Styx - "Mr. Roboto": Classic or Dud?

"Mr. Roboto, I envision a future without rock and roll music."
"BOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! WE WANT TED NUGENT! GRRRR!"

Tommy Shaw hung with the Nuge, so that rules him out right there!

The "Grand Illusion" album is classic though. :-)

Is "Mod Ren" shorthand for "modern renaissance"?

could not agree more...just the thought of Tommy Shaw trying to be a rock star while Dennis DeYoung channels Tommy Tune ("welcome to the gr-r-r-r-ahhhnd ill-usion!") is cracking me up...

AOR soft rock wimps, out of nowhere release MIND MELTING CONCEPT ALBUM ABOUT MENSCHMACHINE JAPANESE ROBOTS!!! You couldn't make this stuff up.

"A gathering of angels, appeared above my head
Sang to me this song of hope, and this is what they said...
(come sail away, come sail away, come sail away with me)
I thought that they were angels, but to my surprise
We climbed aboard their starship and HEADED FOR THE SKIES!!!!"

(I cannot believe I can still remember this verbatim all these years later.)

Must be heard to be believed. Makes Babe sound like Ace of Spades.

Is the reason that no one seems to find this song xenophobic and borderline racist just because no one takes it seriously? Anyway, I'll stand by Pieces of Eight until the castle walls are stormed but this wears out its entertainment value a little earlier.

absolutely. the best part was when tommy shaw said, "the audience is all quaaludes and 'show us yer tits!', and i have to go out there and say, 'but kilroy...what about the children of the world?'" whereupon they got booed off the stage.

is there any other example of a stadium-show headliner getting booed off the stage?

Also, kinda ironically, the first song I ever heard on a (borrowed) Sony Walkman. (CoOl PaNnInG!)

domo arigato, styx, for the classic song.

irredeemable

lol. at least you must appreciate the insightful, penetrating lyrics!

so many young writers were inspired by them, reasoning that if these chumps were making money, why not me

Loved this at thirteen, love it now.

I remember the STYX best of was one of 20 or so albums on the list of CDs that the local music store in my home town would pay their maximum dollar amount ($5) to buy off you...I think this says a lot about the place I grew up.

This would have been circa 2000 CE, btw.

Insanely bad. I'd count the ways, but that would entail listening to the damn thing one more time, which I have vowed never to do if it's in my power to avoid. So, classic, obviously.

but seriously: what the fuck's up with the pronunciation? "I am, thee mod, ren man ... Seek-ret seek-ret, I've godda see KRET!"

the pronunciation is part of the charm.

i loved this to death when it first came out -- in fact, 'Kilroy Was Here' was the first album I ever bought with my own money, got the cassette shortly after it came out -- but jd is right, it's irredeemable. so embarrassingly bad. and I *love* tons of shitty, trashy music, tons of stuff I disowned only to later come back to and love ... but "Mr Roboto" is just beyond the pale unfortunately

i wish cartman covered this song, like he did come sail away.

I knew I started a thread about this song before:

T/S: "Thank U" vs. "Mr. Roboto"

Actually, this is making me want to buy the best-of.

Weird that this came up. I heard this joint in the produce section of Safeway yesterday, for the first time since those commercials were on. The "Kilroy! Kilroy! Kilroy! Kilroy!" bit was jarringly out of place.

it's irredeemable. so embarrassingly bad. and I *love* tons of shitty, trashy music, tons of stuff I disowned only to later come back to and love ... but "Mr Roboto" is just beyond the pale unfortunately

Couldn't have put it better myself, although I have to admit to singing it at karaoke once or twice.

although I have to admit to singing it at karaoke once or twice.

"I've got a secret I've been hiding under my skin"

I bought this single brand new at Bi-Mart for 75 cents when it was a new hit. And I love it to this day.

Saw Styx a week ago and they even snuck it into their opening medley.

This is a brilliant prog pop top 40 hit. And it's about ROBOTS. Love love love.

huge dud. despise this song, though i do love a few other styx tracks.

Saw Styx on this tour when I was around 11. At one point, Tommy Shaw said, "We're gonna lock the doors and rock all night long!!!!!!" I thought he meant it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbkhla8Ivlk

love

I love the idea of them slipping parts of the song into a medley live to get it out of the way--maybe they should just end some random song with "I'm Kilroy! Kilroy!"

Half the time when I open a 20 year old thread, I expect to see a terrible Alex in NYC opinion I vehemently disagree with, but ok wow we agree. CLASSIC

Ha, I just noticed....EXACTLY 20 year old thread.

but seriously: what the fuck's up with the pronunciation? "I am, thee mod, ren man ... Seek-ret seek-ret, I've godda see KRET!"

― spazzercise (staggerlee), Sunday, August 8, 2010 10:34 PM (twelve years ago)

I've heard "Mod'ren"/"Moder-in" and its cousin-in-odd-syllablism "unknow-in" in other songs, too. The Fat Boys in "Protect Yourself/My Nuts" talk about "Moder-en diseases..."; and OMC's "How Bizarre" with "Destination unknow-in..." It can't be a regional Anglophone affect - these varietals must be everywhere, like "nucular", "melk", or "southmore".

The band created the album Kilroy Was Here partly to mockingly respond to Christian groups and other anti-rock-music activists who had previously influenced the Arkansas State Senate to pass a bill requiring that all records containing backmasking be labeled as such by the manufacturer. Cited in the legislation were albums by The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Electric Light Orchestra, Queen, and Styx. ELO similarly responded with its own 1983 album Secret Messages.

The hard rocker "Heavy Metal Poisoning", the fifth track on the album, begins with the backmasked Latin words "annuit cœptis, novus ordo seclorum". Translated from the Latin, these words mean "(he) has favored our undertakings, a new order of the ages". These are the two mottoes from the Great Seal of the United States on the reverse side of the United States one-dollar bill.

the thinnest of lines exists between 'concept album guy' and 'broadway guy' and dennis deyoung crossed over a little too early

i mean, apart from being terrible

I love so many of their contemporaries, but these guys always suck. They sucked then, they still suck now.

*always sucked

And this song is atrocious, although not as bad as, say, "Babe" or "Lady."

They sucked, bad, at the time and if anything suck even worse now. About the only decent thing one could say about them is that the Pieces of Eight cover art is pretty good (Hipgnosis, I think?)

Not that they are an ongoing concern that has the capacity to suck, as I have to think they disbanded some time ago. It's just that hearing their music on the radio angers me now more than it day way back when, which I never would have thought to be possible.

I have to think they disbanded some time ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rW8xomn1kk4