Guns N' Roses are finally releasing Chinese Democracy. Should we care? Their career path of one genius album, followed by a creative nosedive, makes me think not. But it does bring up an interesting question: Why do so many popular musicians produce their best work as young'uns and spend their later careers flailing aimlessly?

This is the reverse in other areas of music. Beethoven's late string quartets are often judged as the most profound works of his life, and outside of Sibelius and Charles Ives, who both produced very little in the last 30 years of their lives, there are few examples of classical composers who decline in quality with maturity. Quite right, too. Surely a songwriter, as a composer, should be able to hone their craft with maturity; learn and refine what they do best and use wisdom to boost their musical output into the creative stratosphere. So why does this not happen in many modern musical cases?

Of course pop is a young person's game. It's also clear that money and success can breed complacency as well as providing a comfortable life that will not translate well into song. But career longevity is increasing post Johnny Cash's revival, aiding septuagenarians like Leonard Cohen and creating space for Seasick Steve. So what's the secret to sustaining a long career?

Don't overstretch your assets

Their brand of cocksure blues metal is now obsolete but, Axl Rose also desperately overstretched the talents of his musicians. Guns N' Roses Mark 1 played awesome, low-slung, dirty blues-rock. Put to work, however, on delicate folk ballads or state-of-the-art prog metal like Coma and they came unstuck pretty quick.

To change or not to change

So does one evolve within a particular way of writing as Nick Cave has done slowly and spectacularly, or constantly try new things? Both can work if done well. I know many people who, after a youth pursuing the shock of the new through Frank Zappa or Naked City, are now beginning to "get" Bruce Springsteen. Why are they warming to these conservative chord sequences? It seems Bruce sustains a career thanks to generation after generation of youngsters growing up just enough to get his romanticism of the everyday. Whereas Joni Mitchell, Björk or, occasionally, Neil Young maintain a hardcore following while gaining and losing admirers from project to project, Bruce just accumulates through maintaining a general level of solid quality.



Assume a character

If you've got a career in pop music then writing about your life could mean telling your listener endlessly dull tales of domestic happiness or holidays with the model missus (or, worse, carping on about the evils of the record industry and media that sustains you). To avoid this, make like Tom Waits or Randy Newman and don't sing about yourself. Assume a character – or like Randy, sing from the point of view of several, even the odd animated gang. Just be careful with that ironic song sang in the first person from the perspective of a racist redneck and make sure you edit your set list in the Alabama leg of the tour.



Use that life experience

Rivalling Seasick Steve, my personal favourite over-50s singer to have sprung from obscurity, is Johnny Dowd. His Pictures from Life's Other Side album is a fantastically uneasy ride incorporating moral tales of drunkenly mutilating loved ones in horrific drink-driving circumstances and bitter tales of adultery. It may all be made-up gubbins, but I'd take this any day over Mick Jagger telling us, "I'm livin' a charmed life…When I step out on the dancefloor… I move to the left, I move to the right". At least make us believe you've learned something from all you've seen.



Have a brush with death

Taking life experience to its logical conclusion, a sighting of the imminent reaper is often enough to prompt a reassessment of what a desirable back-catalogue sounds like. Warren Zevon's last couple of albums are particularly affecting: "Shadows are falling and I'm running out of breath/ Keep me in your heart for a while" or "Please stay, please stay, two words I thought I'd never learn to say" are just a couple of examples of uncomfortable goosebump moments from a dying man. And, of course, the near-unbearable video for Johnny Cash's reading of Hurt, in which he and June were both increasingly frail, could only leave the heartless with dry eyes.

These terminal musings bring me to my own end. So who are the most successful musicians to have kept a genuinely creative career going through middle age? And what has sustained them?