OK, I admit it. I’m one of those guys who used to have a problem with key original members of world-famous rock ‘n roll bands being replaced. Note how I said “used” to have a problem. In recent years, I’ve evolved and learned more about the replacements of some of the groups and what they bring to the party; I’ve warmed up to the idea of replacements being there because without them, those bands would simply cease to exist.
In 1999, Lawrence Gowan was offered the inexplicable opportunity to step in for founding member Dennis DeYoung. It’s easy to believe that he was chosen because of his keyboard playing and a voice somewhat similar to DeYoung’s. But what a lot of people may not know is that before Styx, Gowan was a bona fide superstar in Canada. Although I didn’t bring it up, I suspect Styx courted Gowan quite a bit to get him in the band.
Having seen Styx a few times since Gowan joined, I can say there are no grand illusions, so to speak — he’s the real deal as a musician, a singer, a songwriter and a full-fledged member of Styx. In the following conversation, we talked about his role with Styx, primarily a touring outfit these days, solidly booked through 2014. We also touched on Gowan’s solo career, the likelihood of another Styx studio record, and favorite progressive rock keyboardists.
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So you’re in Aspen today, right?
Yeah, yes. I was about to say that. We left Cheyenne last night after a spectacular night of great Styx adventures in a stadium full of the faithful, and then we woke up this morning in Aspen. So life’s not too bad.
How’s the weather out there? Is it nice today?
Absolutely beautiful. Picture perfect.
I was looking over the touring schedule for Styx, and you guys are busy, man. You’re booked to the end of the year. I mean, how do you do it?
You know, it’s funny, Shawn, yesterday we actually had a meeting with our managers right here just looking at next year and it’s already just about full. There just aren’t enough days in the year for this band to play. It’s a phenomenal thing that we don’t take for granted even slightly. We’re really aware of how fortunate we are to be in a position where people just seem to have an insatiable appetite for the Styx adventure. We’re very pleased and very willing and capable of doing everything we can to satisfy that hunger. We love what we’re doing and we’re happy to keep on doing it.
I did see that even with your heavy schedule, you’re squeezing in this cool little benefit show on October 13.
You are correct about that and thank you for looking into that.
Tell me a little about that. That’s a benefit for the McDermott House?
Yeah, the McDermott House. John McDermott, he was one of the Irish Tenors — I don’t know if you ever heard of that group — he’s got a very good career doing basically traditionally British stuff. He and I are actually from the same neighborhood in Glasgow, Scotland. We both grew up most of our lives though in Toronto, Canada, and John started this charity for palliative care for soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, veterans basically, because we know the challenges they face when the come home — they are plentiful. But this is just to renovate a wing of a hospital in Toronto where some soldiers get some extra attention, so to speak, which they deserve. That’s why I’m doing the solo show for that this year.
The last two years, as thick as the Styx schedule is, as you’ve noticed because we play over 100 shows a year, I had to after being in the band for 15 years now, I really felt compelled to do something to kind of acknowledge my solo days prior to joining Styx because there’s a demand for it in Canada. I started doing a few shows a year whenever I can squeeze them in between all the Styx dates. And I had the Styx manager book them and make sure that it didn’t coincide with any Styx shows. This year, there was just no room for anything but this one solo show in Toronto, so that’s why we’re it for that. So thanks for asking about it.
You’re no stranger to benefits. Styx and REO Speedwagon have done a lot of benefit work with Rock to the Rescue. I read that you raised over $100,000 for Boston. Any more drives like that coming up?
Yeah, we do, but I don’t know what the next one will be donated to. But it is a very good thing that was revived. Because we actually started about 13 years ago. We actually started it and it kind of laid dormant for the last four or five years. But now we’ve revived it and it’s a way of us giving something back, a small little something back to these small little towns, these communities that we play in. And, you know, it seems to be received with great enthusiasm, so we’re happy to keep doing it.
You’ve been with Styx for almost 15 years and have made one record them. What about recording another one?
I have a new solo record that’s actually just 80 percent finished now, it just needs to be mixed and the fine little touches put on it. And I’ve managed to do that. It’s a difficult balancing act. I’ve done that with the time I have at home because I have access to a great studio there and a great producer/engineer who’s been working on that. And in the meantime, we constantly look at when we are going to have a chance to record another Styx record. The most recent thing we did was the DVD that we released last year, Grand Illusion/Pieces of Eight, back to back from a live show we did in Memphis. And that was very well-received, but, of course, that brings people back to when are you going to record some new stuff.
The challenge, the real difficulty is that we have the material, we have the willingness and we have the will to do it; the one thing we’re lacking is time. If we eat up all the time that we have, the tiny bit of time that we have to get home, all together in one studio, it’s become a real — I wouldn’t say challenge — it’s become a real issue with the band. So right now we seem to be kicking around the idea of recording songs just and putting them out individually rather than trying to make a full album statement because we’ve done that a couple of times since I’ve been in the band. But, you know, if we take it in small bites like that, it’ll seem like much less daunting a task. And as I said, we have the material — all we need is six months off to go record it. And right now it doesn’t look like that in the near future.
It’s fairly commonplace these days where you can put just a song or two out on iTunes.
Yep. And I think we should do that.
It’s really been 10 years since you did Cyclorama, and that’s really the only one you’ve been able to write on and appear on.
That’s right, and yes, I can’t believe that’s actually, as you said, it’s on its 10th anniversary. That seems astounding to me. But that’s the pace we’ve been living at and we seem to be thriving on really well. As JY says, there’s a wealth of riches when it comes to what to play in the show. We’ve got plenty of choices, but just this week alone Tommy (Shaw) had a new piece of music that we already demoed and got ready, and it’s pretty close to being to completion. So I’m going to keep pushing the hope that we’re going to complete that and at least put it out as a one-off. But I agree with you. It’s overdue and it’s definitely an issue that we have to address.
I review a lot of CDs and get a lot of stuff sent to me, and a lot of these bands now, a lot of bands from that ’70s era, they’re making records that are recreating that warm 70s analog sound.
Yeah, that’s great.
Frontiers Records is putting out all kinds of albums like that. It seems to me that Styx would be a perfect candidate to make a record like that.
I couldn’t agree more. And funny enough, that’s what I’ve been doing here on this solo record that I’m working on right now. It’s been recorded as if we’re in the 1970s, early 80s, with that level of technology and really limiting ourselves to that method because it seemed to have [brought] about tremendous results particularly for music that’s classic rock-based, you know. It’s just that was the right gear, that was the right setting; everything was right about it. And then we really have to rely on ourselves with that method of working and we’ll probably see great results from that.
You mentioned with the DVD release of The Grand Illusion/Pieces of Eight Live. It brought me back to when I saw the original tours. And I imagine that you guys do something like that to just keep it fresh for yourselves. Would you tackle other albums, perhaps Cyclorama or Cornerstone?
Great idea. We’ve discussed Crystal Ball, Equinox. We’ve discussed Cornerstone as being a possibility. Probably Paradise Theatre might be the next most obvious one for us to tackle, but yeah. We were in the middle of doing that DVD, as you probably realized, is that so many of those songs now that were just once considered so-called B-sides or just basically album tracks, they’ve become central parts of the show. Doing the DVD, we played “Man in the Wilderness,” we played “I’m OK,” we played “Pieces of Eight” — those have become like standard songs now in the set and they never would have been had we not done that. So I love delving into some of the deeper stuff from the past in that way.
I reviewed the Blu-Ray.
Oh, great. What did you think?
You pulled it off.
I’m so pleased. You know what, I take that as the highest compliment since you saw the band do it originally when those albums came out. Because being able to recreate something like that and still make it feel fresh and have it stand with the personality of the current lineup, it’s a balancing act and it wasn’t that easy to do. So believe me, hearing you say that is well-received. Thank you.
I saw Styx a couple times with Dennis DeYoung; and I’ve seen them a few times with you. I’ve got to say I admire how you’ve kind of effortlessly stepped into his place. And you’ve got your own thing going too, and I know you’ve played “A Criminal Mind” a couple of times with the band. Have you ever done any of your other solo stuff on stage with Styx?
Not yet. No, not yet. We’ve discussed it a couple of times. “A Criminal Mind” seems to have been the best choice right now and we’re playing actually in Canada next week. We play in London, Ontario, at a big festival there, and JY was asking, “Shouldn’t we play ‘Strange Animal?’ “And I was just going, ah we could, but it’s going to mean a bunch of rehearsal and you know, it still is Styx. The band that people are coming to see is Styx, and my solo stuff is an important factor to why I’m a member of Styx today, but I wouldn’t want to put too much of the emphasis on that at this time, anyway. I mean, if they really want to play it, obviously I’m not going to say no, but we’ll see, we’ll see, if that has potential or not for sure.
Going back to what you said, I think that part of the reason that the band seems to still thrive is that from my vantage point, I see the band today being the culmination of the efforts of everyone who was ever in this band right from the beginning. So I include John Panozzo, John Curulewski, Dennis DeYoung, Glen Burtnik — those guys all made great contributions to what we’ve amassed to today. And never once since I’ve been in the band, not even one time, has JY talked to me or Chuck asked me to do anything that emulated or somehow, you know, tried to replicate — other than the notes, obviously — what, you know, what was once Dennis’ part of the show on stage. Rather, they immediately liked my crazy spinning keyboard and my own stage antics or whatever you want to call them, and my way of delivering the songs, which is, you know, in my own tone of voice and giving what I hope is the most sincere rendition and interpretation of those lyrics and fitting it into the personality of the band as it exists right now is really what I’m trying to accomplish.
I think you’re doing a great job. You mentioned the spinning keyboard, which is something you sort of came up with — although I think I saw Jordan Rudess do it with Dream Theater. Did he steal that from you or something?
Yeah, well he didn’t join Dream Theatre until the late 90s. I was doing that in a video with Alex Lifeson from Rush. He played on one of my solo records on a song called “Lost Brotherhood.” If you Google that, find a YouTube video of it, you’ll see that when Alex said he’d play on the album, I asked if he could do the video. He said, “Sure.” So I told him the concept of the video, very 80s style, he said, “Yeah.” He stepped out of this burning barn, and I said, “You’ve got all the cool shots in this video. You get to move around with your guitar. I need something that can move around with my keyboard.” I always think they look a little clumsy, cumbersome — not quite a keyboard, not quite a guitar — so I started thinking and said, “What if the keyboard could spin?” And so, that’s what we came up with. And yes, I have seen other people do it subsequently. Prior to that, I never remember seeing it, other than I saw Keith Emerson do a spinning keyboard, but he did it and went head over heels with a full-sized grand piano. That’s what I would never attempt, but that’s the great Keith Emerson for you. No, mine just rotates 260 degrees on a horizontal plane rather than vertical.
I saw Keith Emerson do that at California Jam.
Holy shit.
I was going to ask you, because you are a progressive rock guy — are you an Emerson guy or a Wakeman guy?
Clearly, that’s a great question. I clearly am both. And funny enough, the two of them combined — it’s funny, I loved Wakeman first because of his beautiful set-up and his manner of performing and his cape; I loved all of that. I loved every inch of it. I loved the stuff that he played with Bowie, as well as the stuff he did with Yes. But Keith Emerson blew my mind, particularly with the honky-tonk stuff, the ragtime stuff that Emerson would throw in every now and then, I just embraced that completely. I loved it. So I really loved both for completely different reasons. And that led me to the piano players I loved, mainly Nicky Hopkins, Elton John, Billy Preston. And then there are keyboard players, Keith Emerson, Rick Wakeman, but my absolute favorite is really a combination of all of them named Tony Banks from Genesis. I think he’s the most melodic, most beautifully voiced keyboard player and he rarely gets mentioned when you’re mentioning the great keyboard players. So I owe a great debt of gratitude to all of the above, and I love each of them for what they brought to the instrument and to the whole enterprise.
I couldn’t agree with you more when it comes to Tony Banks — totally underrated and he wrote a lot of those great Genesis songs.
Oh my God. Oh my God. To this day, if I’ve got an hour when I’m not coming up with anything very good myself, I’m a little frustrated, I get out a Genesis song, try to figure out what Tony Banks is playing and once I get it under my fingers, I’m just like, “Oh God this is just beautiful.” Just beautiful.
Would Styx ever go that far and make a concept record? I mean, of course, they did with Kilroy Was Here.
Yeah, I think there’s probably a bit of reluctance toward that, but I would never rule it out. It’s funny, I thought up the idea for a particular concept record with the band shortly after we did Cyclorama. And, you know, we entertained the idea actually, believe it or not, for a couple of days, but then when we looked again, lots of the members began to realize, oh my God, the touring is becoming so ubiquitous, it’s all encompassing… it’s far too ambitious a thing for us to take on and do this amount of touring, which is really where the music industry is shifting. It’s shifting toward live performance and the focus is so intensely upon that, that it would be foolish for the band to take their eye off the ball. And so that’s why we relentlessly pursued that while that’s where the sun happens to be shining right now.
Getting to your live performances, you’ll be here in my area at the Pacific Amphitheatre in Costa Mesa for the Orange County Fair. What can we expect? Are you guys doing a full album, or just kind of a best-of show?
Mostly a best-of combined with, depending how long we get to play, we’ll probably do something from Cyclorama. We did “One With Everything” a couple of nights ago, which is one of my faves. Probably, as I said, some of those, what you might call deeper tracks from Grand Illusion and Pieces of Eight, “Man in the Wilderness,” maybe even “I’m OK” from Pieces of Eight. It depends on how long a time we’re going to be allotted to play that show and it’s all of that plus the great Styx adventure 2013 and how we’ve been able to elevate that with our new stage set. We’re always trying to improve on the show and so we’re going to bring as much of that as we possibly can.
That sounds great. I’m going to let you go, but it was great to talk to you Lawrence, and I look forward to seeing you at the Pacific Amphitheatre.
Great talking to you. I hope we have a chance to say hello somewhere at the show, Shawn.
