1979 - 1980

1980's and Superstardom

Their 1979 album Cornerstone yielded their first No. 1 hit, the DeYoung ballad "Babe". By early 1980, "Babe" had become the band's biggest international hit and first million-selling single, reaching No. 6 in the United Kingdom. The album also included the No. 26 DeYoung hits upbeat "Why Me" and the rocker "Borrowed Time", which was co-written with Shaw, plus Shaw's folksy "Boat on the River" 1980, which was a hit in much of Europe and Japan. The popularity of the album, which reached No. 2 on the Billboard 200, helped win the band a People's Choice Award for Best New Song in 1980.

At the 22nd Grammy Awards, STYX was a nominee for Best Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group and Cornerstone's engineers Gary Loizzo and Rob Kingsland were nominated for a Grammy for Best Engineered Recording. The band was also named the most popular rock band in the U.S. in the 1980 year end Gallup Poll.

1981

Paradise Theatre X studio album, released on January 16, 1981.

The band's most commercially successful album, peaking at #1 for 3 weeks on the Billboard 200 in April and May 1981 non-consecutively. It was also the band's fourth consecutive album to be certified triple-platinum by the RIAA.

Four singles from the album charted on various charts, with two songs reaching the top 10 pop singles chart. The lead single "The Best of Times", written by Dennis DeYoung, went to #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. "Too Much Time on My Hands", written by Tommy Shaw, went to #9 on the Billboard Hot 100, Shaw's only top 10 hit for STYX. "Nothing Ever Goes as Planned", written by DeYoung, went to #54 on the US Pop Chart. "Rockin' the Paradise" — written by DeYoung, Shaw and James Young — went to #8 on the Top Rock Track Chart.

A concept album, the album is a fictional account of Chicago's Paradise Theatre from its opening in 1928 to its closing in 1956 and subsequent demolition, used as a metaphor for America's changing times from the late 1970's into the 1980's.

The band has said that the theme of the album is "one of hope and renewal in the spirit of the American people to understand the problems that confront the world and this country and find solutions themselves to those problems. Don't depend on heroes to do what you must do for yourself. If you hate your job but you have a dream, then pursue it. Just don't sit around and complain about it." STYX

Vinyl Edition ~ 1981

Initial vinyl copies of the album have a design featuring the name of the band laser etched directly onto the vinyl on side 2 (some copies had a wax design of the cover art). The vinyl record sleeve was a gate-fold and was painted by the artist Chris Hopkins. On the back cover, label and spine, the title of the record is spelled "Paradise Theater", while on the front cover, the title is spelled "Paradise Theatre".

To Much Times On My Hands

An ambitious year long world tour commenced in 1981 in support of the album and was one of the top grossing tours of the year. The tour had numerous Broadway and movie infused elements, including a dramatic opening featuring a theatre sweep and DeYoung by himself next to a player piano and the show ending with traditional movie credits. Throughout the tour and throughout the 1980s and beyond, the band would open their shows with "Rockin' the Paradise", the opening track from Paradise Theatre which charted at No. 8 on the Top Rocks Track Chart and whose music video would be among the first to air on the MTV cable channel.

1982

Live at Budokan

"It is all about being open and paying attention to the music in your head. I think most people have original music playing in their heads from time to time."

1983

Kilroy Was Here Xl studio album, released on February 22, 1983.

A concept album and rock opera about a world where rock music is outlawed, it is named after a famous World War II graffiti tag, "Kilroy was here". It was the last album of original material to be released by the "classic" lineup of Dennis DeYoung, Tommy Shaw, James "J.Y." Young, John Panozzo, and Chuck Panozzo.

The album spawned two hit singles, the synth-pop "Mr. Roboto" which later became one of their signature songs, and the power ballad "Don't Let It End". Both of them were major hits in 1983, peaking at No. 3 and No. 6 respectively, on the US Billboard Hot 100.

The album is certified platinum by the RIAA.

It is the most recent studio album by the band to be certified platinum.

1983 - 1989

Disbandment (Why?)

The album Kilroy Was Here went Platinum in 1983, boasting two Top Ten hits written and sung by DeYoung, the synthesizer-based "Mr. Roboto" (No. 3 US) and power ballad "Don't Let It End" No. 6 US.

In 1983, the band mounted an ambitious stage show in support of Kilroy Was Here featuring theatrical presentations of three songs utilizing instrumental backing tracks, including "Mr. Roboto", which featured DeYoung singing live while disguised as a Roboto, "Heavy Metal Poisoning" with Young as the evangelist Dr. Righteous singing while the Panozzo brothers acted as his henchmen on stage and "Haven't We Been Here Before" with Shaw as Jonathan Chance and DeYoung
as Kilroy in Roboto costume duetting. The elaborate show was expensive to
produce and was not as profitable as previous tours.

Kilroy Was Here brought the creative and competitive tensions within the band beyond the breaking point; this was further exacerbated following the band's performance at that year's Texxas Jam. Shaw departed the band for a solo career at the conclusion of the tour. In 1984, the band released its first live album, Caught in the Act. The project featured one studio track, "Music Time", which became a Top 40 hit. The concert was also filmed and released on VHS under the same title and on DVD in 2007. By the time of the album's release, they had already parted ways.

Tommy Shaw Goes Solo...

Time Goes By Very Quickly

Though the 1980's eventually brought the decline of STYX, the decade began with the band riding a wave of commercial success with the #1 pop ballad "Babe" from their album, Cornerstone (1979), which was written by keyboardist Dennis DeYoung. However, tension mounted within the band as Shaw and other band members, preferring the rock direction of the songs written by Shaw and guitarist James Young, expressed dissatisfaction with DeYoung's desire to pull the band into a pop radio direction. Although the band had released singles and achieved airplay on pop radio, up until this point they had done so by sticking to their progressive/hard rock roots. But the planned release of "First Time," another ballad much in the same vein as the previous single "Babe" brought things to a head within the band. Shaw threatened to quit if "First Time" was released, worried that two ballads in a row would alienate Styx's rock fan base. DeYoung and the record company argued for release, but were out-voted by the band. For this reason, unbeknownst to the public, DeYoung was briefly fired from the group in early 1980 but quickly rehired, and the conflict would arise again.

Shaw's dissatisfaction continued to grow as DeYoung took more and more control of the band and their musical direction. Shaw had a lesser role on the theatrically-themed album Paradise Theatre, than he had on previous albums with the band, even though it featured a #9 hit by Shaw, "Too Much Time on My Hands" – his only Top 10 hit with STYX. Shaw's frustration in the band ultimately boiled over with the next album Kilroy Was Here. The concept of the album, along with its accompanying tour, was entirely the brainchild of DeYoung. The live shows featured an eleven-minute movie intro and theatrical performances with dialogue by the band. Shaw very much detested the whole project, and
this time around vetoed one of his own compositions,
"Haven't We Been Here Before" from being released as a single.

From the time Shaw joined STYX, up until the release of "Babe", Shaw had written and sung on six of the band's eight singles released in that period. Shaw released three solo albums
in the 1980s: Girls with Guns 1984, What If 1985, and Ambition 1987, scoring a
Top 30 hit with the title track and a minor hit with "Lonely School," both from the first album.
Shaw's solo band opened concerts for The Kinks in 1984 and for Rush in 1987 – 88.

Blue Collar Man (Long Nights)

Give me a job, give me security
Give me a chance to survive
I'm just a poor soul in the unemployment line
My God, I'm hardly alive

My mother and father, my wife and my friends
You see them laugh in my face
But I've got the power and I've got the will
I'm not a charity case

I'll take the long night, impossible odds
Keepin' my eye to the keyhole
If it takes all that to be just what I am
Well I'm gonna be a blue collar man

Make me an offer that I can't refuse
Make me respectable, man
This is my last time in the unemployment line
So like it or not, I'll take the

Long nights, impossible odds
Keepin' my back to the wall
If it takes all night to be just what I am
Well, I'm gonna be a blue collar man

Keepin' my mind on a better life
Where happiness is only a heartbeat away
Paradise can it be all I heard it was
I close my eyes and maybe I'm already there

I'll take those long nights, impossible odds
Keepin' my eye to the keyhole
All that to be just what I am
Well I'm gonna be a blue collar man

Do do do do do do do do
(You don't understand)
Do do do do do do do do
Do do do do do do do do
Do do do do do do do do

I'll take those long nights, impossible odds
Keepin' my eye to the keyhole
If it takes all night to be just what I am
I'm gonna be a blue collar
Got to be a blue collar
Gonna be a blue collar man

Written By: Tommy Shaw