02. Styx - The Grand Illusion (1977)
After the band’s commercial breakthrough with
Equinox in 1975, the band then stalled on the even more balanced
Crystal Ball album in 1976 but by the time of their seventh album
The Grand Illusion, the band would finally become one of the biggest rock bands in the USA and
The Grand Illusion a mainstay at the higher end of the album chart.
The Grand Illusion is quite simply one of my all-time favourite albums and even today its brilliance still has the ability to mesmerize me and send me to a far away place, something that the best
Styx recordings have always been able to do. If I had my way this album would’ve been in the number one slot on this year’s listing, but as we have a democratic voting system this went to another band. The Styx music principal at this time was to combine intellectual keyboard-orientated pomp rock with a hard rock backbone and plenty of pseudo-intellectual lyrics thrown in as well. The band knew that focused shorter songs were the way to go and with a strong eye on commercialism the band were very much forerunners of the AOR genre.
Now for such a classic album not every song here is great by any means and I’ll get these tracks out of the way first. The opening and title track “The Grand Illusion” is a credible enough track and goes through various stylistic changes which kind of mirrors the opening track “Put Me On” from the previous
Crystal Ball album and
Dennis DeYoung carries the song both lyrically and vocally well enough. The song also makes another appearance at the album end where it acts as a reprise. “Superstars” is a poor track and a real duffer and strangely enough is the only song on the album that despite being sung by
Tommy Shaw, features all the songwriters working together for the only time on the album and this change in focus shows.
The first of the classic tracks starts with “Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man)” a gloriously penned Tommy Shaw track that matches his “Crystal Ball” effort from the previous album. The song starts with a wonderful spiralling keyboard intro that is mixed in with an acoustic guitar and this combo carries the essence of the song, which really gets underway when Tommy Shaw announces ‘relax, take it easy’ and here he comes across as a kindly psychiatrist that is trying to relax his patient before embarking on one of his great musical fables. The album finally goes into its realm of excellence with track four where it almost changes face with the 6 minute “Come Sail Away” and a song like this on the previous two albums would’ve operated as an epic album closer just think “Suite Madame Blue” and “Clair de Lune” from those albums, but here it features slap bang in the middle of the album and starts with a simple piano base and then moves into a strong ballad before embarking onto being a powerful rocker.
The second side of the album starts with “Miss America” and is another one of the great Styx songs and one of
James Young’s finest moments and he was certainly the iron man that put the steel into the band. “Miss America” starts with that haunting almost fantasy sounding Keyboard intro that permeates through most of the album, before embarking as a galloping rocker and its deceptively basic hard rock riffs yearn back to the glory days of American hard rock of the early 1970s. “Man in the Wilderness” is a Tommy Shaw track that I can listen to all day long and he was really a master of evoking feelings of melancholy into his work and this is a dreamy sounding effort full of his fabled lyrics. Finally “Castle Walls” with its heartbeat intro which combines neatly with the band’s medieval vibe, is one of the great Dennis DeYoung efforts as he combines cryptic lyrics with dreamy pomp and the guitar work of Tommy Shaw here is exceptional, as is the keyboard work of Dennis DeYoung.
The winning formula on
The Grand Illusion is without doubt the unique identity of its best tracks where the band’s three primary songwriters and vocalists Dennis DeYoung, Tommy Shaw and James Young have sole writing and vocal credits for their own songs and it’s almost like each member has tried to outdo the other a la
Beatles on
Abbey Road, whereas in the past a large number of the band’s material was either jointly written or had a different songwriter and vocalist combination, a combination I always loved but here the change in direction clearly enhances this album. I think the album cover is glorious as well with its vertical wooded trees which evoke a medieval setting and a medieval vibe can be heard on a number of tracks as well. The multi-coloured horse and the elements of the woman's face add to the album cover's allure. I’m not sure if the album title with its ambition is a nod to the classic
Jean Renoir film of the same title, often considered one of the best French films ever but I'd like to think that it is.
The Grand Illusion is not a concept album from what I can tell, but the name the grand illusion points to some kind of deceptive function behind the whole album.
When I think
The Grand Illusion I think epic and unique songwriting, focused and timeless efforts, glorious synthesizer flourishes, pseudo-medieval elements and interesting lyrics.
The Grand Illusion along with the following
Pieces of Eight would be the two greatest statements from this band and benchmarks in the 1970s American rock scene, a truly legendary album.