Tag Archive for: Dennis DeYoung

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Styx- Paradise Theatre- Tommy Shaw, James Young

If I told you that in 1981  one of America's top music acts released a concept album that  identified growing cracks in the foundation of our society and presciently predicted practically everything we find today, who would you guess it was? Bob Dylan? Neil Young? Crosby Stills and Nash? I doubt that Styx would come to mind to many, but that is precisely what "Paradise Theater"  was, part lament, part warning. Current members Tommy Shaw, James Young, & Lawrence Gowan all weigh in as does ex-member Dennis DeYoung on "Paradise Theater" 's forty-fifth anniversary.

Styx- Equinox 50th- James Young, Tommy Shaw, Dennis DeYoung

there was high drama and great music before with the third-time's-the-charm "Lady", then 1975's strong Equinox  album containing "Light Up", "Lorelei", and the timeless "Suite: Madame Blue". Band leaders even today James "JY" Young and Tommy Shaw look back on the Equinox  along with the original former co-founding member who wrote and sang all of those songs, Dennis DeYoung
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Styx- Pieces of Eight- Tommy Shaw, James”JY” Young

focusing on the  1978 release of "Pieces of Eight", former Styx member and co-founder Dennis DeYoung  confesses that, in spite of his major conceptual songwriting role on the band's 1977 breakthrough three million seller "The Grand Illusion", the highly-anticipated follow-up "Pieces of Eight" was not his finest hour. Styx guitarists/ songwriters/ singers Tommy Shaw and James Young stepped up creatively to fill the void on "Pieces of Eight", again selling triple platinum with the muscular "Blue Collar Man","Renegade","The Great White Hope","Queen of Spades", and "Sing for the Day".
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Styx- Grand Illusion- Tommy Shaw, James “JY” Young, Dennis DeYoung, Lawrence Gowan

Styx co-founder Dennis DeYoung, lifer James "JY" Young, and then recently recruited Alabama boy Tommy Shaw all join me here with current Styx keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan In the Studio for the early days of being the perennial opening act, saddled with the curse "big in the Flyover States", all the while writing and recording "Fooling Yourself","Come Sail Away","Miss America", "Man in the Wilderness", and "Grand Illusion".