Ash wrote:The only thing really interesting in this thread (to me) is the talk about times to make albums. I, too, wonder why it takes such a long time to make a record. Sure - you have to write the songs and rehearse them and work out the parts. There is the whole creative aspect and I can appreciate that as much as someone who doesn't have a musically creative bone in my body can.
But these guys used to crank out a record a year ... and they were damn quality records at that. I'm realistic enough to know that sure, they're older and have a lot of other things going on and that touring likely pays WAY better than selling music these days, but I think it comes down to legacy and throwing your fans a bone. If it took them 8 months to write and record a record back in the late 1970's we'd have never had many of those classics we now enjoy. Can you imagine if they had taken 4 years between Grand Illusion and Pieces of Eight? That's likely what would have happened if those albums had been made today. These days you're lucky to get a new album every two years from your favorite bands. When acts like Kansas, Styx, Journey and REO used to routinely write and record and strike the muse.
As for the other stuff about Glen. Facinating. I don't think it's going out on a limb to say that Zan knows Glen likely better than anyone else on the board. And Glen himself has spoken on this at least half a thousand times. I remember him saying that the only "side" he was on was his side. Sure he and Dennis may have had some issues over some things said in interviews (what... TWELVE years ago?), but adult attitudes usually prevail and everyone works through it and moves on.
So the bottom line is - it's become easier and cheaper to make records, but those records are fewer and further between. If you ask me, that just does't make any sense. Didn't Glen say he was working on some new music? I think I saw him talk about that on facebook a few weeks ago.
Artists create. Can you imagine if Picasso had stopped painting because nobody bought his paintings? Oh wait... nobody DID buy his paintings until after he was dead. My bad.
In my recent interview with Michael Sweet, we talked about the new Stryper album 'The Covering,' and it was eye-opening. It's a really good record (for what it is), and they actually got together and did the tracks instead of mailing them around. And the total budget was $30,000. So the notion that you can't do a new album for anything other than a fortune is crap. I have a friend here in Nashville who used to be with Virgin Nashville, and he did his last record himself for about $10,000 and it sounded better than the Virgin album he did that cost almost a quarter of a million dollars.
Theoretically Styx could write the songs on buses, at home on breaks and such, get them all in a pile and re-work them as a band at rehearsals, on the bus and so on. They could demo them at home and mail parts around for approval until they had the arrangements worked out. Then each guy could learn his parts individually. Then they could block out a huge chunk of time at a studio, about two straight weeks and force a good deal, and everyone get in there and burn through the ground tracks live, then go back and do fixes while everyone's there. That's your major expense but it can be managed and budgeted carefully.
After that, vocals can be added at home for no money, then duck back in with just the singers to do the backgrounds together (I don't like the way the BGVs sound when they are pieced together), then stick the solos on and you're done. It doesn't have to be a big ordeal. Styx is just USED to it being a big ordeal because that's the way the band has always recorded. A new album doesn't have to cost $750,000 or some crazy thing, like EOTC where they spent a month trying to get a drum sound. EOTC would have been a damn sight better if they'd recorded it in two weeks. The more you work on a thing, the more you cut it to pieces and weaken it, especially in rock music.
Here again, it's very readily possible for Styx to do a new record. The people running the band don't want to. And for my money, I'd just as soon not have a new record from the band if their heart is not really in it. What's the point of that?
Sterling
