It’s interesting to start to think about the solo performer and their relationship with bands as they go through the various evolutions of their careers. I tend to think that there has been some kind of radical shift in the popular music industry over the past 40 years. When you look at the careers of people like Neil Young, Eric Clapton, Lou Reed and countless others, they had strengths as solo performers but they moved in and out of collaborations with other artists and various groups.

Was Springsteen a solo performer or was he just the front man for the E Street Band? The product of his more truly solo work, Nebraska is equally brilliant but very different from his work with the band.

I think that much of what we think of as being a “solo career” is not really a solo career but rather a well know artist being the frontman(woman) for a new band. Are you ever really a solo artist unless you are, for example, M Ward up on stage alone with his guitar (and an electronic device playing along side you)? …sure Bjork has a strong personality which is totally Bjork, but is she really a “solo artist”?

No man is an island.

…Did not every great solo artist start out in one band or another before they went off on his or her own?

Having said that, one of my fav solo albums of recent times that I keep coming back to is Mike Ness’s Cheating at Solitaire…quite different from his Social Distortion work.
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