Album · Styx
The Grand Illusion by Styx
The Grand Illusion is an album by Styx, released in 1977. 3 songs from it have charted on rock radio countdowns, with 130 countdown appearances in total. The biggest is “Come Sail Away”, on 78 lists with a best position of #17.
The Grand Illusion, Styx's seventh album, landed on A&M on July 7, 1977, and it's the record that made stars of the Chicago band. They produced it themselves at Paragon Recording Studios in their hometown, with Dennis DeYoung, James Young, Tommy Shaw and the Panozzo brothers, Chuck and John, stacking prog-rock grandeur on top of hard rock muscle until the whole thing plays like a stage musical with the amps turned up. Even the sleeve has ideas, borrowed from Magritte's 1965 painting "The Blank Signature".
"Come Sail Away" is the showstopper, drifting in soft before it lifts off into full-blown bombast, and "Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man)" was the other hit. The title track was never a single but became an FM staple anyway. The album went to number 6 in the US and Canada, sold 3 million copies in America, and opened a run of four straight multi-platinum records.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs from The Grand Illusion on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Years |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Come Sail Away#292 of all time | 78 | #17 | – | 1982–2026 | |
| 2 | Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man) | 29 | #150 | – | 1994–2025 | |
| 3 | The Grand Illusion | 23 | #115 | – | 1994–2025 |
Only songs that appear on at least one countdown are listed. Release data from MusicBrainz.