I'd think age has a lot to do with it, ie. when they started and when they stopped. A lot of people go through major development through their 20's and that can leave em worlds different at the back end of their 20's than the front.
A great example of that last thought would be tracking Faith No More and Mike Patton from 1989 to 1997, I had friends asking me when watching later videos what they did with the guy who sang Epic - lol, I'd say 'gave him more strings'. I think Mike Patton was 21 back in 1989? Holding up The Real Thing against King For a Day Fool For A Lifetime or Album of the Year - you can see a progression but it's clearly not the progression that would have occurred to you when The Real Thing first came out, or even Angel Dust for that matter.
_________________
“Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word "love" here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace - not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.” - James Baldwin