All good things must come to an end and negative seasons seem to pass, especially when it comes to rock and roll. Every day a band is breaking up just as another new band is forming--in the ever changing world of rock and roll, even the most successful bands need to call it quits.
As fans, we love the drama and excitement that surrounds our top raucous rock and roll heroes. Even more exciting is when our favorite defunct groups get back together and rock the world once more. History is full of examples of legendary bands coming back from the brink to do great things. Here is a list of 10 bands that reunited brilliantly after big break-ups.
10 The Eagles
When The Eagles' Don Henley and Glen Frey exploded over a crowd in Long Beach in 1980, famously wrenching the band to pieces, it appeared the group would never get back together after their spectacle break-up. Henley even remarked that they "would get back together 'when hell freezes over,'" according to Ultimate Classic Rock.
So in 1994, when the legendary group behind "Hotel California," "Desperado," "Take it Easy," and more announced that they would be getting back together, it was no surprise that they would be welcomed back with open arms. It was dubbed the "Hell Freezes Over" tour, playing off of Don's now infamous declaration just 14 years earlier, and the reception was something of rock and roll legend.
The band would release a new album under the same name, set off on more history-making tours, and go on to release multiple chart-topping records in the years that followed.
9 Pixies
In 1993, surf-rock dreamers Pixies threw in the towel for good after lead singer Black Francis axed the band via word of mouth and fax. Bemoaning their lack of industry penetration at home and abroad, the band which changed Kurt Cobain's life per Time Magazine, seemed to pass the torch to grunge rock as the new face of alternative rock in the USA.
When the band was reunited at the call of Francis in 2004, it seemed like the best possible outcome for the new millennium's indie-rock-obsessed masses. However, it was their decision to reunite at the newly re-launched, 2-day Californian music festival, Coachella, that marks this reunion as a prime piece of American music history.
Coachella, which had been under development and tweaked over a 10-year period, would be the perfect venue for Pixies' triumphant return, setting Coachella up as the prime festival for major reunions going forward.
8 The Who
In 1978, iconic drummer Keith Moon passed at the young age of 32. Moon's band, The Who, would be in steady decline following the loss until, in 1983, when guitarist Pete Townshend left the band, dismantling the wizards of prog rock.
Also fueled by a trampling tragedy in 1979, a series of disappointing records after Moon's death, Faces Dances, and It's Hard, The Who's demise seemed written on the wall. More of a hiatus, the break-up ended a short six years later when the legendary group would set out on the first of many reunion runs, continuing the long-standing rock and roll legacy of one of the greatest groups of all time.
The Who is set to tour again after sometime away, in a renewed reunion for 2025. Overcoming internal drama once again, it seems that The Who will always return to the font which has kept them on top since 1965.
7 Grateful Dead
The end of the Grateful Dead in 1995 marked modern music's loss of one of the most innovative rock groups to ever do it. After the death of the Dead's bright star, Jerry Garcia, the remaining members of the group called the end of the band's 30-year trip.
For the next decade, members of the Grateful Dead would continue to play music together and apart, continuing the ethos of the original band, until another convergence in 2015--the 50-year reunion of the legendary cosmic folk-rock blues band.
"Fare Thee Well: Celebrating 50 Years of Grateful Dead" would be the first Grateful Dead performance in 20 years, filling Chicago's Soldier's Field with 71,000 deadheads. In his review of the multi-day event for Stereogum, Alex Bleeker remarked that this is "the newly formed and final incarnation of the Grateful Dead. Many fans will surely call this blasphemy, but I believe that it’s true."
6 Blink-182
The internal drama of Blink 182 is certainly one of the band's most infamous angles, and has put the band on ice three times since their inception. In 2001, the band would take a break for two years while Tom Delonge pursued his side-project Box Car Racer.
In 2005, the band went on hiatus for a variety of reasons, certainly Travis Barker's health being one of the most important. The group would come back together for an arena tour in 2009, which rocked the music world at the height of popular punk festivals like the Van's Warped Tour.
More drama would split the group again in 2015 when co-lead singer Tom Delonge left the group to focus on his wildly successful side project, Angels & Airwaves. The group would not get back to basics with the original line up again til 2023, when the band released One More Time.
5 My Chemical Romance
When My Chemical Romance broke up in 2013, they ended their 12-year reign of genre-defining records and culture-shifting rock and roll. In an interview with The Guardian, Gerard Way reflected on their split, "when a lot of people start to have an opinion and that’s when you run into struggle...It wasn’t fun to make stuff any more. I think breaking up the band broke us out of that machine."In 2019 the scales tipped the other direction.
From the band handing out blankets to fans camped out the night before the show to the University of Southern California marching band's rendition of "Welcome to the Black Parade," MCR's 2019 reunion show was the perfect reintroduction to the band after almost 7 years of silence. And the band has continued their previous success without even skipping a beat, highlighting their command of their craft and the longevity of their diehard fanbase.
4 Oasis
Very few reunions have carried the spectacle of the upcoming Oasis reunion. Then again, very few bands have maintained the same level of conflict as the "Champagne Supernova" superstars, who appeared to be teetering on the edge during their entire first act.
Oasis broke up in 2009 after a pre-show fight at the Rock En Seine fest in Paris between brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher. It would be the Gallagher brothers' constant conflict which would keep the band split for going on 16 years, but if time heals all wounds, it seems Oasis is just about done recovering as they prepare to start their long-awaited reunion tour.
We need to wait to see if the reunion shows will live up to the hype. That being said, Oasis is wielding their media-savvy drama-fueled rock and roll persona to great effect as they approach act two--here's hoping the spotlight shines twice.
3 Iron Maiden
While Iron Maiden did not actually break up in the 1990s, the '90s were a low time for the metal-masters. After the departures of guitarist Aidrien Smith and lead vocalist Bruce Dickinson early in the decade, a shell of the former group would limp its way through the final decade of the first millennium.
In 1999, Iron Maiden released Ed Hunter, the greatest hits album with an accompanying video game for PC. This prompted the band to reunite with original members, setting off on the highly successful Ed Hunter Tour.
The newly reunited Maiden would also release their comeback album Brave New World, which is considered to be of the same quality of their earlier work. The reunion shows a return to roots for the legendary band, erasing the six years of uncertainty which shared the name Iron Maiden without the substance that makes the band so memorable and historic.
2 Guns N' Roses
Guns N' Roses were not going to make it through the '90s, as key members began their infamous exodus from one of rock and roll's greatest groups, it would be 1994's cover album which would push Slash to leave the group, effectively leaving the band a group in name only.
What followed was 22 years of poor showings from Axl Rose's band under the title Guns N' Roses including the now infamous Chinese Democracy release, until that fateful Coachella in 2016, which would see the band reuniting to great success. Thanks to Coachella founder Paul Tollett, who cut his teeth in the '80s promoting Guns N' Roses, the festival was the perfect location to relaunch the band.
Guns N' Roses started a 3-year tour following their performance at Coachella, which earned hundreds of millions of dollars. Their upcoming 2025 world tour promises to be just as prolific with performances in the Middle East, Europe, and elsewhere.
1 The Police
20 Years after English new-wave band, The Police, broke up, the group came together for a massive 151 date tour. The 2007-2008 tour took them across the globe and brought in 362 million dollars, according to Rolling Stone.
The band's epic reunion tour, which coincided with the 30th anniversary of their hit, "Roxanne," marked the group's return to form after splitting in the late-'80s. Citing the failure of the band's unreleased 1986 album, The Police called it quits with the members spreading out to grow solo careers, ending the band which was really just going through the motions.
While some great reunions led to new music and further touring, The Police's return in the mid-aughts proved that the band really has that spark. As the members picked up their solo careers after the reunion, what is the most evident is the band's unrivaled talent and cohesiveness as a group.
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