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.

crosspost

"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.

xpost

(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.