DENNIS DEYOUNG On STYX Reunion: ‘Not To Give The Fans One Last Glimpse Of Us Together On Stage, It Makes No Sense To Me’

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Ex-STYX vocalist and keyboardist Dennis DeYoung has once again said that he wants to reunite with his former bandmates for one final tour. DeYoung, the voice behind such STYX classics as "Come Sail Away", "Best Of Times", "Pieces Of Eight" and "Babe", spoke about his previous group while chatting with U.K.'s Classic Rock magazine. Asked what the "real story" is behind his inability to get STYX's classic lineup back together, Dennis said: "I've tried, in vain, to be in that band from the moment they replaced me. In the beginning it was my band, my idea, but now it's really Tommy Shaw's band. "I've said that we should do one last tour together, for those people who made us rich men. They know I'm ready to do it. And recently it was floated as a possibility. But Tommy Shaw was the only one who spoke, and he said no." DeYoung also refuted Shaw's claim that the members of STYX's classic lineup "weren't even happy working with each other in our heyday." "Let me tell you, all this stuff they said about me was the biggest exaggerated bunch of lies I've ever seen in my life," Dennis said. "We liked each other. We never had a punch-up. We never screamed at each other. We weren't those guys. We made music together. So when you cast aspersions — not only on my musical contributions, but also on my character — it's been the greatest heartbreak in my career. "Not to give the fans one last glimpse of us together on stage, it makes no sense to me," he added. "And I know that all STYX fans would want to see that one more time. "This is not about me, it's not about money. It's to relive, and reinforce, what lucky sonofabitches we were to find each other. And show the people that we appreciate what you've done for us. I'm sick over the fact that we can't do it one more time, but what am I going to do? I just can't for the life of me understand it." DeYoung co-founded STYX as a teenager alongside his neighbors Chuck and John Panozzo in the early 1970s. James Young joined shortly after that, with Shaw coming on board in 1975. Three years ago, Shaw likened STYX's relationship with DeYoung to a divorce. "You get married when you're young and everything's rosy," he told "The Big Interview". "Then, as you start to get a little older, you realize you didn't have that much in common and then you go through a tough divorce… We still have songs that we co-wrote together, and those are our children, and we've managed to find a way to keep those things in play." Shaw went on to say that he is content to let the past remain in the past, choosing instead to surround himself with positivity as he enters the next part of his career. He continued: "Personality-wise, at this stage in my life, I want to be happy. I want to be around people who love me and that have my best interest at heart, and I don't have to fight with. There's just not enough years left that I would want to risk not having that again." DeYoung released his final studio album, "26 East, Vol 2", on June 11 via Frontiers Music Srl.