Bands who were way too long-lived
 

I know the overwhelming answer is going to be the Rolling Stones.

REM
U2 (their earlier stuff was actually pretty good)

In case anyone is wondering, Status Quo are well worth checking out live.

Otherwise, I think Motorhead, Iron Maiden, Lou Reed and a litany of others. There are far too many people with record deals on the back of dwindling public interest over 15+ years.

def stones, no question.

butthole surfers, their 80's catalog is impeccable and their 90's stuff is spotty at best, i also lost a lot of respect when they fucked over touch and go, the indie good guys.

flaming lips shoulda stopped after the soft bulletin, theyre not gonna get better than that.

lou reed for sure, shoulda stopped after berlin.

iggy pop shoulda stopped after his collabs with bowie.

Nooooo! Metal Machine Music!

Looking at his discography, there is some merit to the post-MMM records - there's more than one pretty good tune on the bells, Magic & Loss is passable and I like Ecstasy & the Raven for about a week each... but generally, there's about 2 or 3 good tunes a decade. More than the lifetime of most bands, in fairness, but still. Cruel to be kind etc.

Oh, and Vanishing act off the Raven... my goodness, that was special.

Seeing as there's a trend towards 3-in-a-row posts in this thread already, and OT also - what about bands whose later stuff is better than their earlier stuff? I'm thinking Pulp and Otomo Yoshihide, and I'd say the Fall because their first three albums are not up there with their best albums of this decade.

The Fall's first three albums are three of their best.

Bah, they're still producing great records.

Weezer. The Blue Album was great, and Pinkerton was even better, but then look what happened.

Live at the Witch trials has enough drum fills to kill a small child. Just wrong.

zepplin, the rolling stones, and rush all need to chill back, fe real. those dudes are old. I believe Sabbath already chilled back, though when I heard ozzy sing "he's not gonna give it up" i can't help but cheering him on, that old bastard! so while technically no, my sheer love of sabbath supports them in the 21st century, though as of 2008 i believe was not on tour anymore.

and for the record, Journey needs to bring back Steve Perry, not that douche they had with them last year

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_B6p9n5SmA

the rolling stoens needed to quit a long time ago.

The Cure
The Replacements
Magma
Hawkwind

when are you going to realise that it's all been downhill for the fall since marc riley left?

Not mentioned: Pink Floyd

All.

the band all?

Nah, All are good. I liked the Descendents better of course.

yeah, the descendents are way better. i actually think ALL have long lasted their stay. they should just have milo sing instead of doing science and be the descendents for good.

they should've gone away after the wall, i agree. the final cut is awful and they're nothing without roger waters anyway. YOU WANT PROOF? listen to their post-waters albums.

Seriously though, really? I can understand you thinking there's some patchy stuff there, but you're putting everything previous above Perverted by Language, the wonderful and [etc], This nation's saving grace, the Frenz experiment, Extricate, The Infotainment Scan, Cerebral Caustic, Levitate, The Unutterable & Country on the click? Hex... and Slates are very good, but... well, the Fall are in the lyrics, and the best lyrics are somewhere after Perverted by Language. I say you're talking nonsense, but you're pretty, so I'll forgive you.

Wrong, they should have stopped BEFORE Soft Bulletin. (Anytime after Clouds Taste Metallic suits me)

As for other bands:
REM
RHCP
Rolling Stones

The Fall went downhill after Brix left the first time.

The Byrds - I think they should have disbanded after The Notorious Byrd Brothers, though I know people will disagree with me (Sweetheart Of The Rodeo came after TNBB, and is considered a classic).
The Clash - after Mick Jones left, it was bad.

the who! two of their main memebers died! why are they still playing?

green day- they should have quit after dookie

i haven't heard those ones all the way through, but yes all the same

Any band that has none of their original members left.

or one original member

But if the original member is practically the one member of the group then it's fine. Like Guided by Voices, only not broken up.

Oh and Smashing Pumpkins should not have reformed. It is an insult to their fans that they sound so different that they might as well be another band. And there were the same amount of Pumpkins members in Zwan as there were in the reformed Pumpkins. Go figure.

the smashing pumpkins never should have formed in the first place. they blow.

I agree, i love them, but seriously it's not the same band as before. with only half of the other members its stupid. Jimmy and Billy could still make a band with other musicians and people would like it, but they shouldn't be the smashing pumpkins. but i think many people just dont like the new pumpkins because it's not them. its billy and jimmy with other musicians.

Mogwai. They should have retired after Rock Action, anything past this album is just embarassing.

haha, i hate it when the groups like that continue despite the "one member" not being around, like the misfits or thin lizzy

that said,i've seen the fake ass modern versions of both those bands and liked it

The Pogues, Alice in Chains, and Daisy Chainsaw sucked when the singers left/died.

that is, frankly, embarrassing.

I agree, I've seen them performing live 2 years ago, they were pretty good.

AC/DC

I've been doing my part in trying to rehabilitate Status Quo in the public consciousness lately.

Admittedly, it hasn't gone much further than saying "actually, they had a few good songs in the 70's" a couple of times but it's a start, y'know?

Moldy Peaches.
They stayed together long enough to record and release material.