Music Monday (Styx/The Grand Illusion, Side Two)

After covering the magnificent first side of The Grand Illusion here, it is time to take a look at side two.

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5) Miss America - This rocker was written by guitarist James Young, and is usually considered as his most popular song. The song is a gritty look at the whole charade of the importance of Miss America and the shallowness of being the role model, illustrating how commercial the image is. The song explores how the Miss America winner must go through being labeled larger than life, only to be cast away and forgotten when it's all over.

You were the apple of the public's eye as you cut the ribbon at the local mall

A mirage for both you and us. How can it be real?

We love your body in that photograph, your home state sure must be proud

The queen of the United States, or have you lost your crown

Well aren't you Miss America

Don't you Miss America

Won't you Miss America

Our love

Well are you really who we think you are

Or does that smile seem to wear you down

This girl who you once were is screaming jump out

This dream that you must live - a disease for which there is no cure

This roller coaster ride you're on won't stop to let you off

Well aren't you Miss America

Don't you Miss America

Won't you Miss America

Our love

Miss America, Miss America

Miss America, Miss America

Well it's true just take a look - The cover sometimes makes the book

And the judges, do they ever ask to read between your lines

And in your cage at the human zoo, they all stop to look at you

Next year, what will you do when you have been forgotten

Well aren't you Miss America

Don't you Miss America

Won't you Miss America

Our love

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6) Man in the Wilderness - Another fantastic Tommy Shaw song. This is an introspective song about self reflection, not being understood, and finding one's place in the universe. I never knew there was an "extended" version of this song. I have included it here. I don't understand why it was edited in the first place.

Another year has passed me by

Still I look at myself and cry

What kind of man have I become?

All of the years I've spent in search of myself

And I'm still in the dark

'Cause I can't seem to find the light alone

Sometimes I feel like a man in the wilderness

I'm a lonely soldier off to war

Sent away to die - never quite knowing why

Sometimes it makes no sense at all (makes no sense at all)

Ten thousand people look my way

But they can't see the way that I feel

Nobody even cares to try

I spend my life and sell my soul on the road

And I'm still in the dark

'Cause I can't seem to find the light alone

Sometimes I feel like a man in the wilderness

I'm a lonely sailor lost at sea

Drifting with the tide

Never quite knowing why

Sometimes it makes no sense at all

(I'm alive)

Looking for love I'm a man with emotion

(And my heart's on fire)

I'm dying of thirst in the middle of the ocean

I'm alive!

[Guitar solo]

Sometimes I feel like a man in the wilderness

I'm a lonely soldier off to war

Sent away to die - never quite knowing why

Sometimes it makes no sense

Sometimes it makes no sense

Sometimes it makes no sense at all, at all

Make no sense at all, at all, at all

Can't find the meaning of it all

Can't find a...

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7) Castle Walls - Dennis DeYoung gets his turn on side two. This is an eerie, yet awesome song sung by him, with a fantastic keyboard/musical interlude right in the middle.

Once in a dream far beyond these castle walls

Down by the bay where the moonlit water falls

I stood alone while the minstrel sang his song

So afraid I'd lost my soul

There in the fog his song kept calling me

Leading me on with its haunting melody

Deep in my heart a voice kept echoing

I knew I'd soon be wandering

Far beyond these castle walls

Where the distant harbour meets the sky

There the battle raged like hell

And every dove had lost its will to fly

Far beyond these castle walls

Where I thought I heard Tiresias say

Life is never what it seems

And every man must meet his destiny

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8) The Grand Finale - This is a reprise of "Come Sail Away", "Superstars", and "The Grand Illusion" from side one. It wraps up the album perfectly.

Sail Away Superstars

Sail Away Superstars

So if you think your life is complete confusion

Cause your neighbors got it made

Just remember, please please, it's a grand illusion

And deep inside we're all the same.

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After being disillusioned over the success of the band, The Grand Illusion sold over three million copies and has reached triple platinum status. "Come Sail Away" was a Top 10 smash and suddenly they were what they were trying to become: superstars.

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Now about that album cover...

I think sometimes the success of an album is augmented by the album cover, and The Grand Illusion has an awesome one. The album cover art, created by Alton Kelley and Stanley Mouse, is an homage to a painting by René Magritte entitled "Le Blanc-Seing" (The Blank Signature), which is shown on the left. It is also similar to the even earlier avant garde painting "L'Incantation ou Le Bois Sacré" by Paul Sérusier (The Incantation, or The Sacred Forest), which is on the right. The Magritte is obvious, the Serusier not as much to me.