Quotes by Dennis Deyoung - Page 2 | QuoteForever

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I like being on a team and that's what a band is like. It's us against them, strength in numbers, and sharing the success and failure.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Sharing
Copy Quote
My views are simple. If you're gonna make a commitment, particularly marriage, stick to it. If you can't compromise, you've got no chance.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Compromise
Views
No Chance
Copy Quote
I think a lot of bands would rather put mediocre rock tracks on their album to try to maintain some sort of testosterone badge of courage.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Mediocre
Testosterone
Badge
Tracks
Copy Quote
As an artist you always want to challenge yourself, but as you get older you want to bring the audience with you while expanding creatively.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Expanding
Creatively
Copy Quote
I always say, when I play the first few notes and people scream... if you're tired of that, you should try retail. What else are you looking for?
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Notes
Retail
Scream
Copy Quote
A unique style comes from not being able to do things in a conventional manner. If David Byrne could have sung like Paul McCartney, he would have.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Conventional
Byrne
Manner
Mccartney
Paul
Paul Mccartney
Sung
Copy Quote
101 Dalmatians' espouses virtues good to revisit: In times of crisis, families must pull together through love and commitment to overcome obstacles.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Obstacles
Love Good Together
Overcome
Virtues
Revisit
Copy Quote
I really believed it was important to explain to our young audience that expectations based on people who are trying to sell them things are unattainable.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Unattainable
Copy Quote
If you pretend to be somebody that you're not when you write songs - and I did that on some of the early Styx albums - nobody cares about what you have to say.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Nobody Cares
Styx
Cares
Pretend
Copy Quote
If you are going to take me a to a musical, you'd better give me three songs that I'm gonna like. Nobody goes to the opera for the recitative. They go for the aria.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Aria
Opera
Me Better Nobody
Copy Quote
If you have talent and you work really hard, it increases your odds but it doesn't ensure anything. But every now and then, the universe must tilt in your direction.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Now And Then
Odds
Tilt
Ensure
Increases
Copy Quote
When I play the first few notes of a song and people start screaming, I think: 'That's why I did this. That's why I wrote this song. That's a good job.' And it is a job.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Good Job
Notes
Screaming
Copy Quote
Music was everything. But what the digital revolution has done, with streaming services and downloads, is take the value out of music. When things lose value they lose their meaning.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Streaming
Copy Quote
We came along at a time when people were really focused on music. We were part of the second generation of bands after all of those great 60's bands when rock was still in its' infancy.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Infancy
Time Music Great
Copy Quote
I can do anything onstage. Here's the misconception: You could record an album called 'The Best of Styx.' And all you would have to do is pay the individual songwriters a mechanical royalty.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Misconception
Royalty
Songwriters
Styx
Mechanical
Onstage
Copy Quote
Anyone in showbiz rock 'n' roll who says they're so tired of playing their hit songs, I want to smack them. I think it's an act. Because, look, you work your tail off to get people to validate you.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Showbiz
Smack
Tail
Validate
Copy Quote
It was a song I wrote for my wife as a present, never intending for it to be a Styx song. 'Babe' was a demo. The demo became the hit record, including all the background vocals, which were done by me.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Babe
Styx
Demo
Hit Record
Intending
Vocals
Copy Quote
It's great when it all comes together in a great musical like 'Sweeney Todd,' when Stephen Sondheim writes songs from heaven, the book is good and the staging is good. But it's very rare when that happens.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Heaven
Sondheim
Staging
Good Great Together
Rare
Todd
Copy Quote
Look, nobody is a bigger fan of Tommy Shaw than me. The day I met him in 1975 I knew he was going to be a great guitar player, performer and songwriter. I was his biggest fan, and I'm Styx's number one fan.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Guitar Player
Styx
Tommy
Copy Quote
I want to see the '70s guys, if they're gonna do something, stay valid in the '90s. Then they belong. If they're trapped in the '70s, then it's nostalgia. You're not getting me in those platform shoes again.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Nostalgia
Trapped
Belong
Valid
Copy Quote
When I went out and started making solo records, I was determined not to, I guess, put my name on an album that sounded like Styx. I wanted to carve my own niche, so quite frankly I went in a different direction.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Determined
Niche
Solo
Styx
Carve
Frankly
Quite Frankly
Copy Quote
I formulated the theme behind 'The Grand Illusion' album after observing how American culture creates illusions through advertising and entertainment to convince us that our lives our lacking, in order to sell products.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Advertising
American Culture
Convince
Lacking
Observing
Creates
Grand
Illusions
Copy Quote
Over the years, I thought many times about how my life would have changed if I had been drafted and Styx never had happened. Even if I hadn't been wounded or emotionally scarred, it would have changed my whole timetable.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Styx
Wounded
Life My Life Never
Drafted
Emotionally
Scarred
Timetable
Copy Quote
When it came time to do 'One Hundred Years' I had been encouraged to really make a Styx album without the guys. I gave myself permission to do that. I set out to get people who sang with me who could make those harmonies.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Permission
Styx
Time Myself Me
Encouraged
Harmonies
Hundred Years
Sang
Copy Quote
What people fail to realize is that any album we did, really, 90 percent of it reflected the songs people brought in. If someone had brought in two great rock songs for 'Cornerstone'... they would have been on that record.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Cornerstone
Reflected
Copy Quote
Every artist wants to feel like they're still valid in a contemporary way. But you can't be so arrogant not to think that people who have thrown down their hard-earned money don't want to see and hear the things they want.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Arrogant
Contemporary
Thrown
Money People Way
Money People Feel
Valid
Copy Quote
My voice doesn't sound like anyone else's. I wanted to sound like my favorite singers when I was young because when you're young you don't put much value on uniqueness. But later I realized I had something special to offer.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Singers
Something Special
Uniqueness
Copy Quote
Our music did not sound like the Beatles in any way, shape or form. I could never find it in myself to use those Beatles tricks in Styx records because they were sacred to me. But what they did always influenced my thinking.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Sacred
Styx
Music Myself Thinking
Influenced
Our Music
Copy Quote
Radio stations provided a service. They weeded out the stuff that no one should ever have to even think about. Now, they made mistakes and they made mistakes with me even but, by and large, they provided a service. They were an editor.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Radio Stations
Editor
Provided
Copy Quote
I've tried to figure out ways to be less pleased other than the search for perfection. Talk about a thing that'll make you have a miserable life. On that quest, on that journey, down that path, there's a lot of feelings of, 'Why am I doing all this?'
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Miserable
Pleased
Quest
Search
Copy Quote
I love Styx as much as I could love anything in my life. I started playing in the band when I was 14 years old. You become so involved in something when you start in it that young; you're doing it purely out of love of what you're doing and a belief in it.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Styx
Life Love My Life
Purely
Copy Quote
Back in 2000, I had come to a crossroads in my life, unsure about what career path I should pursue. Shepherd, bouncer, philosopher king, ventriloquist or perhaps man on the flying trapeze. Fortunately, I was guided back onto the path of the magical world of music.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Career Path
Crossroads
Flying
Philosopher
Pursue
Trapeze
Unsure
Life Music Path
Life Music Man
Guided
Fortunately
Magical
Onto
Shepherd
Ventriloquist
Copy Quote
Originally, AXS TV came to me last year and asked me if I'd be interested in doing an acoustic 'Live from the Grammy Museum' performance. But I was bound and determined to do an electric show with this great band to dispel any notion that I wasn't a 'rock guy' in Styx.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Determined
Electric
Grammy
Last Year
Notion
Styx
Acoustic
Great Me Doing
Great Me Live
Dispel
Museum
Originally
Copy Quote
I had worked so hard on three projects 1997 that it knocked the gas out of me. It was a mystery to the medical profession, but you can test positive for Epstein-Barr and not have it. When you get a post-viral syndrome, for some people it causes chronic fatigue or hearing loss. For me it became light sensitivity.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Causes
Fatigue
Gas
Profession
Sensitivity
Chronic
Copy Quote
If you want your rock stars that are completely 100 percent serious about themselves and you want them to pretend like they're 25, I'm probably not the guy for that. But if you want to come and say, 'Hey, you know that guy right there, he's just being himself. I kind of like him for that,' you know, then that's me.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Pretend
Rock Stars
Copy Quote
My brother-in-law, Chuck, whom I have known since we were teenagers, is a disabled veteran who was wounded while fighting with the marines in Vietnam. I've been around to observe how the war affected his life and the problems that veterans have, and I knew for a long time that I wanted to write a song about Vietnam.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Brother In Law
Chuck
Disabled
Vietnam
Wounded
Life Time War
Life War Time
Marines
Observe
Teenagers
Veterans
Copy Quote
This is no condemnation of Chuck Berry, who I greatly admire. But Chuck Berry's music will not translate as well to orchestration because of its very three-chord rock 'n' roll nature. It is the music of the artists that are more pretentious, pompous or closer to the kind of big dramatic stylings that orchestras are good with.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Chuck
Condemnation
Dramatic
Orchestra
Pompous
Pretentious
Berry
Closer
Greatly
Copy Quote
I just believed in 1979 that prog rock was finished. I just saw the handwriting on the wall. And I believed that if we continued in that direction, our career would be finished. So I kind of led the band to making 'Cornerstone,' which is an album from my point of view which was not trying to be necessarily softer, but more natural.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Handwriting
Point Of View
Cornerstone
Softer
Copy Quote
I made 'Desert Moon' and when I made those solo albums, I was trying not to be Styx, because I thought, 'That belongs to us.' So, I made different kinds of solo albums that were not dipping my hand back into the magic Styx jar and pulling out all the tricks - because bands, they have tricks, don't they? That's what makes them different.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Desert
Different Kinds
Moon
Solo
Styx
Tricks
Belongs
Dipping
Jar
Copy Quote
After being replaced in Styx, everyone around me encouraged me to try and stop them legally. I just couldn't. It would have been like suing myself and I held out hope they'd ask me back. They toured under the STYX name for a year and a half before I initiated legal action. I didn't sue for money or use of the name. I simply wanted back in the band.
Dennis Deyoung / Singer-Songwriter
Replaced
Styx
Encouraged
Initiated
Legally
Sue
Toured
Copy Quote

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