Styx celebrates a big milestone today. 50 years ago today, on February 22nd, 1972, the iconic rock ‘n roll band signed their first record deal—with Wooden Nickel Records.
The 1972 lineup included Dennis DeYoung on keyboards and vocals, drummer John Panozzo and his twin brother Chuck on bass, and guitarists John Curulewski along with James "JY" Young.
Young once commented about originally joining Styx back in 1970:
"[The] year after Woodstock [future Eagles manager] Irving Azoff put on this festival in a place called Kickapoo Creek [Illinois] and my band, playing all original music, got standing ovations. And I was about to get out of college with my aerospace engineering degree, but I wanted to play rock and roll music and Dennis [DeYoung] thought I was the most arrogant person he'd ever met, but he recognized that I had talent and so I joined up with those guys and that was the beginning of Styx."
The band recorded and released four albums on the Wooden Nickel label -- Styx, Styx II, The Serpent Is Rising, and Man of Miracles -- before moving to A&M with their fifth album, ‘Equinox,’ in 1975 which was the last album with Curulewski, who was replaced by Tommy Shaw.
[Source: Classic Hits Today]