STYX – Son Of Edge [Unreleased Album 1991-1992]

1992 collection of demos recorded by Styx for a proposed album that was never released. This CD had an extremely limited pressing and was only sent out to record label execs.* Styx is Dennis DeYoung (keyboards & vocals); James “JY” Young (guitars & vocals); Glen Burtnik (guitars & vocals); John Panozzo (drums & percussion); Chuck Panozzo (bass guitar).

* Album produced by Dennis DeYoung; Recorded at The White Room (Chicago, Illinois); Engineered and mixed by Gary Loizzo and James “JY” Young.
+ “Don’t Give Up On Me” – A non-Styx version of this track (recorded by Glen Burtnik as a solo) was released on the 1996 Glen Burtnik album “Retrospectacle”.
+ “It Takes Love To Make Love” – A slightly re-recorded and remixed version of this track was released on the 1996 Styx album “Greatest Hits Part 2” under the title “It Takes Love”. The band liked the original version so much that they just stripped off Glen Burtnik’s parts and had Tommy Shaw record over them.
+ “Paradise” – A non-Styx version of this track (with slightly different lyrics and lead vocals by Dawn Marie [Candlish]) was released on the 1996 Dennis DeYoung album “The Hunchback Of Notre Dame – A Musical”. A re-recorded Styx version finally saw commerical release on the 1997 Styx double album “Return To Paradise”.

Was thinking about this the other day and realized Glen had did a track breakdown for me ages ago and this was posted on this very board:

Older Dear Glen about Son of Edge. It was in response to a question by none other than Jodes….

As for the “Son of Edge” demos, there were a very few CDs burned, I believe less than 10. I can’t say I know who ‘owns’ the masters to the tapes. As I’ve said before, I personally don’t think that particular compilation is near as exciting to hear as the legend of the material seems to be, so I prefer NOT sharing my copy…

It does seem that one of the tunes, ‘All For Love’, was well received this past weekend at the NJ shows.

Although I’ve listed this before, I’ll tell you the sequence of that demo (along with some details about the fate of the tunes) here.

1. ‘It Takes Love To Make Love’ (written by Bob Burger and myself, I believe much of this performance was part of the Styx official release of the song around 1995. Tommy’s vocals surely replaced mine, however you can hear me on the final note “oooh” and I’m fairly certain that’s my piano playing on it as well. Kinda cool _ I’m like a ghost on that record)

2. ‘Nothing In Common’ (a ballad of Dennis’, I believe all the parts were completely sung and performed by him)

3. ‘Love On My Mind’ (A song I’d written with Rick Neigher for Rod Stewart – who never recorded it. JY, Dennis and I cut this version in Dennis’ home studio and the track sounds a lot more like the Black Crowes than Styx.)

4. ‘Watching The World Go By’ (written by Bob Burger and myself, this was a stripped down version of the song I later recorded and released on my ‘Palookaville’ album.)

5. ‘Beneath The Moon’ (this was a song off a solo album of Dennis’ – I think it was ‘Boom Child’?)

6. ‘All For Love’ (written by Dennis and myself, this was my stab at joining the classic Styx sound with something somewhat current. To me now – a dozen years later – it sounds generally dated, but upbeat.)

7. ‘Devil In Me’ (Another tune written by Bob Burger and myself, I consider this sort of a Prince/Fine Young Cannibals-influenced song. Very un-Stygian. Dennis has been suggesting we pull this one out and dust it off for his upcoming San Diego show, which I’ll be at. I’m a little reluctant, so I dunno…we’ll see.)

8. ‘Someday We’ll Fly’ (Another classic Dennis ballad. It’s possible this and/or ‘Nothing In Common’ wound up as themes used in his ‘Hunchback’ show…you tell ME!)

9. ‘Don’t Give Up On Me’ (This was a power ballad of mine, written with Plink Giglio. Much of the demo was recorded by Plink and me in NJ, with some parts overdubbed in Chicago by Dennis and JY, who both remixed it. The original version, without their parts, wound up on my ‘Retrospectacle’ album).

So, as you can see, 4 out of the 9 tracks have been re-recorded and/or released very much as they appeared on the ‘Son Of Edge’ demo.

I was in a very prolific stage at the time, and there were a number of other songs of mine in the running that JY liked more than Dennis, like ‘Heaven In Your Heart’ (written by Mary Lee Kortes and myself) and ‘Love (And Love Alone)’ (written by Bob Burger and yours truly) which JY recorded and released his own version of on his ‘Raised By Wolves’ album.

So if we look at all of them, the only tracks that have not been released in one form or another are the Dennis songs – Nothing In Common, Someday We’ll Fly, and All For Love * have yet to surface.

* All For Love – I have a copy of it from a live show when Glen and Dennis did a few gigs together. There was supposedly another track that was going to be played live Glen had mentioned (Maybe Devil in Me?)

turbo