CRASH OF THE CROWN

Ok, I admit it. At my core, I'm a Styx fan. Sure, they get the short end of the stick a lot of times in music circles, and they might not necessarily be the coolest band to like, but I really think that there's some real artistic merit to some of their 70s releases. They hit their sweet spot mixing some lighter and accessible elements of progressive rock with pop rock sensibilities and big melodic hooks and solos. Styx acted as an important stepping stone band to me. Helping me eventually get into more challenging progressive rock bands. Though they're no longer one of my all time favorite bands like they were several years ago, I still get a lot of enjoyment out of their music and have a lot of fun with it. I think the album that shows them at their creative peak is 1978's 'Pieces of Eight.' For me, that record is full of a good mix of uplifting and hard rocking tracks, strong songwriting and a real sense of chemistry within the band. However, following that release, key songwriter Dennis Deyoung started taking the band in a different direction with much more of an emphasis on power ballads such as the hit songs "Babe'' and "The Best of Times" along with somewhat of a theatrical edge and personally, they begin to lose me here. Being candid, I think the following records are the reason that they have the mixed reputation that they do today. Ultimately, this sound reached its eclipse on the notoriously disastrous half-concept record Kilroy Was Here in 1983 that also boasted a nearly equally infamous trainwreck of a tour that soon after, led to the split of the band. After some solo efforts from the members that ended with mixed results, the band came back in 1990 with Dennis Deyoung once again at the helm, notably with the absence of the other key songwriter, guitarist and singer: Tommy Shaw. This album was titled Edge of the Century. However, despite having a hit song in "Show Me The Way," it just wasn't meant to be, and the band split once more soon after in 1991. Personally, I think I like this record even less than Kilroy to be frank about it. However, this wasn't the end of this story. In 1995, the band was back with almost the classic lineup intact. Drummer John Panozzo was struggling with alcoholism, which he eventually succumbed to in 1996, unfortunately. Taking his place was a young Todd Sucherman, more on him later. The resulting tour of this reunion ended up being a massive success, so of course, it only made sense to make a new record. Unfortunately, old gripes and tensions would resurface during the making of 1999s Brave New World, resulting in an album that comes off to me as just directionless and among their weakest material. Soon after, Dennis Deyoung was more or less kicked out the band due to him and Tommy Shaw, along with other guitarist James Young finding it incapable to get along after all these years. I get the impression Dennis, found somewhat of a niche, and perhaps many many dollars in his more ballad based direction. When for all this time, Tommy and JY wanted to bring the band back to it's hard rockin' somewhat prog adjacent roots. They brought in Canadian singer/songwriter Lawrence Gowan to fill his shoes, and in 2003, they released Cyclorama. An album that.... exists. It didn't make much of a splash in the 2003 music landscape, so the band from there on out decided to become a touring band. That remained the case until 2017.

Deterred from the commercial failure of the last album, the band was always hesitant to throw new songs in the pool. However, seemingly finding a new source of inspiration, Tommy Shaw teamed up with songwriting partner Will Evankovich to write new music. This eventually led to 2017s "The Mission." Now, I can't imagine too many oldschool Styx fans were very enthusiastic about the prospect of a new Styx album, without Dennis Deyoung, in 2017. However, this album actually blew me away, and it seemingly had a similar effect on fans who were willing to embrace this current lineup of the band. You see, this album didn't feel like a return to form. Instead, it was something new, a progression, a reinvention. While classic elements of their sound still remained in the mix, I found this record to be not only among one of their most progressive, but also very bold and ballsy. They sounded tight, inspired, and the production and songs were excellent. The drumming of Todd Sucherman also just took things to a new level, dudes insane. Since its release, I've always held it as the second best Styx record. That brings us to the present, 2021. Styx has released the follow-up to that record with Crash of the Crown and once again, they've really surprised me with just how well they've moved their sound into the 21st century compared to many of their contemporaries. The production is once again extremely rich, potentially even better than ever with more of an emphasis on embracing ear candy electronic and percussive subtleties. This album, like The Mission, is a concept record, perhaps a little looser than its predecessor in that respect. It falls into one cohesive unit with all the songs flowing into one another with different motifs and melodies recurring throughout the record. I mentioned that The Mission to me, was likely their record that was the most rooted in progressive rock. Well at this point, Styx is just a modern prog band in the same vein as Ted-era Spock's Beard, Neal Morse Band, some Kansas and even early Dream Theater. This is a straight up progressive rock album with pop rock sensibilities, rather than the other way around like it tended to be on their 70s albums. Once again, the drumming! Todd Sucherman just cruises through a multitude of odd meters and rapid structural change-ups across this record. Tommy Shaw just sounds exactly the same as he did in the mid 70's, his voice simply hasn't aged. I can't quite say the same for James Young, but he only has one lead vocal on this album and it's also a shared lead vocal at that. So really, the performances and production on this record get an A+. Very few bands of this age ever sound this inspired and fierce to me. Also unlike many contemporaries, this isn't a nostalgia act. This is a band that's pushing themselves creatively and trying all sorts of new sounds and song structures, and that's likely going to be a turn off to a chunk of their fanbase which? is likely made up of a lot of old classic rock radio fans who aren't particularly interested in that. That's alright though. At the very least, they've earned back my respect with these last two records for this reason. Let's get into the songs now.

The Fight of Our Lives is a short opener that quickly introduces a motif that will pop up again later in the title track. The band quickly hits you with a pretty signature large-scale Styx harmony. This track acts as a bit of an overture to the album, but ultimately, while this does a good job of kicking off the album in an energetic fashion, there's much higher peaks to be reached later on. For example, the following track "A Monster." Though once again clocking in just over 3 minutes, this track feels very complete and packs a lot into those three short minutes. It opens with a cool menacing main riff before flowing right into a nice acoustic guitar backed verse. The synth melodies across this song really stick with me and always act as a nice little immediate payoff within the music whenever they pop up. This track gives me some strong Dream Theater vibes, especially in the closing minute where Gowan seems to channel Jordan Rudess for a sweet solo to close things off. One of the best tracks here, really tight vocal performance as well which is somewhat of a constant across this record. Reveries is a really pleasant and playful track similar to Fooling Yourself off the Grand Illusion, but now with Gowan delivering the lead vocal. It has a very summery vibe to it with another big chorus and uplifting synth lead. This song also packs a pretty fiery guitar solo in the middle that adds a little "umph" to it. Hold Back The Darkness is a somewhat more intimate and darker song. I like a lot of the production effects in this track, and the somewhat slowburner cadence behind it is a nice change up as well. While I have no particular complaints, it just ends up falling a little middle of the pack on the album, as does the following track Save Us From Ourselves. Again, nothing blatantly wrong here. It just doesn't stand out to me. Perhaps extending it by a little bit and throwing in a little more variety would have benefitted it. That's something you may notice on this album, the songs are all very short. It's pretty clear this tracklisting was designed for a full album front to back listen, but on a couple tracks I do feel there's room for a little more development and extension and this is one of them. The titular track that follows this up however, similarly to a monster accomplishes plenty in its runtime just shy of 4 minutes. All three lead vocalists get a little time to shine here and structurally this track is broken up into three different sections to complement the vocal shifts. The opening is very exciting and melodic with a smooth 5/4 groove. Gowan transitions us into the next passage of the song with a cool little symphonic sounding synth motif before it kicks into Tommy Shaws portion of the song. The groove! Closing the song is a really rampaging and stomping finale with some cheeky little nods to Queen in the guitars and vocal deliveries. The album really hits a stride starting with this track, as Our Wonderful Lives totally soars. I feel bad because I think I've said this word a good four times already in this review, but man, this song is so incredibly uplifting. It just really hits the spot, especially now in this time where I'm fortunate enough to live in a place where my life is more or less, back to normal. For those of you not quite there, please hang in there! This track has one of the strongest hooks on the record, and towards the end of the track there's some nice Beatles-esque horns. Keeping this momentum, Common Ground comes up next and once more, stands tall as one of the best songs on this album. Once more, the hook is incredibly inspiring. This one reminds me a little bit of Sing For The Day off Pieces of Eight. I also really like the little change of tone in the instrumental halfway through this song, as well as the tradeoff of lead vocals towards the end. Continuing this streak is Sound the Alarm, a very pretty ballad covering ground that sounds both somber, yet hopeful at the same time. Funnily enough, this one reminds me a little bit of Take Away My Pain by Dream Theater, which honestly when you really listen, sounds more like a Styx song than it does a Dream Theater song. The keys act as a strong backbone to this song, properly setting the stage for an emotional delivery from Shaw on lead vocals. The next track Long Live The King doesn't quite stand out as much as the sweet streak of tracks that preceded it, but the instrumentation on this song is really unique in its darker somewhat windier tone. Lost at Sea is a short little dreamy interlude that brings us into another highlight in 'Coming Out The Other Side,' which is kind of a good summary for what I feel like my life has been like as of late. This track has an effortless 9/4 groove, while the music and melodies around it blossom with beauty. The guitar solo on this track is probably my favorite across the whole album. There's an incredible amount of feel in the playing and the guitar tone really compliments the performance we're given. The solo would make Andy Latimer of Camel proud. Unfortunately, the next track on the album "To Those" is my least favorite. It's not bad, but it's the only track where I feel like it's very safely a Styx song. I feel that on this track they're pulling just a little too much from some of their past works. The chorus has a pretty similar melody to the Pieces of Eight titular track as well as a few cuts off The Grand Illusion. Perhaps it can easily be summed up as the least adventurous track, and sadly, adventure is what I'm looking for in this album. Now on the final track Stream! This is a really good note to end out on and I think "Stream" is a fitting title for the music that accompanies it. The guitar solo that takes up half of this relatively short track is probably my second in command after the one on Coming Out the Other Side. The solo and cadence of the track has a real easygoing and comfortable quality to it that I really dig. This is another case though where I think the track could've been extended by about a minute, giving the band room to build up to an even more majestic finale. Instead the track somewhat anticlimactically fades out, but I'm happy enough with what we have here!

I'm super into this album right now and Styx should be proud of it! A certain subset of fans will probably immediately write it off because a certain name isn't attached to it, but at the very least, I hope some of those people at least give it a few spins with an open mind to see if it ends up changing their perception or growing on them with time. This album makes me happy, and it came at a time when I'm in a perfect headspace and situation to? feel happy! I hope we see another album from Styx where they continue this inspired and proggy direction. Hopefully I can catch the band at some point this summer and see some of these tracks live. Feel no shame about loving the bands you love folks!

4 Stars