yay or nay

[Raditzu]

generally when a band "sells out" they start making music to apply to a mainstream audience and stop caring about the kind of old music they used to make.

This is something you generally hear a lot of when people talk about bands "selling out," but has always raised two questions with me:

1) How do people know that a band stops caring?

They need money. Maybe they hate the fact that they're doing something just to sell records. Maybe they don't. I've never been one of the bands that's sold out (and I'd wager no one here has) so I can't really say.

2) Why is it a bad thing to change your style?

Some of my absolutely favorite bands ever have done through fairly drastic style changes. Less Than Jake, Reel Big Fish, Mad Caddies, just to name a few. I don't fault them for moving on, I applaud them for expanding their musical horizons, if you'll pardon the intense corniness of that.

(Disclaimer: I, generally, don't really care about music the way some people do. I'm just making conversation.)