As always thanks to Wikipedia.org for much of the biographical info, also as always the opinions are all mine.
Many people consider Cream the best supergroup ever, but honestly they never did much for me. They definitely have some great songs. Cream lasted for three years, which seems to be about the typical life of a supergroup, from 1966-1969. This three year time period was one of the most fertile time for new and great music in rock history. Cream features Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce. They were known best for the songs "Sunshine of Your Love", "I Feel Free", "White Room":
and one of the most covered Blues songs ever "Crossroads":
Another supergroup that I'm sort of meh on is The Traveling Wilburys. They are the supergroupiest supergroup of all-time. They feature five members who were already superstars before forming the Wilburys. The Beatles George Harrison, some lesser known singer Robert Zimmerman, ELO's Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison and a singer that used to be in Mudcrutch. The Traveling Wilburys lasted for 3 years. Their best known for "Handle With Care" and the addictive, jangly "The End of The Line".
Of all the supergroups The Prophets of Rage may be my favorite supergroup, It's probably either them or Audioslave. I realize those two bands and the amazing Rage Against The Machine have the same 3 core musicians with four different vocalists.
Classic Rock also mentions a band called Ultraphonix and their first CD, 2018's "Original Human Music". Ultraphonix features Living Colour's Corey Glover and Dokken's George Lynch. That CD isn't the most amazing CD ever, but it does have some good songs. Their best song being "Walk Run Crawl".
A much derided supergroup in my research is The Power Station. I'm not sure why they got so much hate, because I loved a lot of their songs. The Power Station featured vocalist Robert Palmer, Chic's drummer Tony Thompson, and Duran Duran guitarists John and Andy Taylor. Their self-titled first CD is their best CD and it also features some of the funkiest music of the 80s.
Another not exactly critical darling band was Asia. They have had a rotating cast of members over their years, which probably has helped lead to their longevity. Their first line up featured King Crimson vocalist John Wetton, guitarist Steve Howe of Yes and Keyboardist Geoff Downes also of Yes and The Buggles and ELP drummer Carl Palmer. Their self-titled debut CD is a classic. It features such songs as "Heat of The Moment", "Only Time Will Tell" and "Wildest Dreams". Like so many bands their first CD was also their peak. Asia continues to tour and released their last CD "Gravitas" in 2014.
A supergroup that never quite reached the sum of their parts was the underachieving Velvet Revolver. While they did have some great songs, shouldn't they have been better. They lasted for six years, but they were six very volatile years, from 2002 to 2008. Velvet Revolver featured Stone Temple Pilots singer Scott Weiland. It also featured three former members of Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash, bassist Duff McKagan, drummer Matt Sorum along with Wasted Youth's Dave Kushner. Velvet Revolver released two CDs in their existence. Their best songs are "Slither" (which won a Grammy), "Let It Roll, "The Last Fight" and "Loving The Alien".
Them Crooked Vultures features the Mighty Zep's John Paul Jones, Nirvana and The Foo Fighters Dave Grohl and Joshua Homme. Homme and Jack White seem to be battling for how many bands they can be in in a career. Them Crooked Vultures couldn't even make three years, they couldn't even make it to their two year anniversary. They occasionally talk about making a second CD, but they've been talking about that for seven years now. Sometimes one just has to realize that something probably won't be happening. That looks like what will happen with a second Vultures CD or that long awaited Led Zeppelin reunion. Honestly for me no songs really stand out. They had some good songs, but not any great songs. Their two most popular songs are probably "Mind Eraser, No Chaser" and "New Fang". "Fang" was the 2011 Grammy for Best Hard Rock performance.
Likely the last supergroup I'll feature is CSNY, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash and the great Neil Young. CSNY had some of the best songs of any supergroup. 1974's "So Far" features such CSNY classics as "Deja Vu", "Helplessly Hoping", "Wooden Ships", "Teach Your Children", "Ohio", "Woodstock", "Suite Judy Blue Eyes" and "Our House".
themusicaddict
