Are Gin Blossoms Actually Gin Blossoms?

I attended a Gin Blossoms show in Kansas City last week. I couldn’t help from thinking about this: How could one name a band Gin Blossoms when only some original members remain part of it? How does one properly define a band or group nowadays? When a critical member (de)parts, does the show still go on? Are simply hits and name recognition enough, not to mention the explicit, blatant bamboozlement of a likely uninformed public? 

Troubled songwriter and guitarist Doug Hopkins unfortunately killed himself in 1993, after the band terminated him; he wrote the band’s major Billboard hits “Hey Jealousy” and “Found Out About You”. Watching singer Robin Wilson sing these songs and cheerfully work the audience, tambourine and all, was a bit unsettling to me; same goes for Hopkins’ “replacement” on guitar, Scott Johnson. But the band does have a new album due later this month.

Here is video from a show in Boston.