Scorpions are already gone to my understanding. Most of those bands will call it a day, some will make albums but not tour, some will go on with new members. It makes you wonder if some of these bands will just continue on for hundreds of years after the last original band member is gone, like musical zombies. Journey seems to be a good pick for that maybe.
Freegards
Scorpions did announce their retirement 2 years ago and went on tour which was a huge one for them and then decided to do a covers record and enjoyed doing that so much they said “We might not be ready to call it quits...just...yet.”
Neil Schon in Journey said recently that things are very hot for them right now but he does see something coming in a few years where they would like to wrap it all up with all of the former members of Journey for a last record and tour.
Alex Lifeson, Geddy Lee, and Neil Peart have all hinted in recent months that the evening with format to their tours will be coming to a close...3 hours a night is becoming too much for them and that this tour will likely be the last evening with and scale it back to 2 hours with an opener. Peart has gone on record as late as 2004 saying he didn’t want to be touring when he was 60...well...he is on tour at 60 as we speak. Lifeson said he wants to enjoy his wife, kids, and grandkids plus help out producing younger acts and artists who have requested for him to play on their record but he never made time for it.
Geddy stated a few weeks back he doesn’t want to be on stage at 70 and sees things coming to a close as far as tours go in around 5 or 6 years max. You have to think about that because they just started a tour for their new record a month ago and have dates scheduled through the fall of next year. They will then likely release another live DVD/CD package and have more time off the road and then tour for their 40th Anniversary and before you know it...we are 3 to 4 years already from today by the time that is done.
Bottom line? Go see these bands now while you can.
Aerosmith has a 2 year tour ahead of them and they too have stated they will likely fall back into doing individual projects and what not and this current tour will likely be their last long tour scaling anything in the future back to just the U.S., that travel is just wearing on their bodies.