Bard in ARR was a 4 button faceroll, and you are overestimating Bard's complexity in HW. Sure, it had to deal with the hardcasts (albeit they were very short, so it barely mattered), but you didn't have to rotate 3 different songs, you didn't have to keep track of a song gauge, and some people will disagree here, but I think having to refresh the DOTs every 18 seconds was actually more manageable than doing it every 30 (reason being, 18 seconds is a very short amount of time, you can literally count your GCDs until your next Iron Jaws, 30s makes it easier to forget).
Bard in HW was just massively overbloated with buffs, Hawk's eye, Blood for Blood, Internal Release, Barrage, Raging, etc. Then you had Foe's Requiem which was a flat 3% damage buff to all the party (surely engaging... <.<). The only thing convoluted about HW's BRD was the opener, but keeping the rotation going was simpler than it is in ShB imo.

Opinions though.