On The Subjects of Playng the Hits and New Music

[Boomchild]

So we have discussed here before the subjects of playing the hits as well as new music (making and playing) or no new music. I came across this recent interview with Tom Petty who I think we can agree is a "classic artist" in the same or similar position as Styx. In this interview, he expresses his opinion on the subjects mentioned. What is interesting is he has a different take on it from what members of Styx have said on the subjects. Check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7oN4mkbz-I

FYI: If you don't want to watch the whole thing you can skip to these time points where he talks about the above subjects. They are 3:39 and 14:29.

[masque]

cool interview thanks for posting!

here are my thoughts;

1) tom petty from an overall arc is a much more popular artist than styx….therefore, he is one of the lucky few "classic" artists that still seem to have an audience that cares about the music he writes. tom is considered more of a "hall of fame" songwriter than anything else and as he's gotten older his song writing has also evolved in a way that he kept a great deal of his appeal.

2) i think tommy and jy and the boys are still very interested in making new music……but when you look at a great album like cyclorama only selling around 50,000 copies total, WHILE they were on a HUGE tour with journey and reo and they played 4 songs off that new album and it still didn't sell then it certainly shows them that in their case, for the most part, their fans aren't too keen on new material from them……so i am sure they look at it and think "why bother, why embarrass ourselves by putting out stuff that won't sell?" by comparison, petty's new album just sold 131,000 copies in it's first week and became his first #1 album…….but what most people don't know is that you could choose to receive a copy of the album when you bought a ticket to see him live in the coming weeks……so there is no doubt that the marketing tool helped tremendously with sales figures for the week…….but i tip my hat to him and his team for having the idea and finding a way to get the music into the hands of the people buying tickets to his shows.

[masque]

oh and i forgot to say this as well……..i think there is a legitimate possibility as well that styx realizes that new music is not going to increase ticket sales at all to their live performances so it's simply not a part of their business plan……writing and recording a new album is time consuming and hard work…….especially for these guys to write songs good enough to live up to their past work……..so i think it becomes easier to just not do it or make what you believe are valid excuses for not making new music.

as a musician myself who has written a lot of songs it does seem pretty bizarre that they don't find a way to keep making new music……but whatever the reason, for them, it appears it isn't going to happen.

for what it's worth, i don't think petty's new album will sell one additional concert ticket either…….his fans, like all classic rock fans are coming to see all the songs he has done over the last 30 years that they know and love……but petty himself feels better having new music to tour behind and since he plays 3 hour shows it gives him the chance to please his audience and himself because there is time to play the majority of what the fans want and he gets to throw in a handful of new songs to keep it feeling fresh for him and the band.

[Boomchild]

I think that Petty and Heartbreakers have worked very hard on the new stuff they create and fans are buying the new stuff because of that. It's clear he knows that for the most part the albums are not going to sell like in the old days. But that is not why he does it in the first place. He clearly has a passion for creating new music which is what seems to drive him to continue in the business. Honestly, I don't think those in Styx have that same type drive to create new music. Granted there are the issues with the marketplace and the industry that effect classic artists from putting out new material. I think that in a way that the current Styx uses those things as an excuse when it's more about they just don't have the drive to do it. I think the band in general lost the ability to be able to sell new music and it's not just because changes in the industry. My feelings are that the "parody of yourself" thing that Petty talked about is something that Styx is now falling into.

[Toph]

cool interview thanks for posting!

here are my thoughts;

i think tommy and jy and the boys are still very interested in making new music……but when you look at a great album like cyclorama only selling around 50,000 copies total.........

I think a big IMO is needed in front of that. I would hardly classify Cyclorama as a "great" album. IMO, One With Everything was a solid song and the two Gowan songs were decent as was Kiss Your A$$. These are Times was tolerable for JY. The rest is awful.

[masque]

cool interview thanks for posting!

here are my thoughts;

i think tommy and jy and the boys are still very interested in making new music……but when you look at a great album like cyclorama only selling around 50,000 copies total.........

I think a big IMO is needed in front of that. I would hardly classify Cyclorama as a "great" album. IMO, One With Everything was a solid song and the two Gowan songs were decent as was Kiss Your A$$. These are Times was tolerable for JY. The rest is awful.

we'll have to agree to disagree on that........most everyone I know other than you seem to feel that cyclorama was very worthy of being an album to have success and certainly not something they had to apologize for.....i think it blows brave new world out of the water with the exception of "goodbye to roseland".

the point is that boom is probably right in that they just dont have the drive to do it.....but I will say that it's pretty hard to muster up the drive to go thru the process of making a new album that you know wont sell.......at least for petty he still has enough of a foot hold on the market place to make it worth his while so to speak.....and since his new album debuted at #1 then who can argue.......of course, it only took 131,000 units to be #1 which says alot about the record industry as a whole. 20 years ago that number would have been a good week 2 months into a new release.

in fact, full moon fever, his most successful album sold over 6 million copies and never went beyond #3 on the charts. that's not dismissing his current feat because I am still proud of his current achievement as a fan. but he's running a different race with different rules than he did 20 years ago.....but once again, i tip my hat to him because he's found a way to stay relevant.

here's my question......do any of you feel that new styx music would sell? with or without ddy?

night ranger pumps out new music that sells 6000-10,000 copies.......last foreigner barely sold anything. i never even saw or heard a track from the last reo album.......i think even the last journey album tanked. so i think we can say that petty is tapped into a different market than the ones mentioned above....because other than journey's first album with arnel, none of them can sell an album anymore.

[Toph]

cool interview thanks for posting!

here are my thoughts;

i think tommy and jy and the boys are still very interested in making new music……but when you look at a great album like cyclorama only selling around 50,000 copies total.........

I think a big IMO is needed in front of that. I would hardly classify Cyclorama as a "great" album. IMO, One With Everything was a solid song and the two Gowan songs were decent as was Kiss Your A$$. These are Times was tolerable for JY. The rest is awful.

we'll have to agree to disagree on that........most everyone I know other than you seem to feel that cyclorama was very worthy of being an album to have success and certainly not something they had to apologize for.....i think it blows brave new world out of the water with the exception of "goodbye to roseland".

the point is that boom is probably right in that they just dont have the drive to do it.....but I will say that it's pretty hard to muster up the drive to go thru the process of making a new album that you know wont sell.......at least for petty he still has enough of a foot hold on the market place to make it worth his while so to speak.....and since his new album debuted at #1 then who can argue.......of course, it only took 131,000 units to be #1 which says alot about the record industry as a whole. 20 years ago that number would have been a good week 2 months into a new release.

in fact, full moon fever, his most successful album sold over 6 million copies and never went beyond #3 on the charts. that's not dismissing his current feat because I am still proud of his current achievement as a fan. but he's running a different race with different rules than he did 20 years ago.....but once again, i tip my hat to him because he's found a way to stay relevant.

here's my question......do any of you feel that new styx music would sell? with or without ddy?

night ranger pumps out new music that sells 6000-10,000 copies.......last foreigner barely sold anything. i never even saw or heard a track from the last reo album.......i think even the last journey album tanked. so i think we can say that petty is tapped into a different market than the ones mentioned above....because other than journey's first album with arnel, none of them can sell an album anymore.

On Cyclorama, this is assigning your and maybe your friends' tastes to the public at large when in actuality, it isn't close to reality. Take amazon listener ratings. Cyclorama has a 3.8 out of 5 stars. That is the same as Brave New World and much lower than the 4.5, 4.6 of Grand Illusion, Paradise Theatre, et al. Even the much maligned Cornerstone earns a 4.0. The one album Cyclorama beats is Kilroy which is rated a terrible 3.3

That being said, I do agree with you that Cyclorama is better than Brave New World. It is much more cohesive. Is it as good as the A&M days, like you and JY believe? In my opinion, it isn't close. Too many filler songs and, for a band that "wanted to rock" to many poppy songs. "Yes I Can"? Really? I would rank it under all of the A&M albums, including Kilroy and Edge, but higher than Brave New World, higher than the Wooden Nickel albums with the exception of Styx II, and higher than Big Bang Theory.

Now, of the other bands, Journey had success with Arrival and Revelation and was poised to have a big album with Eclipse, but instead of putting out a catchy, Journey-esque album, they decided to follow Neal Schon down an ego trip and put out that awful Eclipse, an album that unlike Revelation, had few "hooks" and sounded little like classic Journey. Talk about blowing your opportunity. It was less about the band's age than the quality of product that was put out.

Foreigner, likewise, on Kelly Hansen's first LP, had a couple of songs that got radio airplay. Could they do it now? Now sure.

Night Ranger's "Somewhere In California" was critically acclaimed and I'm sure blew through more than 5000 - 10,000 units. In fact I believe they do pretty well in Asia. Speaking of Asia, the band Asia has done very well overseas, specifically in Japan, with their latest releases.

Regionality could definitely play a role here. Heck, Dennis DeYoung had a gold record in Canada.

Point is, it can be done. Whether they want to expend the energy and the creative juices is up to them. Personally, I question whether this lineup has a lot of creative drive.

[masque]

toph this is one time i nearly agree with everything you said……yes i do like cyclorama a lot but there is no way i would consider it on the same level as anything from equinox thru kilroy………those albums are in my blood…..cyclorama was an album that got a lot of mileage from me and i really enjoyed and honestly it turned out better than i thought it would……but it's not a pimple on the ass of grand illusion or pieces of eight to my ears.

when i speak of album sales i only base that on stuff i read and run across pertaining to american sales only……many of these bands like night ranger and especially some bands like mr. big do well in japan and other markets which is fantastic for them. but even for a band like night ranger lets say my numbers are way off and the somewhere in california album sold 25k +……for a band that has sold over 16 million in their career i think even they would be like "meh" over those numbers. nothing against the boys at all because i loved that album and they are one of my faves of all time…….i just think none of those bands can sell significant amounts of albums again…..i think the journey record a few years ago was the "last hoorah" for classic rock bands actually selling albums in large numbers.

and there is no arguing that the proof is in the pudding with tommy and jy and the boys that apparently they just flat out don't wanna create new music……either from the lack of a creative drive or the fear of dwindling success or not enough money or all of it.

[Cassie May]

My two cents....nobody is moving huge amounts of music unless they are in the teenybopper market, such as One Direction, Miley, Bieber, Katy Perry, etc. Teens are the main audience when it comes to music charts, album sales/downloads, and concert tickets. It's been that way since music charts began. In general. Let's face it, when we as teens named Styx the #1 band in 1980, were any of us buying Elvis or Frank Sinatra records? It's just the same with teens today.

I have read many interviews with JY, Ricky, and Gowan, and they all give the same party line: the music business is totally different today (which we all know is true), touring is where the money is to be made nowadays (many other acts have also said the same thing), and there is such demand for the band live that they can't take the time off to record. As for creativity and creating, I read that Gowan is finishing a solo album in his spare time, Todd has his drum clinics and other side projects, and Tommy recently moved to the Nashville area, so he may be pursuing more bluegrass, the music he grew up with.

I don't think there is any one answer that will satisfy everyone. Especially with so many variables at play.

[Boomchild]

here's my question......do any of you feel that new styx music would sell? with or without ddy?

night ranger pumps out new music that sells 6000-10,000 copies.......last foreigner barely sold anything. i never even saw or heard a track from the last reo album.......i think even the last journey album tanked. so i think we can say that petty is tapped into a different market than the ones mentioned above....because other than journey's first album with arnel, none of them can sell an album anymore.

To answer your question, I would say no. So if they are motivated to create mostly on that then your not going to see it. Petty on the other hand made it clear that is not why he does it. For a Styx album of new material to sell well it would have to be mind blowing good and relevant. The other reason that Petty has been able to still be somewhat successfully selling albums is that he never stopped making them. That and he's not afraid to keep putting the new material in his set lists all the time.

[Boomchild]

……but it's not a pimple on the ass of grand illusion or pieces of eight to my ears.

and there is no arguing that the proof is in the pudding with tommy and jy and the boys that apparently they just flat out don't wanna create new music……either from the lack of a creative drive or the fear of dwindling success or not enough money or all of it.

Well, I don't see JY being that motivated to do it considering that his stuff seems to have been "left on the cutting room floor" and\or wasn't bringing much to the table when it comes to writing material. Let's face it, the bulk of the responsibility would fall on Tommy.