Bands that haev changed/altered their sound for teh BETTER

I'd say, for me, Scott Walker has also improved.. But i loved his work with the walker brothers and his early solo stuff still! But The Drift is just, although this sort of statement seems to be chucked around a lot now, pure genius.

Scott really got better after his career with the Walker Brothers, but fact is, he only released great solo albums. The Drift is pure brilliance indeed, but i can't compare it to his older albums like Scott 3 & 4, i think they all have the same quality and artistic value, they're just different. Climate of Hunter and Tilt are wonderful too, the guy is just awesome all the time, he never had a low point during all these years time to be honest.
 
I totally agree.. I plain love the man.. But The Drift and Tilt, for me, are just.. so good. I could never EVER dream of being able to write those albums. Ever.
 
Isis have definitely improved a LOT from their earlier days.
I will agree with you that they've improved, but Celestial is fantastic in its own way, I think. A big part of why I like Isis is the fact that they definitely seem to evolve their sound with each album. (Although Oceanic to Panopticon wasn't really a huge difference. Panopticon's still good though.)

I agree with a lot of the bands already mentioned.. Akercocke, Enslaved, Opeth, etc. The Beatles are a very good example as well. Um, I'd also like to add basically all of the popular prog bands.. Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull, Rush, etc all really improved upon their debuts. Of course they all also eventually reached a peak and went downhill from there, but whaddayagonnado.
 
I think Oceanic and Panopticon are pretty darn different, can't say I like either one better though. But I definitely think they got generally better after Celestial (which is still a great album).

People have mentioned most of the bands I'd list already, can't really think of any other obvious ones.
 
I will agree with you that they've improved, but Celestial is fantastic in its own way, I think. A big part of why I like Isis is the fact that they definitely seem to evolve their sound with each album. (Although Oceanic to Panopticon wasn't really a huge difference. Panopticon's still good though.)

I agree Celestial is good... but Oceanic and In The Absence of Truth are two of my all time favourite albums and Panopticon is also right up there. So it's hard for me to say they've improved anything less than heaps. But I understand where you're coming from.
 
^^true. Therion's best album is 'Ho Drakon, Ho Megas' and the best ones from Amorphis are clearly 'Elegy' and 'Tales From The Thousand Lakes'
 
Well, I personally think Tuonela was better than Elegy, but their first two LP's were the clearly best. Therion were consistently good for the first few albums, then went boring.
 
Are you for real? :)
Old sepultura (Morbid Visions -> Arise) are incredible albums, especially for their time. And the sound on these albums kicks ass.

Sepultura is only really great from Beneath the remains to Chaos A.D, the first albums like schizophrenia and Morbid Visions are too repetitive, derivative and immature, and the vocals sound like crap to me.
 
Heh, ok. I thought you meant they improved for the better after Chaos, glad you didnt. :)
I dont even see the band as "Sepultura" anymore, i mean.. none of the Cavalera brothers is in the band anymore. They should change the name.
 
Well Rush went from so-so to epic but then back down to aged and fairly lame, so do they really count?

Ween. The early freak-outs have a certain charm, but they really became an accomplished couple of songwriters.