In my observation, I see only one general trend post-2000 - a distinct lack of motivation to give something creative in IR's output!

There were a few gems like "thalaatum kaatre"(Devan), the Mumbai Xpress album, the stunner TiS album and maybe a few more - but overall I see IR doing 'eno-dhaano' kind of stuff

His interludes have become increasingly plastic - for instance, until the early 1990s, he was using creative motifs even while using synth stuff minimally - take the interludes in the song 'en uyire vaa' as an example - last few years, the interludes are getting shorter but also lacking the imaginative flow richly found in IR's earlier songs

Even the songs of Nandhalala had nothing to write about in terms of the interludes - IR seemd to have focussed on the tunes without paying too much attention to the ludes - donno why he is doing it

plus, his compositions seem to have a deja vu feel to them

But having said all of this, 2009 seems to have brought something out of him - I have hopes from him this year

Inspite of this, as Vignesh has perfectly zeroed in on one issue, if IR puts all his efforts and comes up with a winner, but fails to package it nicely (i.e., does not market it well), its commercial success and reach may not be viable, which could reflect on his motivation to do better albums - but then that line of thinking might be outside the scope of this thread