CORNERSTONE

This album could also be called "Dennis' Revenge"--a poppy reaction to the hard rock , Tommy Shaw-domainant predecessor Pieces of Eight. This album has striking diversity, but almost completely lacks the hard rocking down-and-dirty soul of Tommy Shaw and James "JY" Young. If you ignore the ballads "Babe" and "First Time", you find some interesting tunes. This album as a whole is not my favorite by any stretch becuase of the turmoil wreaked by the change in their sound, but the ONE song that somehow encapsulates ALL the things I like about Styx is on it: "Borrowed Time". It has to be the absolutely last time thay wrote a song in true collaboration as a band that was worth a damn. No wonder the dissident DeYoung refers to this song as a "bastard": it is probably the last really rockin' song he did and it rocks because he only wrote the lyrics (which are some of his best and capture the essense of 1979) and let Tommy Shaw write and arrange the music.