10 Great Guitarists In Terrible Bands

Styx has spent their entire career being a critical punching bag. Their records may have sold in droves throughout their run in the '70s and '80s, but the mix of prog rock, hard rock, and concept records made them appear more pretentious in music magazines than actually gifted songwriters. For as much as Dennis DeYoung's songs grated on the editors of Rolling Stone, JY Young happened to be carrying some guitar fireworks under his belt.

Across the band's career, JY was always known as the more dangerous side of the band, with traces of Cream and Led Zeppelin laced throughout his playing. Though Styx got a lot of success off of their ballads, songs like "Come Sail Away" don't really come to life until JY fires off those amazing arpeggios. When the band actually managed to get a genuine rocker on the charts like "Renegade," JY pulled out all the stops, with the entire song coming to a halt for his jaw-dropping solo run.

Far from just a guitar wizard, Young's singing abilities made for some of the moodier songs in the band's discography like "Heavy Metal Poisoning" and "Miss America." For as cringey as some of Styx's material can get at the worst of times, it's still worth it if it means learning a handful of JY's licks.