I've been thinking... maybe it's time to give it up... Let good enough be good enough... Not hang on to the past... Allow the glow to remain untarnished... Maybe it's time to let go.

I've been thinking the 20th anniversary show, assuming there is one, will be my last.

RIP

Stool brory, co

I've been thinking the same thing with my son.

"Well, kid, we really had some magical times, but since you turned four it's just not been what I wanted it to be. I can't let your inabililty to be exactly what I envisioned to tarnish the memory of when you were too small to have a personality."

So I'm putting the little fucker up on ebay.

Well, I've been seeing threads like these for almost every band, movie director, author etc.
People that become fans are hooked by a certain song/era/concertvibe/movietype etc and after a (long) period they notice that it is changing.
Wether it's Bon Jovi, Stone Sour, Metallica, Patrick Watson, Kevin Smith...they all change. There are always a lot of people that get disappointed. But at the same time, new people are becoming fans because of what is made now. So I guess it isn't a quality reduction..it's just change.

It's impossible to keep that same thing that hooked you in the first place for years and years. Isn't it a bit foolish to think it'll all be as good as the think that drew you in to begin with? I dig stuff from the past and the present, also dislike stuff from the past and present.

Relax, enjoy the ride and where it takes ya. It's evolution baby.

This is a good point, and I've noticed that virtually every band that I really got into when I began college in 2001 very much dissapointed me by 2007. Pearl Jam (well, I've been into them a lot longer), Wilco, Radiohead, The Flaming Lips, Belle & Sebastian, Sonic Youth (though The Eternal was a real return to form), Beck, I could go on.

Again, good observation.

^ Sonic Youth, really? I think they have had a remarkable late career surge. I didn't like NYC Ghost & Flowers, but Murray St., Sonic Nurse, Rather Ripped, and The Eternal are all either really good, or really really good IMO.

For many I think it's just growing old.

At 28, I am less likely to blow through $200 to see a concert. Even though I make real money now, I have better things to do with my time, money, and energy. I have other interests, more responsibilities, and I am not in awe of the band like I once was. If I made what I make now 10 years ago, I'd be traveling with the band everywhere. Today, I am still down for a show every other tour or so.

But I always wrestle with the "giving up" idea every time 10c renewal time comes around. And I always crumble. That's how they get ya.

i'm basically just talking about how disappointing Rather Ripped was following up NYC, Murray Street and Nurse. It seemed like a "safe" "return to form", much like Avocado, Sky Blue Sky, In Rainbows, At War With the Mystics, etc.

I kind of share this sentiment. I'm glad I'm only seeing one show this tour. In the past it was a bunch, but even if they were playing multiple gigs close by within decent driving distance, I no longer feel excited by the new music. I'm content to just see one gig when they tour the city closest to me.

I've been to four Pearl Jam l, and I can't imagine wanting to see any individual band or artist many more times than that. They'll be two hours away this tour. I'm staying home.

The only way I'd go, and I think I'm repeating an older post I made, is if they only played songs from the last three or four records. Or at least stuck very nearly to that limitation. Anything older than that, I'm not so interested.

I don't think I've been particularly disappointed in the artists I like, either, as time has gone by. It seems to me that, by and large, most of the artists I like tend to get more interesting the more their catalogue grows.

I get how hearing certain songs over and over can wear thin, but saying you only want to hear music from the last decade seems like a bold statement.

my fandom comes and goes. it was on life support for me around Riot Act, and i didnt even know ST came out until i heard it on the radio. it seems to wane after every album comes out. i'm different than McP, in that i like their off album tours and festival shows better most of the time. i really only care that they play stuff i like, not whether its old or new or if ive heard it a million times. having heard Backspacer once live, i have no interest in hearing it again.

but after Jazzfest i really dont expect them to play anywhere near me again unless i move, so i see my fandom dropping soon. but it will come back. Bonnaroo kinda restored my faith for awhile after ST, im sure something else will eventually.

Or it's both.

I don't think so. It's a statement I feel pretty secure in and comfortable with. It's not a dismissal of everything that came before, but I could make similar statements about a lot of artists. Pretty much anybody I've seen twice or more, I'm not high in motivation to see again. I don't see, or necessarily desire to see, enough shows in a given year to give one of the few to a band I've experienced four times already. Not unless it's a big shift from the shows I've already seen.

So I'm not alone...

I like the idea of looking back and saying, "goddammit those guys were awesome." Letting it become part of the past, a highlight for sure, but the past. I cannot imagine a band giving more to their fans, for longer than these guys have done. I hate the thought of walking into a concert with some mental checklist of songs I haven't heard yet or hoping something unique happens so that show somehow becomes 'special'. Let me get out before I become that kind of fan.

"The important things you leave behind is the stuff that turns into treasures"

This type of thoughts has been creeping up on me too. Maybe I should take a PJ break before my Hartford trip. Or do the opposite and re-listen to a couple favorite boots.

Then why the fuck do you go see live music? No offense, but if you think people who want that kind of experience are beneath you, that's really sad.

I haven't listened to the band since they played SNL. These little sabbaticalsbefore concerts really make them a lot more enjoyable to me.