old songs were surrounded by new ones, making the albums quite dif- ferent from one another. However, throughout the years, the band didnt really change its

served all of the legendary bands featured in this book well; in fact, some of the problematic times for star brands occur when they stray too far from what their fans expect and have rewarded with loyalty in the past. Success in the market can usually be attributed to specific brand strengths, and completely abandoning those traits rarely results in greater acceptance or sales. Whereas U2, Bruce Springsteen, and Sting have improved and em- bellished on their musical strengths to increase their popularity over the years, Garth Brooks almost brought his career to an abrupt halt with a bizarre twist on total reinvention. Brooks almost single-handedly led the migration of country music into mainstream culture. Wearing a cowboy hat, western jeans, and a country-boy grin, he combined the electricity of a KISS concert with the beat of the Rolling Stones or AC/DCs music to create a new genre of music that struck a deep, rousing chord with Americans from a vast array of socioeconomic and demographic backgrounds. Some called it crossover, some called it country rock, but nearly everyone called it sensational. It crossed the wide chasm that had traditionally divided rock and country audiences. But even beloved stars can go too far in pushing the envelope of originality. After several platinum albums, numerous Grammy awards, and a string of sold-out stadium concerts, Brooks assumed the identity of Chris Gaines, a fictitious character he created to allow himself to explore different artistic channels without alienating or diminishing the Garth Brooks band. Then people were told that Gaines was really Brooks. Try as he might to explain to his fans and the media why he suddenly looked like someone in the witness protection program, many thought he had lost his marbles and didnt buy the new album. 126 | B r a nd s Th at Roc k     It wasnt long before the blonde, hard-rock version of Brooks disap- peared and the good old country boy reemerged. Since then, how- ever, Brooks has failed to hit the level of popularity he claimed in the early to mid-1990s. Marketers sometimes underestimate the time required for innova- tive new products to diffuse through the population because of failure to understand generalization. Products that require a substantial change in behavior are classified as discontinuous innovations; they take more time to diffuse and be accepted than products that con- sumers perceive as similar to what theyve used in the past. Microsoft

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