even some of Banks' stuff starts to get a bit dated. I was re-reading Consider Phlebas the other day, and in one sequence he snuck into a high-security concert type event and he's making narrow escapes because concert security is humans checking for paper tickets. And while I am sure you could come up with an in-universe reason for why a super-technological somewhat morally ambiguous future event with pervasive technology would be relying on 1980s levels of surveillance, I think it's just funny how people not that long in the past couldn't easily imagine how willing we'd be to overcomplicate things like that.

I entirely agree but I'm entirely biased, in a world without Sir Terry Pratchett he'd easily be my favourite writer.

It's one of the reason that Musk referencing The Culture makes me want to smash my head on a desk (or someone's at least).

On a personal level I suspect Banks would have deeply disliked Musk (based on his political leanings during his life time and his works in aggregate).

He's definitely up there with Asimov and others.