Songwriter Magazine August 1980

Writing the Hits for Styx

Dennis DeYoung

A graduate of Chicago State University with a degree in music, DeYoung had been biding his time as a music appreciation instructor in a Chicago-area junior high as Styx hustled a deal. When the deal came, he was relieved. "I figured it would be easier to entertain the kids with Styx than by teaching!" But Wooden Nickel wasn't the breakthrough Styx had hoped for. Four albums came… and went. Outside of Chicago, Styx was nothing more than that mythical river of the underworld. Ah, but then we come to one of those great breakthrough stories of rock and roll. It involved Lady, which was featured the group's 1972 Wooden Nickel LP, "Styx II." Dennis picks up the story from there: "Wooden Nickel was so small in Chicago that it really couldn't promote the song. Jim Smith, who was working at a small FM station in the city at the time, heard it, however, loved it, and played it. "About two-and-a-half years later, Jim became program director at WLS (the big AM station in Chicago). We had just released our fourth and last album on Wooden Nickel, so we went to bow down to the great people at WLS, because they had never played any of our records. Jim Smith said that he wouldn't play our new album either, but he would play Lady once a night - starting that night - until it was a hit record. "And that's just what he did. He played it for three or four months straight." It's been Top 10 ever since. It's a time of change for Dennis DeYoung. While he and the other members of Styx seem committed to ride the wave of their popularity for some time to come (as this is being written, "Cornerstone," the group's most recent LP, is still in the Top 100, 32 weeks after it's release), they're now pondering extracurricular activities. DeYoung, in fact, is beyond the pondering stage: "Right now I'm trying to expand by capabilities by placing materials with artists I would like to see record my material. Stuff that would probably not be suitable for the band - movie themes, main title themes, etc.

I'm looking to vent this creative energy of mine." He adds that he's accumulated a "catalogue" of songs over the years that he didn't deem appropriate for Styx, softer songs like Babe (for the great story behind the writing and recording of that Styx change-of-pace hit, read on). I caught up with Dennis, in fact, during a recent songplugging foray of his to Los Angeles (he, his wife Suzeanne, and their two children still live in the Chicgo area). He was only in town for the day, but he found time in his schedule for a chat in his room at Beverly Hills' L'Ermitage. I found an engaging man, very much "up" expressing himself on the questions I put to him, the first of which centered around the "For Paul" dedication following the lyric to his song, First Time, on "Cornerstone." Is that Paul, Paul McCartney, by chance? DeYoung: Yes it is. I don't have many people that I look up to in rock and roll, but I can say that I - I don't want to use that word "idolize" - but he is probably the only one that I can think of that I admire. I am just as happy being me as being anyone else I can think of, with perhaps the exception of Paul McCartney. I think he is probably the most versatile singer that has ever existed in rock and roll. And what can be said about his songwriting that hasn't already been documented? Songwriter:When did you first feel you were your own writer performer? DeYoung: I didn't feel I was a writer until somebody started buying our records. You can't really think you are, until somebody proves it. And the only way to prove it is to have somebody lay out a couple of dollars and say, "I'll buy that." Songwriter: Are you convinced yet? DeYoung: I am now. We struggled a long time. We had those four albums out on Wooden Nickel before anybody knew who the hell we were. Songwriter: Now that you have an audience,

do you feel a special responsibility when you write a song? DeYoung: You bet! It's amazing the degree in which some people become immersed in what we say in our songs. People take our songs dead seriously, more than you can ever imagine when you are sitting there writing. Of course, whatever I say in my lyrics I want to believe. It has been my experience that the more honest I am in my lyrics, the more successful the song is. Whether I am talking about politics or religion or love or the media, if am expressing something that I really believe and feel, people respond. Songwriter: Have you always felt this way? DeYoung: There was a time as a songwriter, when I was beginning, that I was less likely to make those kinds of commitments as a lyricist. In other words, I think you are initially afraid that no one has anything in common with what you think, nobody cares about your feelings, nobody has the same feelings that you do. So you try to formulate lyrics you think everyone will think are really hip or cool. When you start doing that, you are really in trouble as a songwriter. So if there is any advice to give songwriters - since that is what Songwriter is all about, try to have a real emotional response to what your lyrics are saying. I can point to songs that I have written early on that I know are just bogus. I mean they were nice, they rhyme, they're cheery, but they did not have any real substance. Although I know when people read the words of these songs, they see something that I never intended. Songwriter: How do you resolve the autobiographical nature of your lyrics when you collaborate with Tommy Shaw? DeYoung: Generally, one person writes the lyrics when we collaborate. For instance, Tommy and I wrote two songs together on "Cornerstone," Borrowed Time and Lights. Lights is Tommy's words. My contribution

DeYoung: The trick is to write something that is really memorable. I think the secret is to have someone say, "I am sure I have heard that before," when actually he has never heard it before. So you want to have a simple enough idea, so that it sounds familiar. Topic-wise, love is probably the best area. Love is something everyone can relate to, either positively or negatively. Songwriter Do you know when you have written a hit? DeYoung Not always, but occasionally I will be overwhelmed by something. Recently, I wrote something that I couldn't! As I started to sing it the words just kept on coming. I had scribbled them down on the back of a Hallmark card that was lying on the piano. I went back and resang it… and I started crying. I couldn't finish it. It was a sad type of song and really very personalized. There were feelings coming out of me that I do not think I was 100% conscious of. I was startled. Songwriter Did Lady come from a similar stream-of-consciousness experience? Suzanne DeYoung DeYoungNo. Lyrics generally do not occur that way. Generally, it is just a lot of hard work - sitting down, getting an idea, and trying to make those words fit to those little melody lines that you have created. Before I wrote the words to Lady in 1971, I had the music. The word "lady" had come to mind and I just took it from there. Songwriter Did you sense that Come Sail Away was a hit? DeYoung When I first played Come Sail Away-- the part that goes "A gathering of angels appeared above my head" and then goes into "Come sail away," - I could feel, "I have got something here." It is just electricity. It just goes right through you.

You start to get goose bumps and start to shake just a little. Songwriter Which one of your songs do you like best? DeYoung Probably Babe, although Lady has stood the test of time. Babe will too. You have to go with the one people like most. Songwriter Speaking of which, how did you come to write Babe? DeYoung It was getting close to my wife's birthday, around the time for the "Pieces of Eight" tour. I had been going on the road and leaving my wife and our first child for six years. In the beginning it had seemed justifiable, because I had that tremendous ambition. But when I'd become successful, that ambition waned a little bit; I didn't have that same tunnel vision, where I could only see one thing. I began to see how much everything else in my life matters. So, to make a long story longer, I wanted to tell my wife how much I really needed her and missed her when I had to travel. So I wrote Babe for her as a birthday present. It is a song really aobut separation. I call her "babe." As I found out later, almost every man calls his girl or wife "babe," which I think is part of the tune's universal appeal. I didn't know that when I did the song. Actually I questioned whether or not I should use that word because I knew about the perfume by that name, and the fact that there was a certain amount of commeciality attached to the word that I did not like. But I said, "Well the truth is that is the way that I refer to her as. Since that's the bottom line, I'm going to use 'babe'!" So I wrote the words and I went in to do a demo because I wanted to give her the tape. It was just drums/bass/keyboard, and I sang all of the parts. I gave it to her on her birthday. Songwriter Did you ever intend for Babe to become a Styx record? DeYoung I never really thought oo much about it, except that I really liked the way the studio sounded. I thought, "this demo sounds better than the goddamned albums we have been making for the past couple of years." So what it did was to get me stirred up to change studios and engineers. So, I would play Babe for people that I really respected to get their opinion on the studio sound. "Have you ever heard a sound like this?" The overwhelming response was no. But in addtion, they also said that is some song. I played it for the guys in the band some five months later and we decided to go to this studio and do the album. Babe ended up on "Cornerstone" and became the first single. Aside from that, exactly one year after I gave my wife the song, Babe became No. 1 in the United States.

SongwriterLet's switch gears and talk a little craft. Do you abide by any specific guidelines to give your songwriting direction or continuity? DeYoungEvery time I sit down at the piano as a songwriter, I try to let something happen. I don't set out with a preconceived idea of what I am going to do. In other words, it is just a matter of banging on the piano. If I get a little phrase that I like, I try to elaborate on it. Now that I am going to start writing material for other people, maybe I will be thinking of another performer when I am writing. Songwriter Do you ever write when you're not poised in front of your piano…perhaps using no instrument? DeYoung Yes, rarely. It is sometimes beneficial to take your hands of the keyboard. If you are a singer, it can be a great asset. As a singer, I'll stop playing because there are certain things that I always do with my hands that I won't do if I take my hands off and just start humming things in my head and then onto a tape recorder… and then try to find out where they are on the keyboard. It can be a trick to start humming the little melody, trying to find out where there is a chord change. To me, it's like putting a puzzle together in a very peculiar way, almost backwards. But some ideas have been spawned from that process. Songwriter How structure concious are you? DeYoung I try to make enough changes so that my songs don't all have the same damn structure. The guys in Styx are a help in this area, because they've had an input in the arrangements. That outside input is so vital… it gives you a point of view that you normally would not have. Songwriter Have you ever experienced a dry spell? DeYoung I think every time you write something really good like Babe, you are sure you will never have another good one. I had that with Lady, then I had it with Come Sail Away and The Grand Illusion. Now I will have it with Babe. But I think that feeling is common to every creative person. Songwriter How do you deal with the fear of failure? DeYoung Well, I go to the piano and hope to God for something good. I hear about writer's block; I have never had writer's block -- yet.

Songwriter How long does it take you to bang out a song? DeYoung There is no time table for that. Sometimes it takes a long time; sometimes it comes really fast. I wrote Castle Walls on the "Grand Illusion" album and I bet it took me a year to write that. I had the idea for months and I could not get the melody to go anywhere. Songwriter When you write lyrics, do you have any special do's and don'ts? DeYoung Yes. I try my best sometimes not to rhyme things. A lot of times I will have a long phrase with no rhymes and then two quick phrases in a row at the end of this long phrase and those two rhyme. It is a trick not to make things rhyme. The easy thing to do is to make lines rhyme. "Lady, when you're with me smiling, give me all your love. Your hands build me up when I'm sinking. Touch me, all my troubles will fade." There is no rhyme in that verse. And even the chorus is "Lady of the morning, love shines in your eyes, Lady." A tremendously successful song but no rhyme. Yet I think if you were to ask someone, they would think the words were rhyming. I like that. Songwriter When did you first hit upon this technique of not rhyming? DeYoung Actually, I didn't realize how little I was rhyming until I got a letter from a girl who is a songwrite. She wrote, 'I really like your stuff because… it doesn't rhyme.' And then I started to look at my lyrics and I said, "Well, I'll be damned, it doesn't rhyme!" Songwriter Well since you're not a rhymer, I guess you don't have much use for rhyming dictionaries! DeYoung Never used one. Nor a thesaurus. If I do not know it inside me, and I go and use somebody else's words, then it is not me any more. I try to use my own language. Songwriter Do you have any do's and don'ts as a melody writer? DeYoung I guess the mortal sin is corniness. Songwriter Do you spend more time on your melodies or lyrics? DeYoungMy lyrics. There is no question in my mind. For me, that's the hardest part. Melodies I could write all day long. No problem. The greatest responsibility for a songwriter lies in writing the lyrics, not the melody. As I said earlier, our audience can really be moved by what we say. Songwriter And, as the charts show, your audience is one of the big ones. Which us to business. How do you deal with your songs becoming commercial commodities? DeYoung I know that people tend to think that artists are in it for the money. I would be the first one to say I like having nice places to stay. But I have never met anyone in this business whose first and foremost burning desire is not to be the best at what they do, totally apart from the money. Honestly, I think all artists don't give a damn about the money unless it interferes with what they do. They want to sell millions