Styx

After 14 years on the road and without releasing a new album, Styx shocked fans by releasing one out of the blue. Even more shocking is that it’s damn good.

After 14 album-free years, they’ve surprised everyone by releasing a new album. The other surprise is that it’s rather good.

Given what else he and his wife could do at home on any given night of the week, Styx guitarist Tommy Shaw – and indeed Mrs Shaw – must really like his band’s new album. That’s really, really like it.

“There’s a 5.1 version of it that will come out later in the year,” he says, laughing at the absurdity of what he’s about to say next. “Every so often I ask her: ‘Honey, do you want to get a glass of wine and sit in the studio and just absorb the thing in 5.1?’ And she loves to do that. We get completely lost in the storyline, the experience, the whole thing. It’s just a fucking trip.”

It had better be.

And it’s been a long trip for the Chicago band, The Mission being their first collection of original material for 14 years (2005’s Big Bang Theory was a collection of covers). Understandably, Styx are extremely proud of The Mission, saying it’s their “boldest, most emblematic album” since Pieces Of Eight in 1978.

Talking to Classic Rock, Shaw and guitarist/vocalist James ‘JY’ Young both feel that following a lengthy period in the creative doldrums The Mission once again legitimises Styx. For too long they had ground out a living on the road, often revisiting past glories, including the 2012 trek based on vintage albums

The Grand Illusion (1977) and the aforementioned Pieces Of Eight.

“Who wants new music from a classic rock band?” Shaw shrugs. “Cyclorama [2003] told us the answer to that question. So we hunkered down and touring became what we did. After Ricky Phillips [bassist] joined the band in 2003, we played between a hundred and a hundred and twenty shows per year for fourteen years. It’s what kept Styx viable, and we figured out how to do that beautifully.” Something important was missing, though. “Cyclorama went nowhere. In fact, we had more success the following year with a cover of [The Beatles’] I Am The Walrus [that appeared on Big Bang Theory],” JY admits. “The making of concert videos served its purpose, but it really was time to do something completely new.”

After more than a decade of playing the same old songs night after night on the road, now that they have a new album in the shops, Styx feel like a band reborn.

“It’s more than that,” Shaw insists. “I know it’s a cliché, but after being silent for so long this could be our first album. We had another fourteen years of our lives to draw upon.”

It’s somewhat ironic that it was Shaw, and not Young, who has a degree in Mechanical And Aerospace Engineering, who dreamed up The Mission’s futuristic tale of a first manned

“WE PLAYED BETWEEN A HUNDRED AND A HUNDRED AND TWENTY SHOWS PER YEAR FOR FOURTEEN YEARS. IT’S WHAT KEPT STYX VIABLE.”

TOMMY SHAW