why late at night in the u.s. does ilm get all yessed out

Your mention of the "Owner Of A Lonely Heart" video reminded me there was one version that had a guy with maggots crawling around on top of his closed eyelids. Did "Fear Factor" rip off this idea? I think MTV stopped showing that version.

i love yes. sometimes i'll be walking around and suddenly a bass line from some yes song will pop into my head and i'll be all excited.

would that ilm actually were a bit more yessed out.

One of my (many) large gaps of musical knowledge is rock of any variety from 1970-1985 or so.

Wobbly, if you're out there, tell your Jon Anderson at NAMM story . . .

best

Drew

at a booth that sells vocoder software there is a man earnestly saying in a silvery, elven speaking voice reminiscent of Glinda the Good Witch "no, no, NO, you don't understand. I want to make my computer-" and here he erupts into a shivery high melodious flutter "s-i-i-iing!" and it's HIM and he's singing the word "sing" in THAT Yes voice.

What is NAMM, anyway?

I just watched some of that DVD "The Future Is Wild", the cheezy computer animated forecast of what freakish species will dominate this planet in 200 million years. It was very Yessed out too, CGI supercontinent-formation footage and giant global oceans (topographic tales of .. .)

http://stat.discogs.com/R/262506-1103102672.jpg

Olias of Sunhillow Critical Edition, with commentary track guest starring the 'scientists' from The Future Is Wild

maybe a little like the trevor horn yes (or maybe i just wish it sounded more like trevor horn yes).

it's basically arp-heavy metronomic 1978 eurosynth cheese.

I always see a Dean landscape, or some Art Nouveau P. Craig Russell planet landscape whenever I listen to Yes. Except for Yes mach-90125 and onward.

I guess the only interesting thing in them was that apparently Eddie Jobson was in the "Owner Of A Lonely Heart" video. They tried to edit him out when he ended up not being in the band, but couldn't do it completely. The edits are one reason why the "plot" is so hard to follow.

and yes, there ARE maggots on the dude's eyes.

BUT! just guess what my classic rock station is playing right now on their so-called DEEP CUT weekedn at this ungodly hour ...

yup, STARSHIP TROOPER!!

good god what a tune.

and i'm out

I found my mint LP copy of Relayer for a dollar in a used bin.

http://www.drjazz.ch/album/bilder/Moraz30.jpg

damn, and i'm not even close to being drunk tonight!!

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y123/Eisbaer29/be70040c-9265-47c2-ab7b-0dc6abe418a.jpg

I'm yessed out on poppy pod tea and I just played guitar for an hour. Yes!

karaoke, yes-style!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwoE9r11a-c

Oh dear...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlgH7Oec__s

Nothing succeeds like excess: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMF1-OEZYBE

Watching Bruford in that clip makes me think of the story (perhaps apocryphal) of the Genesis tour he was on when he'd get bored and start playing different beats just to screw things up.

DIG IT! (the "it" being really bad stock footage, apparently)

as much shit as tormato gets, i do like squire's bass sound on that
and wtf with wakeman's synths? the birotron - cheesy to the max
xpost

LOL cheesy late 70s video effects -- also, it reminds me of the "i want candy" video.

"don't kill the whale" is actually an OK song, maybe the best thing on tormato. and the really painful wakeman synths are in the beginning of "arriving UFO" (maybe the worst yes song of all time?)

The Birotron was an ill-fated tape replay keyboard conceived by Dave Biro of Yalesville, Connecticut, USA, and funded by Rick Wakeman of the progressive-rock group Yes in the late 1970s.

The Birotron was a keyboard instrument that used 8-track cartridge tapes to play sounds whenever a key was pressed on the keyboard. It is similar in concept to the Chamberlin and Mellotron, and was a forerunner of digital sampling. Keyboards like the Mellotron and Birotron were mainly used for strings, choirs, brass, and flutes; sounds not easily reproduced on the synthesizers of that era. The major innovation of the Birotron was that it stored its sounds using 8-track tape loops, which allowed it to play the sounds indefinitely, a great improvement from the 8-second limit of the Mellotron.

History
Dave Biro invented this instrument and showed it to Rick Wakeman, who was so impressed by the idea that he offerred to fund its manufacture. It was developed by Birotronics, Ltd which was one of Wakeman's Complex 7 businesses. The Packhorse road case company was under this umbrella as well. Birotronics apparently made a very limited number of these instruments (David Biro says only 17 were made, including the original and 4 prototypes, while Rick Wakeman claims 35.) 4 of those were owned by Rick Wakeman, who noted in an interview in 1999 that 2 were stolen and 2 were damaged beyond repair. Only 5 or 6 Birotrons are accounted for today.

Two major factors led to the Birotron's demise. The most direct cause was a lack of necessary and consistent funding. The Birotron also suffered from poor timing, being introduced very shortly before the arrival of the digital sampling technology (such as the Fairlight_CMI) which would render it obsolete.

OOooooh the band Yes... I thought you meant high.

Squire on "On The Silent Wings Of Freedom" here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=Q5KQIaHFma4

The world of Yes tribute bands on YouTube is very strange, but I gotta give them points for trying...

The packs of Marlboros in the foreground totally makes this video: http://youtube.com/watch?v=lvjkG5EgFxA

OOooooh the band Yes... I thought you meant high.

-- trashthumb, Sunday, October 21, 2007 7:29 AM

OMG I AM YESSED OUT FOR THE FIRST TIME IN A COON'S AGE

I love Tormato but they're taking it easy and not doing anything grand, I like quite a few albums like that, with a band just having fun without any grand vision. Topographic is mostly maligned for being too long and it came after Close To The Edge (the best album ever).

oof, new song is very very bad

they're taking it easy and not doing anything grand

Sure, on two or three of the shorter songs, but all four of the relative "epics" are going for Big Statements and wobbling somewhat. It's not quite as bad as people say but bad decisions (sonically, lyrically) are starting to proliferate. The outtakes show how Anderson and Howe in particular were taking different roads.

Tales has an RYM rating of 3.53 so it's not really that maligned. I think its reputation comes from the fact that it was released during prog's golden years, when bands like Yes and ELP were actually hitting the top of the charts and selling out stadiums, so naturally there was an (understandable) backlash to all of this from folks who thought songs ought to be 2 minutes and not 20. Although Close to the Edge was reviewed well I think a lot was made of the fact that it only had 3 songs on it. I don't think any massively successful acts at the time were doing things like that, and now here comes a double where every song is 20 minutes long, also its (let's face it) not a particularly tight double, it drifts around a lot and is full of ambient passages many find boring. Compared to the top tier Yes albums it just doesn't kick enough ass. Originally I think they tried to play the whole thing live but quickly dropped most of it because it just wasn't getting a good response. In short it provided a lot of ammo for the haters. But yeah it's pretty nice as a whole, probably could cut 15-20 minutes but it's got some great passages, guessing it very much appeals to the folks who like Jon's solo work. (haven't heard Steven Wilson's mix yet, I assume it's very good, IMO he's the only guy who oughta be allowed to remix Yes albums)

Tormato on the other hand you can tell the band is kinda checked out, its sorta like ELP's Love Beach where they're not really trying hard enough to really screw things up. It's got parts I like (the first track and the wild bits on "Arriving UFO") but yea, similar to War Child I guess, but imo not as good. I think both this (and Love Beach) are better than their reputation, but I'm not really gonna stick up for them.

The approach of starting with the uh...less good albums I think is interesting, but I think for that you might want to consider the albums released after Tormato to be sort of a separate entity. Drama is great and does still sound like Yes (despite having no Jon or Rick), 90125 is really good but doesn't much sound like Yes (despite Jon's vocals), after that things get pretty wacky and strange, at one point there were two incarnations of Yes touring at the same time and it was basically a disaster. They did have a period from 95-01 where they brought back some of the 70s magic but they were clearly a nostalgia act at this point.

related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MN2b7-CDxYA

https://townsquare.media/site/295/files/2021/07/attachment-Air-Supply.jpg

Hover connections

an FB post today reminded me that Arc of Life (essentially, a bunch of the current Yes lineup without Howe or Downes but with Jimmy Haun) exists.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbXXXP7mrgE

(it is not good at all. it makes Circus of Heaven sound like fucking Close to the Edge)

idk what it is about him but I just do not buy Jon Davison. he was fine with Glass Hammer, kinda charming actually like "awww they got their own Jon", but he's like the Temu Jon. yeah I'm sure he can do the "I get up I get down" part on CTTE pretty well but he doesn't have Jon's other vocal modes, and he certainly doesn't write songs like he does. he does write strange nonsequitur lyrics but not in a way that sticks in your head, he doesn't really sell it like other Jon, old Jon comes off like he's taken heroic doses of psychedelics in order to personally greet and befriend the machine elves, while new Jon just comes across like he's really into Jesus. just my opinion

yeah for that reason I prefer either of the two Trevors and even Benoit David to him.

I just wanna yell at him FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU DO like he's the Chunky

Circus of Heaven is awesome. This is my kinda pop song

happy 35th to UNION, an album that had its own subsection at the used cd store i frequented in college

Benoit was great. I don't know why they felt that Horn needed to re-do the vocals on Fly from Here.

I saw them twice on that tour in case anyone was mistaken that I was cool or something.

Xp

I think Horn felt like he wanted to redo the vocals so they let him. I think both versions are good.

There are also some good things on From A Page, the album that got aborted in favor of Fly From Here, including a different take on Into the Storm.

watched some old Yes footage late at night (of course), including some from the Drama tour. I don't think I'd ever seen any live footage of that, Horn and Downes just do not appear comfortable on any of the classic material, but they're basically fine. then they hit "Tempus Fugit" and it's totally killer. watching Horn mug for the camera is so odd, I mean you almost forget the fact that they just took in the Buggles wholesale like that. cool era for them, wish it had lasted.

after that watched some 2003 stuff...basically the classic lineup, and they are still very good, but you can kinda tell by their stage demeanor that they aren't really enjoying themselves. outside of Jon, who always is I suppose. amusingly in a few of these Jon would just come out in a t-shirt and hoodie which I think made Wakeman/Howe/Squire's outfits look even sillier. anyway at the end of "Siberian Khatru" they launched into a long jam session like they always did and it's pretty apparent none of them want to have a thing to do with what the other members were doing, Howe's just off in space, Wakeman waiting for it to be over, Squire's scowling at everybody, and Jon's just dutifully slapping the tambourine...weird times. but still a good performance overall.

This was very much the vibe I got from the Union tour, they were bored and didn't like playing together, very little enthusiasm, just dutifully cranking out the hits. Hard to overstate how much more lively and entertaining Jon Anderson and the Band Geeks were.

Does that weird crustacean-looking stage set from the Relayer tour give anyone else the ick?

xpost I dunno I saw them in NYC on that 2003 tour and they were on fire.

Good piece on ‘Owner of a Lonely Heart’. https://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/yes-owner-of-a-lonely-heart/

Just found out there's a Steve Howe + Jon Anderson cover of Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands. Not enough overdubbed-Anderson-choir on the verses, and too much soulless turn-of-the-century major-label-rock sheen everywhere, but still, it's pretty neat.

all complete in the sight of seeds of life with you

bear season 5 teaser episode makes the best use of "heart of the sunrise" i've heard since buffalo '66