Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)Live recordings of some of the best bands in the world rarely, if ever, truly capture the essence of the live performance. Now meet the exception. Although Gary Loizzo is behind the mixing of this album, it is still truly one of the best produced recordings of Styx' career. I mention the above only because I thought that Styx' production values dropped considerably after Pieces of Eight, when they replaced Barry Mraz with Loizzo for Cornerstone and future albums, including the horrible Caught in the Act live album of '84. All of those albums sounded cheap and tinny with a production sound made for adult contemporary radio rather then rock. You can blame Dennis' songwriting from 79-83 for that as well.
But here on Return to Paradise, Styx is in the finest form of their career. Dennis and Tommy's vocals and instrumentals are spectacular. Chuck's bass lines are thundering, JY's guitar playing could set fire to a lake, and newcomer Todd Sucherman is a drum god! The highlight of this album is Suite Madame Blue. You can scrap the original recording and go with this version in a heartbeat.
I don't miss Dennis' egotistically overblown ballads, and the current Dennis-less lineup is a total joke. But for one magical night in 1997, Styx recaptured the magic and put on the best show of their career! And how lucky we are that they captured it on CD and DVD.
I do have to note one rather odd observation: I saw them on 3 different nights for this tour, and can tell you that every song intro and/or comment made between songs was rehearsed and repeated word-for-word at every show. You would think that a band who has been in the business for 30 years would be creative enough to ad-lib just a little bit.
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