STYX IS READY FOR TAKEOFF WITH THEIR FIRST STUDIO ALBUM IN 14 YEARS, ‘THE MISSION,’ DUE OUT JUNE 16 ON ALPHA DOG 2T/UMe
Friday, April 21 -- Welcome one and all to THE MISSION, STYX’s sonically sweet 16th studio album and its most ambitious, most challenging, and most rewarding release to date. Please take note of the official stardate, as THE MISSION has duly been set for liftoff June 16 on the band’s label, Alpha Dog 2T/UMe. Fans can pre-order the album at any of these online retail outlets and Styxworld.com.
The first single, “Gone Gone Gone,” was released today at radio and online retail outlets. A video premiered on Billboard.com and can be seen here.
“The planets truly aligned for THE MISSION, and I couldn’t be prouder,” says vocalist/guitarist Tommy Shaw, who co-wrote the album’s storyline with longtime collaborator Will Evankovich (Shaw/Blades, The Guess Who). “It’s our boldest, most emblematic album since PIECES OF EIGHT.”
As founding guitarist James “JY” Young continues, “In the 40th anniversary year of our release of our biggest selling album of all time, GRAND ILLUSION, it just seemed truly appropriate to save our new studio album until this year. Needless to say, I’m very excited.”
“THE MISSION is a deep, conceptual, and cinematic epic that offers listeners a thrilling emotional journey — and all ‘cast’ with impassioned guitar parts and those textured, ‘chill-inducing’ Styx vocals. Guitarists Tommy Shaw and James Young sound like they’re energetic upstarts with something to prove, rather than members of a band with decades of history. This is a truly brilliant soundscape, as well as a tribute to the evocative power of the guitar.” — Michael Molenda, Editor-in-Chief, Guitar Player
“A throwback to the styles of classic Styx records like THE GRAND ILLUSIONand PIECES OF EIGHT, THE MISSION is a wonderful mix of knotty, '70s-era progressive rock madness alongside the melodic power pop the band does so well. Todd Sucherman might be the baby of the group, but he’s an old soul when it comes to finding the right flavor for the new material—and he’s not shy to provide a healthy slab of blazing hand technique, elevating parts to a whole other level of excitement.”
-- Ilya Stemkovsky, Modern Drummer
“Styx have really delivered a welcome addition to their catalog with the arrival of THE MISSION, which wraps in all of the important elements of their much loved classic sound, with a wealth of big hooks, anthemic choruses and most importantly, an album’s worth of really good Styx music.”
--Matt Wardlaw, UltimateClassicRock.com
Indeed, THE MISSION is an aurally adventurous 43-minute thrill ride that chronicles the trials, tribulations, and ultimate triumphs of the first manned mission to Mars in the year 2033. From the hopeful drive of “Gone Gone Gone” to the stargazing machinations of “Locomotive” to the rough-riding blaze of glory that permeates the hard-charging “Red Storm” to the elegiac optimism of the closing track “Mission to Mars,” the album succeeds in delivering the greater good from a band that continues to fire on all cylinders, 45 years after signing its first recording contract.
In fact, THE MISSION--which was recorded over a two-year period at Blackbird Studios, The Shop, and 6 Studio Amontillado in Nashville--displays the best aspects of the ongoing in-harmony musical intersection of the six-man STYX team: the aforementioned guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan, original bassist Chuck Panozzo, drummer/percussionist Todd Sucherman, and bassist Ricky Phillips.
The new music was created to reflect the viewpoint of the six-person crew enlisted for the maiden voyage of Khedive, the first entry in a new fleet of nuclear-powered interplanetary spacecraft underwritten by the Global Space Exploration Program (or GSEP, for short). The Khedive team consists of The Pilot, a fully hands-on, seat-of-the-pants born leader; a First Officer who serves as the team’s big-brother figure; an Engineer who is skeptical of every phase of the mission but remains confident in his own abilities to make the best of any technical situation; and a Top-Shelf Trio of science, astrophysics, and survivalist experts.
“The album feels simultaneously comfortable and new,” observes Gowan. “It’s both entertaining and charming, and a natural progression of our sound.” Concludes Panozzo, “THE MISSION is a sincere and honest representation of how STYX built upon where we were in the 20th century in order to go somewhere new in the 21st century.” And that’s the gist of THE MISSION, STYX’s bold sonic voyage into an exciting new frontier with the goal of discovering how the universe’s mysteries unfold—and then creating the perfect soundtrack to accompany it.
After a three-months rest, Cornerstone are back with their second single from the longplayer "Reflections": the song "Northern Light" was released on 03/31 and was mixed and mastered, like the whole album, by Harry Hess (SIMPLE PLAN, MUSE, BILLY TALENT) in Canada. The video for the song, which has been shooted the same time like the first single "Last Night", was produced by the well-proven filmteam THE COCKPIT and director Christian Enzmueller. "Northern Light" is already available as download on iTunes and in all other online-shops.
REVOLUTION SAINTS head into the studio next week in Italy to start the recording of their highly anticipated second record with producer Alessandro Del Vecchio, who also produced the debut album.
Deen Castronovo (ex Journey, Bad English), Doug Aldrich (The Dead Daisies, ex Whitesnake/David Coverdale, Ronnie James Dio), and Jack Blades (Night Ranger, Damn Yankees) will record a scorching set of songs written by Doug and Alessandro between the end of 2016 and early 2017.
In between recording sessions, Revolution Saints will make their official live debut at the Frontiers Rock Festival in Trezzo (Milan, Italy) where they will be performing a setlist of songs from their first album, plus a few surprises! The band hopes to do more shows to promote the forthcoming album, which is currently set for a release in early October.
Along with Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, Deep Purple are credited by many as the third jewel in the British hard rock crown. At the suggestion of their accountant, Deep Purple would look to save some money by recording their 1972 album Machine Head outside of the UK tax jurisdiction and in the quiet resort town of Montreux, Switzerland.
The events that transpired before and during the recording of Machine Head are legendary, immortalized in the band’s iconic song “Smoke On The Water” which details the massive fire that destroyed the venue where Deep Purple were set to record. Singer Ian Gillan and bassist Roger Glover share with IN THE STUDIO host Redbeard the story that has become Rock and Roll folklore, resulting in Deep Purple leaving Switzerland with a career-defining album.
“We have always had a kind of aversion to recording studios, for various reasons. We are not very good studio workers. We We are quite naive about studio technique and technology. We concentrated very much on the music.” - Ian Gillan
“It (Montreux) was a very small sleepy town in the early Seventies. It was the place you retired to. And we’re lookioking for somewhere we can make a lot of noise in the middle of the night. That’s a pretty tall order.” - Roger Glover
I've spent most of this week without a computer - hence the lack of updates.
I've also been forced to re-do a lot of work due to both my main and backup drives getting corrupted in my failing PC a few weeks back. So it really put me under a lot of stress and fitter behind than ever.
Right now I won't be back in business until sometime over this Easter weekend, so with most people busy, I'll take the next few days as an opportunity to get new system up and running and take stock of what has been a frantic start to the year.
Lots of problems unfortunately - some of which come from rushing to meet deadlines and attempting to catch up on too many things (reviews for one...).
With a clearer focus on things, I'll be back to deliver what everyone wants from MR and more.
One last small issue with Arti Tisi release - being a bonehead, I forgot completely about the Easter break, so I have to push the shipping date back one week (April 26).
Jimmy Davis should be fine to remain on target for May 19.
The MelodicRock Records title for June is one more from the vault which I'll announce after the break. It's a monster and it's been one of those releases that just seems to have been too hard to get a result from. But the wait is almost over!
And to confuse those guessing, we've managed to turn a 10 track album into a double CD!
There hasn't been much said about MelodicRockFest 5 - mainly due to a delay in detailed responses from a couple of artists and also the USA venue. But I'm confident that will also be resolved fully over the next week, so we can move that into full forward!
For those eager to book vacation time, the USA event is May 4-5-6 and Sweden will be 25-26-27.
Some truly great artists lining up to take part. I just need to make sure the budget works and we can fit into both weekends, the best possible artists that you may not otherwise see elsewhere.
I've signed 3 new artists this week for albums on MelodicRock Records which will come out over the coming months. Lots of great music there and a couple of seriously heavy albums alongside some melodic rock gold.
Plus I have a list of vault titles a page long that I'm determined to continue chasing. Lots of music to come.
Thanks to all for your patience and my apologies for a haphazard start to the year.
Finally - because of these PC problems, I haven't been able to cover the sad passing of some more notable rock n rollers.
I'd like to pay tribute to J Geils and former Autograph drummer Keni Richards as well as Eric Cook (Demolition Records). May they all rest in peace.
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