No Rock And Roll Fun

A WORK IN PROGRESS, WE THINK: An attempt to explain why bands can ebb and flow in how good they are, how tolerable they are, but that there always comes a point where they just go beyond the pale:
each band is granted, by God, or Paul Morley, a fixed amount of goodwill when they start out. For some bands, its a lot (Blur, apparently); for others, it's less (Shed Seven).

But all have a certain degree of goodwill. Let's call it x.

As they slug away making records, they can add to the goodwill (making good records, playing small venues in Northumberland, being amusing in interviews) which will increase x.

Or, they can sap the goodwill (putting out the same single three times because its been used in a mobile phone advert, cancelling gigs to do ToTP, releasing albums of Malawi musicians because you think its cool, taking loads of drugs to the point where they believe we actually are interested in the drugs they take). x diminishes.

There comes a point - and, i think this what happened with Blur - that x eventually sinks below zero. And once that's happened, there's no way of getting any more. You can build on goodwill, but once it's gone, it's gone.