The singer Ian Hunter recently announced a reunion tour of Mott the Hoople, the British band that recorded some memorable hits in the early 1970s. But, Hunter tacitly acknowledged, it wasn’t quite a reunion.

Of Hunter’s four bandmates from Mott’s defining 1972 album, “All the Young Dudes,” two are dead and one is incapacitated from a stroke.

Multiple deaths are rarely the end of great rock bands. So Hunter will tour with the guitarist and keyboard player who joined Mott for its anticlimactic 1974 swan song, “The Hoople.” Displaying a level of honesty rarely embraced by those trying to sell concert tickets, he called this band not Mott the Hoople, but Mott the Hoople ’74.

It’s possible that Hunter could have picked some musicians from a Craigslist ad and legally presented the group as Mott the Hoople. (He declined an interview request.) Increasingly, calculated misrepresentations are part of an older band’s repertoire. Once a band name turns into a brand name, there’s a strong incentive to continue on, even with a lineup that makes fans ask, “Who are these guys?” As rock approaches its eighth decade, partially intact bands are more the rule than the exception. If you’re a purist who wants to see only bands with their full original lineups, you’d better love U2.