once again, during work on the album, personality conflicts drove the band members apart. while tommy shaw's material attempted to bring the band into the next century and jy's songs attempted to convey a hard rock vein, dennis deyoung's more pop and broadway-style leanings led to divergent sounds on "brave new world". according to deyoung, another crucial difference was that he was not the overall producer on this album, as he had been on the others.