Some would simply call it an evolution of style, and others might call it a sellout. I’d like to hear your examples of musical acts that changed so radically over time that you’d consider it a sellout.
My example would be Jefferson Starship. Their first album was “Blows Against The Empire”, which was about hippies hijacking a starship. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzclibWeXM8&t=1126s
Grace Slick was the first person to say “motherfucker” on television when performing their material.
They went from that to shedding personnel, renaming themselves “Starship”, and making pop music. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDI2WQJyE7I
What are your before and after examples that you consider a sellout?
I like this example because it’s not about their music, it’s about their attitude and forgetting where they came from. Personally, my favorite Metallica album was Kill Em All, and I haven’t really liked much of what they did after that.
I liked everything up until the black album. The black album was hit-or-miss for me; it had some parts i liked and some parts that weren’t really doing it for me. Load and Reload sounded (to me) kind of generic; it was metal but it wasn’t up to the standard I expected out of Metallica. The less said about everything after those albums, the better.