside of AMM. it's turned into a very mutually beneficial relationship, in every way but financially.

one of the proudest accomplishments of my life thus far is to give KR the opportunity he never really had previously, to fully express himself in his own projects. I'm pretty much constantly amazed at his energy and flow of ideas, on a macro and micro level. I work with dozens of musicians from around the world, but for me, Keith is still leading the way in this field, 40 years after he started.

Louis Armstrong I'd give from 1923 (first appearance as a sideman with King Oliver) to 1961 (the record with Duke Ellington), 38 years. obviously Keith hasn't had the same immediate impact on the world (although he did teach Syd Barrett guitar, and there are reports that the Beatles were influenced by AMM's shows in the late sixties), but I'll stack his creative legacy up against anyone.

The Ramones never really got bad or embarrassing.

Tammy Wynette?

please

It's the same with Ellington as with George Jones and his "chinee" song...Ellington did some crap in the '50s and '60s for sure. But when did Ellington start, '27 or so? From then until the Blanton-Webster '40s stuff it's all pretty great, and he never really stopped composing and touring until virtually the day he died. 40+ years and most of his music is good. Miles is also a good choice from the late '40s until the '80s, altho the stuff he did after he came back for the final time isn't too great, except for maybe "Aura."

"...and for what it's worth, jones one woman man isn't a bad album worth owning anyway. it includes another worthy novelty, "pretty little lady from beaumont texas" (whose best quality, according to the lyric, is the "oil well in her yard"), and it began a damn good patch of albums that continued with along came jones and walls can fall. "

yeah, it's a good album, I have it and listen to it frequently. What can I say, I love George Jones and he's my choice. Any singer who rides a lawnmower to go to the package store has to be the one.

Ellington started recording in 1924, and while, as Eddie says, the 50's and 60's were a bit spotty for him, the amazing New Orleans Suite is from 1970, 46 years between top-notch releases is probably the longest run I'm aware of.

And thing is, he was already 36 or so in 1953, right? Didn't his stage career go way back to black vaudeville, or later minstel shows or something? He was like the Satchel Paige of music (unless Pigmeat Markham was, which would make Rufus the Minnie Minoso I guess.)

What? With Real Gone? Or Coffee and Cigarettes? Hardly. If doing a Jim Jarmusch is jumping the shark, then he jumped in '86 when did Down by Law. I still think he's a strong contender.

I don't know anything about Louis Armstrong, but Al Green's gospel work is the epitome of jumping the shark (cf. Camden Joy's "The Greatest Record Album Singer Ever).

When did Joe Strummer and John Lydol jump the shark?

Some might say Sandinista!.

Either way, it wasn't long.

He was a pretty fair singer and trumpet player, from 1923-1971. Some say he influenced a few other musicians in his day.
And he never jumped the shark, even when he was performing bad material. The winner.

I love Eno, but he jumped the shark back around "Neroli," when he started releasing his Koan-generated installation music.

Releasing a slew of fair to middling albums isn't jumping the shark, right?

and what about XTC?

I expect that you guys no more about both, but I couldn't think of anything too Fonzie.

anyway, how about yo la tengo? going on twenty years without a dud (except for maybe that jad fair collaboration.)

OK, he only ever got around to making one solo album but that album is pretty well faultless. Also check out his two songs on Carl and the Passions: So Tough - "Make It Good" and "Cuddle Up," which in my more morbidly melancholic moods I think are the two greatest and also the two most painful love songs ever written.

Despite their history, the Beach Boys musically avoided jumping the shark for as long as the Stones - every album up to and including Holland is generally superb and even the later questionable ones (Love You, MIU, 15 Big Ones etc.) have their isolated moments.

grateful dead (certainly didn't jump it during jerry g's lifetime)

steely dan (i'm stunned by their omission from the thread so far. this IS ilm, right?)

Even though he doesn't make the best albums, he's a great singles artist. His talent for writing catchy songs hasn't diminished enough to say he's jumped the shark. Thankfully he abandoned the Jeff Lynne production style, which jumped the shark in 1990 or so.

just kidding.

Guided By Voices likewise seem to exist solely to jump sharks (or rather, execute a drunken high one-leg kick over the shark).

Ornette jumped the shark doing "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman," but then came Naked Lunch and some decent Prime Time work.

Residents jumped when all the original members left and it became just the singer and whatever clunky 1980s MIDI crap he could string together. I'd pitch this sometime around the Mole trilogy.

Bo Diddley was completely awful when I saw him in concert a few years ago. No square red guitar, plus he spent most of the concert trying to do hip hop and it just didn't work.