Styx "The Grand Illusion"

The Grand Illusion is the seventh studio album by Styx, released on July 7, 1977. It launched the band to stardom, spawning the hit singles "Come Sail Away" and "Fooling Yourself", and selling over three million copies in the US (Triple Platinum).

The album was recorded at Paragon Recording Studios in Chicago.

As with much of Styx's catalog, lyrically and thematically many of the songs have a quasi-medieval, fantasy feel, while serving as allegories and commentaries on contemporary American life, as well as the individual members' experiences in an American rock band in the mid-to-late 1970s.

The album cover art, created by Alton Kelley and Stanley Mouse, is an homage to a painting by René Magritte entitled "Le Blanc-Seing".