Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings [Original recording remastered]

Styx | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 15, 2005)
• Number of Discs: 2
• Format: Original recording remastered
• Label: Hip-O Records
• ASIN: B0007LLPM4
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (52 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #19,452 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

97 of 99 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I've been waiting for this one for a while..., March 1, 2005

By 

Richard A. Siler "rasiler2" (Chamblee, GA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings (Audio CD)

When most folks think of Styx, they obviously think of "Come Sail Away", "Renegade", "Blue Collar Man", etc. The late 70s / early 80s hits. Most folks aren't familiar with the band's first four albums, recorded for a small label with sometimes crappy production before getting signed to A&M Records. And that's too bad, because there are many treasures to be discovered here.

I've been a fan of these four albums for many years now, and I'm very excited to see them remastered and in a single collection.

In many ways, the least Styx-ish of the set is the first album, STYX. Only about half the album was written by Dennis DeYoung and/or James Young; the rest is made up of cover songs, and even includes a George Clinton tune! :-) Oddly, the album opens with the longest track the band, in any of its incarnations, would ever record: "Movement for the Common Man". However, it also gives us one of the band's early gems, the wonderful "Best Thing."

STYX II is a real triumph, a huge leap forward, with all the material coming from Dennis (mainly) and John Curulewski. Its a very cohesive album, much moreso than the first and third. It features the only enduring hit from this era, the lovely (and overplayed) DeYoung ballad "Lady". But in addition to this, we also get a few other winners: Dennis' "Father O.S.A." (I never knew what the initials stood for) and "Earl of Roseland" (a fun song about his early pre-Styx days in Chicago ["I can see Charlie on the porch, Johnny clicking his sticks / And two boys I don't even know rehearsing electric string tricks"]), and John C's absolutely superb "A Day". Spend some time with this song and it will reward you handsomely.

While II belonged mostly to Dennis, THE SERPENT IS RISING has JY and JC taking the reins, and what we find is what an unpredictable character JC is. Each of his few songs sound totally different from each other, ranging from II's gorgeous "A Day" to SERPENT's quirky title song and completely bizarre "Krakatoa" (and let's not overlook the silly and completely weird "Plexiglass Toilet"!!!). Both are very strong works, with "Krakatoa" being very experimental and 'soundscape-y'. JY turns in a couple of real gems here as well: "Witch Wolf" and "Young Man" are both terrific songs. He also gives a really great vocal performances on two Dennis-penned tunes, "Winner Takes All" and the excellent "Jonas Psalter". Plus, this album features one of my favourite Dennis songs of all time, the enigmatic "The Grove of Eglantine".

MAN OF MIRACLES closes the Wooden Nickel era, and is not only less experimental than STYX or SERPENT, but gives us glimpses of what's to come. This is much more a band album, with each guy contributing equally strong material (as opposed to II being very Dennis-driven and SERPENT being steered by JY and JC). Most of the stand-outs here come from Dennis. Most people point out "Golden Lark" and "Song for Suzanne", but for me, the highlights are "Mr. Christopher" and the absolutely excellent "Evil Eyes". Go have a listen to these less obvious tunes and see why they're so damn good. JY's songs here are mostly okay, "Man Like Me" and "Southern Woman" being the best. But the real surprise comes at the end: the title track is a brilliant song, and gives us shades of some of Styx's later mini-epics. JY's vocals on this song are absolutely outstanding, and Dennis' keyboards in the middle are foreshadowings of "Come Sail Away".

All-in-all, these are four very good albums, that show a band coming into its own, expanding its talents and abilities, and experimenting with classical music, church organs, spoken word pieces, cover tunes, and still turning in some very good, straightfoward rock music. They also show what a prominent role JY had in the band prior to Tommy Shaw's arrival in 1976.

And I'm completely thrilled to have them in my CD collection in newly remastered form.

31 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The First 4 Albums Remastered on 2 CD's!!, February 24, 2005

By 

Eric Morris (San Antonio, Texas United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings (Audio CD)

About time! These individual discs have been extrememly hard to find (except for Styx II). I had to pay collector prices to get some of them. This has the original artwork and sequencing of all 4 original discs, plus one bonus song. Nicely done! This collection is only for the Styxaholic like myself. More casual fans can stick to the remastered "Come Sail Away: The Styx Anthology" and still get a sample song or two from these first 4 albums. BTW, don't forget to pick up the 2003 Styx release "Cyclorama" if you haven't already. It's their best work since 1978's "Pieces of Eight."

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Extraordinarily eclectic progressive hard rock, January 27, 2006

By 

Jeffrey J.Park (Massachusetts, USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings (Audio CD)

This excellent, economy-priced compilation repackages the first four Styx albums together including Styx (1972), Styx II (1973), The Serpent is Rising (1973), and Man of Miracles (1974), along with some very nice liner notes, the original cover artwork, and exceptional sonic clarity.

The first three Styx albums are simply staggering in the range of styles that are utilized within individual compositions, and from one song to the next while Man of Miracles is more straightforward. For example, along with hard rock and "boogie" (these styles dominate the four albums), there are scattered snippets of King Crimson, ELP, Jethro Tull, and southern rock influences, not to mention J.S. Bach (Fugue in G Minor - played on a pipe organ of course), snippets from great American composer Aaron Copland's Fanfare for a Common Man, an excellent rendering of the Hallelelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah, covers of pop tunes (e.g. Lies), along with subtle avant-garde influences (found sounds), electronic experimentation, and um...bathroom humor (there is a silly, quasi-Mexican folk music flavored passage on As Bad As This where the subject matter includes a Plexiglas toilet - and ruins an otherwise great song). I'll be honest, even as a huge fan of 1970s English/continental European progressive rock (who loves eclecticism in music) I am completely in the dark as to what these guys were up to, but that is what I love about it - even if the eclecticism gets a bit "Frankensteinian" at times.

Of course, not all of the music is as crazy as I am making it out to be. Lady was a fairly popular hard rocking ballad, the cover song What Has Come Between Us is very proggy, Jonas Psalter is a great hard rock tune, and the Serpent is Rising, Grove of Eglantine, along with Young Man and the Movement for the Common Man suite are all excellent examples of progressive hard rock. With respect to the Dennis DeYoung/Chuck Lofrano authored bonus track Unfinished Song, it is very good and was apparently issued as a single in 1974.

Of the four albums on this compilation, my absolute favorite includes the unbelievably good The Serpent is Rising, which is the proggiest album of the four and comes complete with mellotron and loads of analog synthesizers. Coming in at a close second is the debut album, which is also very adventurous. With regard to the band members in Styx at this time, Dennis DeYoung is my favorite composer. He really hits the progressive rock thing on the head, and contributes a symphonic quality to the music that I find very appealing. Of course, his use of Hammond organ and tons of analog synthesizers including the moog, string synthesizer, and the mellotron does not hurt either.

My recommendation to Styx newcomers is to start with the incredible The Grand Illusion (1977) and work backwards through Pieces of Eight (1978), Crystal Ball (1976) and Equinox (1975) before tackling this 2 CD set. As far as my fellow progheads go, you may like some of the material on the first three albums and may love The Serpent is Rising, although there might be too much hard rock for the typical Yes/ELP/Genesis fan. Chances are that if you like Kansas, 1974-1975 period Argent, 1970-1971 Deep Purple, and early Atomic Rooster you will like this compilation. I know I did.