Like a lot of other North American listeners, my first exposure to the progressive rock group, Yes, was via their edited for radio version of “Roundabout” from their fourth album, Fragile. Albeit a small hook, given the edited version, yet like everyone else I, too, was blown away by the sheer prowess of the full length version, as well as the rest of the album. For the rest of the 1970s, the album Fragile was in nearly every record collection I ever looked through. Now, if that isn’t a gage of a truly classic album, I don’t know what is.
This week’s Sunday Big Note presents an excellent quality soundboard recording of Yes performing at Wembley Arena in London, UK, on June 29th, 1991:
Rhythm Of Love
[audio:SBN_S20110213_01 Rhythm Of Love.mp3]
Shock To The System
[audio:SBN_S20110213_02 Shock To The System.mp3]
Heart Of The Sunrise
[audio:SBN_S20110213_03 Heart Of The Sunrise.mp3]
Owner Of A Lonely Heart
[audio:SBN_S20110213_04 Owner Of A Lonely Heart.mp3]
And You & I
[audio:SBN_S20110213_05 And You & I.mp3]
Changes
[audio:SBN_S20110213_06 Changes.mp3]
I’ve Seen All Good People
[audio:SBN_S20110213_07 I’ve Seen All Good People.mp3]
Lift Me Up
[audio:SBN_S20110213_08 Lift Me Up.mp3]
Awaken
[audio:SBN_S20110213_09 Awaken.mp3]
Roundabout
[audio:SBN_S20110213_10 Roundabout.mp3]
line-up:
Jon Anderson – Vocals, keyboards, percussion, harp, guitar
Chris Squire – Bass, Vocals, Keyboards, Guitar
Steve Howe – Guitar, Lap Steel, Bass VI
Alan White – Drums, percussion
Rick Wakeman – Keyboard, piano, synthesiser
Trevor Rabin – Guitar, Keyboards, Piano, Bass, Vocals
Tony Kaye – Organ, keyboards
Bill Bruford – Drums, percussion
Note: the above video performance of “Roundabout” was performed at Tower Theater, Philadelphia, PA, 15 June 2010. Yes is currently still touring. Expect a new Yes album sometime in the near future. For more details, click here.
Great quality concert. Thanx! My first Yes-experience was on 9th of january in 1971 in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam where they were the support act for Iron Butterfly (first Dutch performance 8,9,10 january 1971: Eindhoven, Amsterdam, Rotterdam). I remember the audience did not want them to leave the stage for Iron Butterfly. We only wanted to hear In A Gadda Da Vida, anyway. Yes blew our minds completely.
Thanks to bands like Yes (early stuff), I was able to get into FZ, or better yet they led to me FZ. His music to me, is the next logical step. The Yes Album, Fragile, Close to the Edge, and Relayer are all classic stuff IMHO. I have to thank my high school Dean of Discipline for getting me into Yes.
The early 90’s reformation was a stretch IMO, and it’s only gotten worse. I think it sad that these geezers are reduced to forming their own tribute band. With original lineup.
Don’t get me wrong: in their heyday, Yes was hot shit and formed an important piece of my personal soundtrack in the 70s. I loved that bombastic stuff back then.
[quote comment=”24504″]The early 90’s reformation was a stretch IMO, and it’s only gotten worse. I think it sad that these geezers are reduced to forming their own tribute band. With original lineup.
Don’t get me wrong: in their heyday, Yes was hot shit and formed an important piece of my personal soundtrack in the 70s. I loved that bombastic stuff back then.[/quote]
Interesting opinion. Considering many other prog rock groups are doing (or have done) the very same thing (such as Gong, The Alan Parsons Project, etc), do they all fall under the same general opinion? While certainly they will never reach the heights they once did back in their heyday, I still think these “geezers” have a lot to offer. You really cannot compare them to the “old men” like the current Rolling Stones. Even now, they are in a completely different league, musically.
My first Yesshow was the Relayer tour, with Moraz; very interesting time for the band, right after the release of everybody’s solo albums. Beautiful stage set, great mid-70s lighting extravaganza, and nice segments from the solo stuff, with Squire’s stuff getting the best airing.
My last two shows were THIS tour, in fact — once on the front end, once on the back. The first show was, sadly, marred by poor venue sound, which was most noticeable when the original Fragile lineup took the stage (with Bruford, not White) to do Long Distance Runaround, and virtually all of the sonic detail was lost.
The second, at Cap Center in Landover, was a corker in every way. The band were shit-hot that night — I swear, the auditorium practically levitated during Heart of the Sunrise (I still get goosebumps remembering the sheer beauty of it that night). I had 5th-row seats for it, and watching the contrasts in playing style (Howe’s intricate delicacy vs. Rabin’s rock/fusion flash; Kaye’s clusters and shadings vs. Wakeman’s detailed virtuosity, White’s sheer muscularity vs. Bruford’s lithe finesse) was one of the highlights of my concert-going life. They all seemed really attuned to each other that night.
All that said, none of the three Yesshows I’ve seen were as enjoyable as seeing Bruford’s band (with Dave Stewart and Jeff Berlin) at a club a decade or so earlier. Now THAT was a mind-melter.
I first “discovered” Zappa in about 1970, and then a little later, Mahavishnu Orchestra. After that, I spent any money I had trying find other groups close to them in musical sophistication…with limited results. “Yes” was one of those and I went through a Yes phase around 73 or 74. They didn’t hold my interest over the years, but it was fun to get the remastered, bonus-feature CDs of their first few releases a couple of years ago.
Thanks! I got into Yes with 90125 and went backwards. This is some killer shit. Not the 2010 version of Yes though. Jon Anderson and Chris Squire together is Yes.
Tryin’ to think of a Yes connection with Zappa. All i can come up with is that Scott Thunes used to play the bassline of Owner Of A Lonely Heart as sort of an in-joke(?) during the mid-1980’s.
Another Yes-Zappa connection: I remember a show in 2003 (Hannover, Germany) where Jon Anderson was talking about the heroes of his youth. I think one was Micky Mouse, the other one was Zappa. Jon was singing a few lines from “Dancin’ Fool” then.
True story, I sware.
Th.
Mike Keneally — Faithful Axe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yED9kQVpp-o
[quote comment=”24913″]Mike Keneally — Faithful Axe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yED9kQVpp-o%5B/quote%5D
Thanks, Matt. Love that tune. Love the entire album, Boil That Dust Speck. Btw, Mike Keneally says about “Faithful Axe”: “Tom Freeman plays drums on several tunes including some of the twisted little link material, and the backhanded Yes tribute “Faithful Axe”, which was great wicked fun to execute, especially the faux-Jon Anderson vocal. Recording the Steve Howe snippets for this song was this album’s single most arduous recording task.” Read more, here.
Just clicked the link, and damn the drumming sucks on that Kenneally Yes tribute song! I know he couldn’t get Alan White (or even Bill Bruford–yeah right!) but couldn’t he find somebody who could play odd-time signatures in a *convincing* English prog-like manner?!? Ruins the joke for me!