Fascination/Repulsion with Styx

yeah, my favorite ep besides the motley crue one. almost funnier than spinal tap.

"Equinox" is a pretty heavy album and a contains a fair share of loud & fast rockers stuck between hard rock and pomp metal. Styx II was also good. All you need to do is skip "Lady" and the rest of it falls into place.

"Equinox" is the only one in print anymore that's reasonably priced. The previous albums for Wooden Nickel and A&M, which are worth a listen, are being hoarded by dirtbag CD resellers. This has driven up the prices. Check Amazon for a laugh -- $60.00 and up for the
early band releases is just evidence of pure avarice.
The records are fair to good, though, and the greed now on display concerning them makes me recommend some enterprising soul rip them off, from old vinyl if necessary, and post them on the net for downloading.

I really liked "Too Much Time On My Hands" as a kid, too. I liked the line about having "a bottle of cold brew".

I guess "JY" is a White Sox fan, though. So that makes him A-OK in my book.

*most of us were gay
as you might have imagined
we didn't know it

He did "Renegade", "Blue Collar Man", "Too Much Time on My Hands", and "Fooling Yourself (Angry Young Man)". I like all of those songs well enough. So he had talent, I think.

TS: "Snowblind" by Styx vs. "Snowblind" by Black Sabbath" vs "Snowblind" by Ace Frehley

dennis deyoung always struck me as being something of a douchebag.

"Borrowed Time" now that was fucking genius!!!!!!!!!

"YES! NO! YES! NO!!!
NO! YES! NO! YES!"

The reunion tour of 1996 was fantastic. I was REALLY surprised how good they were. But then to put out an album where it was FAR too obvious that Dennis De Young and Tommy Shaw recorded their own tracks- in separate cities- without each other's input and called it the band Styx, just cancelled out everything the reunion stood for.

Tommy Shaw trucks on playing State Fairs with JY and the rest of the latest incarnation of Styx while Dennis sings one-off gigs on Chicago stages, recorded for enjoyment on public television.

With all due respect, these guys blew it. GREAT Behind The Music for sure but man, they have to know they blew it. Chalk this one up next to Foreigner, Van Halen and Journey in the sad demise of the classic rock outfits.

The sad reality is there will be a few people in that audience this summer when Lawrence Gowan sings "Lady" that will have no idea. They'll just the singer just dyed his hair as compared to the old videos. PLAY CRYSTAL BALL!!!!!!!!!!!!

I wonder if it was "Great White Hope" that pushed Bangs over the edge. Is his review in that Psychotic Reactions book or available online? "Aku-Aku" has some nice guitar harmonies.

What do you think of the synth break in "Come Sail Away"? I used to think it was a bad "Baba O'Riley" rip but sometimes I actually find it kind of, um, trippy.

http://he.fi/video/apache.mpg

Ha, I had totally forgotten about the above video. It's still pretty funny.

Anyway, I've bought about two physical CDs this year, and one of them was Paradise Theater which just arrived today. Last time I bought this album was in 1981 I guess, at Sears, first and only lasar-etched album that I owned.

Still a ridiculously good album. I'm up to The Best of Times right now, and eagerly anticipating the Snowbling/Half-Penny, Two-Penny combo coming up (which I've somewhat forgotten as they don't get played on the radio and aren't on Greatest Hits).

Good times. (Any why isn't this available via iTunes/Amazon? They didn't have it at Borders either...I had to mail order from half.com. It can't be out of print, can it?)

Just finished. Holds up awfully well. Half-Penny was even better than I recalled...WE ALL WANT TO BE FREE!!! Almost sounds like a Joe Walsh (?) track at the start w/the guitar riff, and the vocals on the verses are way less mannered than I remembered. The suspended harmony on the chorus: brilliant. The bridge w/construction noises, piano, bells tolling: brilliant. The guitar solo coming out of the bridge: brilliant. Transition into A.D. 1958 and State Street Sadie still surprisingly moving. In a weird way this song puts me in mind of Bowie's Sweet Thing/Candidate/Sweet Thing bit on Diamond Dogs.

So glad I'm giving in and re-buying things like this.

Fascination/Repulsion/Revulsion, repeat.

God that song sucks.

Yeah. I like Pieces of Eight though.

What's amazing about that song is how much it sounds like Oingo Boingo.

dennis deyoung always struck me as being something of a douchebag.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Monday, May 31, 2004 10:55 PM (4 years ago) Bookmark

Best part of the Behind The Music: remembering their stadium show in Texas with Ted Nugent, Shaw says, "The audience was beer, quaaludes and 'show us your tits,' and I have to walk out there and say, 'But Kilroy, what about the children of the world?'"

Getting booed off the stage AT YOUR OWN HEADLINING STADIUM SHOW? Classic.

sooooo broadway (and i love it)

OK WAHT

ned, explain this

"Despite all my rage, I'm still just a Kilroy in a cage."

Gotta say, Lurch is looking good there.

"Dennis DeYoung is the Brian Wilson of Styx" - I cannot get this phrase out of my brain today.

And always a nice surprise to see some of Timi Yuro's posts popping up.

besides hating all their songs, a real problem with styxx is that dennis has one volume: belting it out. zero dynamics. the music just gets quieter or louder around him. it's infuriating.

I fucking love 'Mr Roboto'.

'Blue Collar Man' and 'Renegade' both get me every single time, somehow.

The lyrics of both so hilar as to become profound.

KEEPIN MY EYE TO THE KEYHOLE

"Too Much Time On My Hands" is a jam fuiud

Dennis DeYoung's scream just before the band kicks in in "Renegade" is all-time. As good as Daltrey in "Baba O'Riley."

^ YES.

wait-- do you mean "Won't Get Fooled Again"?

gotta echo the sentiment itt one more time that these guys really had maybe the best episode of Behind The Music

Dennis DeYoung's scream just before the band kicks in in "Renegade" is all-time.

YES

As good as Daltrey in "Baba O'Riley."

NO

xxp Yes, yes I do

I like J.Y.'s guitar.

The Brian Wilson of Styx

The James "J.Y." Young of the Beach Boys

Too Much Time On My Hands and Renegade are irresistible to me, I cannot not love them

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M44XBYCnf-o

And always a nice surprise to see some of Timi Yuro's posts popping up.

Bimble too...

I fucking love 'Mr Roboto'.

― emil.y, Wednesday, September 26, 2012 11:46 AM (5 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Oh man, I came in here to post about the BTM episode about Styx! I just got KILROY WAS HERE for $4 and am already regretting it. "Mr. Roboto" is obviously incredible but the rest is just boring.

Yeah I can't find anything useful. Lots of great album covers, though, dope logo, dece iconography

No Styx vocalists ever terrified me as a young child, the same can't be said for the REO Speedwagon dude.

I caught part of "The Grand Illusion" this morning on the "classic rock" station. It just made me sad for them. Clumsily scotch-taping vaguely "classical" cliches onto "rock" instrumentation wasn't new in 1977, but they played with a pathetically naive approach like they'd come up with some new shit.

sadly also an apt summary of your mom last night.

<3 I will never hang out with matresslessness for fear of rupturing my sunken chest via uncontrollable laughter

<3

I just listened to the Equinox album on Spotify and...didn't hate it. It's actually a really solid '70s rock album. Catchy songs, a minimum of off-Broadway ballad bullshit...I'd heard their first four albums before, and thought they were OK, though not quite as good as Kansas, and that's kinda where I'd file this one, too.

Looked around on Amazon and realized their catalog's never been remastered or gotten any kind of deluxe reissue treatment. I wonder what's up with that?

as a nine-year-old i *definitely* wanted to see the movie 'kilroy was here' suggested existed

in retrospect i dig 'renegade' and 'blue collar man' but it's all pretty awful

bet u anything that dennis deyoung has pitched a 'kilroy was here' musical tho

in retrospect i dig 'renegade' and 'blue collar man' but it's all pretty awful

DeYoung's scream on "Renegade" is the best thing he's ever done (or would ever do). And it's pretty swinging, given how blocky their rhythm section usually was.

Uh, wat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24jV_QlWD38

Just listened to "Renegade" for the first time in years... somewhere, there's a universe where this was a CSN track.