Yes

Every Album, Every Song

Stephen Lambe

• Publisher: Sonicbond Publishing
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781789520279
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Music History & Criticism

This is a new edition, bringing the Yes story up to date for 2020 and specifically including a brand new section on the 2019 album 'From A Page'.

InYes On Track, Stephen Lambeprovides a thorough assessment of the career and output of one of the most important Progressive bands of all time.

Lambe authoritatively examines each of the band's twenty-one studio albums, chronicling the many high points and the rarer missteps, as well as dissecting the changes in band dynamics, which led to some eclectic - but always interesting - music over fifty years of recording.

Lambe also discusses the band's many live recordings and provides a brief guide to the band's performances on DVD and video.

Featuring coverage of the 50th anniversary celebrations, this is a comprehensive guide to the band's music and should be essential reading for the band's many devoted fans.

Stephen Lambe is an author, publisher and record label owner. He is an acknowledged expert on progressive rock, having written the best-selling Citizens of Hope and Glory - the history of Progressive Rock in 2011 - and has discussed the subject on BBC Radio.

Lambe has co-hosted the Summer's End Progressive Rock Festival since 2005, and is a former Chairman of the Classic Rock Society. His first live concert - of many hundreds - was Yes at Wembley Arena in 1978.

Sonicbond Publishing Limited

www.sonicbondpublishing.co.uk

Email: [email protected]

First Published in the United Kingdom 2018

First Published in the United States 2019

Reprinted 2019, June 2020, December 2020

This digital edition February 2021

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data:

A Catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright Stephen Lambe 2018

ISBN 978-1-78952-001-9

The rights of Stephen Lambe to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing from Sonicbond Publishing Limited

Typeset in ITC Garamond & ITC Avant Garde Gothic

Printed and bound in England

Graphic design and typesetting: Full Moon Media

For Chris Squire and Peter Banks

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the following people for their help, encouragement or simply hard work in this project, which was the catalyst for something rather larger – Sonicbond Publishing itself:
Huw Lloyd-Jones, Andrew Wild, Steve Pilkington, Mike Goode,
Chris Walkden and Jay Slater.

Thanks to Jez Rowden, Ken Fuller and Mike Cruse for proof reading.

Special thanks also to Oliver Wakeman and Bill Bruford
for occasional moments of face-to-face insight.

Thanks to Rich Greene for the 1974 photograph and particularly Bruce Strickland for sharing his ticket stubs and Yes programmes.

Thanks, as ever, to the Prog Widow – my gorgeous wife Gill.

Contents

Prologue. Barclays Centre, Brooklyn. 7 April 2017.

Introduction

Cast of Characters

Yes Cover Art

Yes (1969)

Time and a Word (1970)

The Yes Album (1971)

Fragile (1971)

Close to the Edge (1972)

Tales From Topographic Oceans (1973)

Relayer (1974)

Going for the One (1977)

Tormato (1978)

The Paris Sessions and related tracks (1979)

Drama (1980)

90125 (1983)

Big Generator (1987)

Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe (1989)

Union (1990)

Talk (1994)

The Keys to Ascension (1996) / The Keys to Ascension 2 (1997)

Open Your Eyes (1997)

The Ladder (1999)

Magnification (2001)

Fly From Here (2011) / Fly from Here – Return Trip (2018)

Heaven and Earth (2014)

From A Page (2019)

Epilogue – Yes turn 50 in 2018

Compilations and Video Biographies

Live Recordings – on CD and DVD

Twelve unsung Yes tracks you should revisit

Paying Tribute

Bibliography

Prologue. Barclays Centre, Brooklyn. 7 April 2017.

Yes are inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame. Finally. This is a big deal in the USA, less so in the UK, but it’s still a major event, as there had been the growing feeling that the band had been snubbed for many years. The hall is huge, and absolutely packed. Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson of Rush give a gracious – almost star-struck – introduction, and then the band themselves come on stage. This is interesting, as it is the 1991 eight-piece Union version of the band that is to be honoured. In recent years, some of these musicians have been involved in two different ‘versions’ of Yes, and while they are hardly ‘sworn enemies’, there appears to be no love lost between the two factions. Additionally, the line up chosen by the Hall Of Fame means that three current, full members of the band – Geoff Downes, Billy Sherwood and Jon Davison – are not invited to take part. The event is made all the more poignant by the fact that one of the inductees – Chris Squire – has died almost two years previously, and is represented by his wife, Scotty and daughter Xilan.

Anderson, taking sips from a bottle of water, dedicates the award to Yes fans everywhere, and gives a rambling but gracious tribute to Squire and Peter Banks, plus Bill Bruford (who, he forgets, is standing behind him). Trevor Rabin gives a dignified speech, and an ill-looking Alan White gives a rather touching tribute to Chris Squire. Steve Howe gives a more cerebral, quietly funny speech, paying tribute to his current band mates. Rick Wakeman does some of his risqué stand up comedy set.

Later, Anderson, Howe, Rabin, Wakeman (with cape) and White play ‘Roundabout’ with a thrilled Geddy Lee on bass, and ‘Owner Of A Lonely Heart’ with Howe playing a Rickenbacker bass, a nice touch that, and while there’s not a lot of inter-band eye contact, it is a joyous, if slightly uncomfortable occasion.

Joyous and slightly uncomfortable. If you want a phrase to describe Yes’ career, what could be more perfect than that?

Introduction

Was there ever such a complex band as Yes?

By that I mean structurally complex. I can think of few groups that have had so many line up changes, and yet so many members that have left the band and later rejoined; a band that have had so many different methodologies and motivations for creating music; a band that has been so divided by inter-band politics and squabbles over money. Yet Yes are a group of musicians that, at their best, have made some of the most spectacular and uplifting music ever created. It makes for a colourful story, and – amazingly – the band has lasted for over 50 years in one form or another. Only for a couple of barren years in the early 1980s was there no band called Yes at all, and while other years have seen the band dormant, someone – somewhere – was holding the torch. Musicians were planning or talking or writing. And their fans were waiting.

One of the crucial factors that made Yes the band it was, happened before they formed in London in early 1968, from the ashes of Mabel Greer’s Toyshop. Aside from drummer Bill ‘Tubs’ Bruford – who found his way into the band by the sheer weight of his talent as an eighteen year old – the band that formed was made up by relatively seasoned musicians. Tony Kaye was 22. Chris Squire and Peter Banks – who had already played together in the band The Syn – were both twenty but had played in professional groups since 1965. Jon Anderson – who had survi...