defend the indefensible: TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS, by YES

favorite so far: "ritual (nous sommes du soleil)," esp. for its opening.

(I do have the latest reissues of The Yes Album and Going For The One.)

My morning commute is 70 minutes if I take the early train, 80 minutes if I take the late train. So sometimes I'll take the late train just so I can listen to TFTO in its entirety on my iPod.

And 'Gates of Delirium' is better than anything on _TFTO_ anyway.

Amen.

And I do appreciate TfTO very much, especially the acoustic bit on "the Ancient" and the 'relayer' section on "the Remembering".

It's also not as good as Close To The Edge or Fragile or The Yes Album. In fact, I probably listen to it least of all the Yes I own. But I still wouldn't trade it for an ole' brown mare.

i'm also pleasantly surprised that there are no bashers yet. surely there MUST be some here?!?

i have only ever heard one cocteau twins song!

when I was a big Yes fan in Jr High, TFTO was the only one of their albums I couldn't get through. Now it's the only one I still occasionally listen to (probably because I haven't played it to death like the others). But after reading this thread, I listened to it again to try to remember what I used to find so difficult about it. I think it was because compared to something like The Gates of Delirium, TFTO doesn't progress though movements in a way that seems logical. On the contrary, it meanders around seemingly changing direction at random. In that way it's a much better match for my current tastes. The other difference I noticed is that The Gates of Delirium gives you occasional doses of fist pumping payoff (er, well as close as it gets considering who we're talking about here) and there's almost none of that on TFTO. That was probably a lot of the problem. Too cerebral and not emo enough. Or something.

On the other side of the coin, I can't stand Close to the Edge anymore. A lot of sections on that album just seem to overstay their welcome.

Ha ha, that reminds me of a friend of mine who was listening to a vinyl copy of this and it got going into this repetitive sort of riff in a funny time signature and he was like, "Wow, that's quite cool". And it kept going on and on and on. Then he fell asleep and when he woke up it was still going and he was like, "I knew this was record was long but Jesus!" Then he realised the record had been stuck for 45 minutes.

far out.

I used to crank it
while I lifted weights, which meant
it all cancelled out

Ironically enough, considering Pashima's

It's so...uplifting! It just goes up and up and up and up. So rich & warm-sounding.

it segued into "Going for the One" and I thought, "Now THIS is uplifting." Something about the high synth sounds in the background, literally pulling you up throughout the song.

I should actually get some of this again, since I only ever listened to my dad's albums.

Side 1 and 4 are the most consistent.

OK, Good night.

i am listening to this motherfucking album all the way through for the first time EVER right now

side 2 is where it's at. feel safe now!

ok

this is gonna take a few listens to sink in

like, i enjoyed it pretty much throughout, but uh

it's 7 hours long?

yep

jesus

I thought it had more of a reputation as the epic that didn't get played live, it's the only big track from the TYA/Fragile/CTTE era that isn't on Yessongs, it's not on Yesshows or either of the Keys to Ascension releases either. I dunno why they shunned that one but all the fans seem to love it.

But they did; they did an entire tour in 1974 where they played the whole thing. There's a bootleg of it floating around, called Topographic.

I really wish that "To Be Over" was better

I want everybody to know that in an effort to be a better person i restrained myself from clicking FP here

god i really need to not read people with mixed opinions about Yes

I really like "South Side Of The Sky", I heard that they were playing it more in the last tours with Anderson. "Awaken" is the one that really doesnt do much for me but a lot of people seem to love it.

"Anyone else think Tormato is seriously underrated"

I HATED this album when I first heard it. Hated it so much I threw it away and didn't listen to it again for years. And then when I did I thought it really wasn't that bad; the worst thing about it is the cover and Jon Anderson's kid talking about clowns. It's a terrible sounding record though (so is Going for the One).

never been able to get into "awaken" either or most of going for the one. tormato is still lost on me. but then comes drama and holy shit, god bless the buggles

a nice defense of tales if you are at all into michael chabon ~

I actually write, frequently, while listening to Yes records: Close to the Edge, Relayer, and Tales from Topographic Oceans. The dynamics are pretty steady, the bass and drums are propulsive, and the lyrics make no sense (to me, at least) and thus do not intrude on my own word-flow. They are just pretty sounds. I listen to vinyl records, unless I'm working on a plane.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2012/09/10/michael_chabon_interview_why_the_telegraph_avenue_author_still_loves_prog_rock_.html

It's a terrible sounding record though (so is Going for the One).

tormato was my reference record when i went through headphone hell a few years ago, mainly because the bass is mixed in fairly solidly right the way through

GftO sounds awesome in my car

MOVE YOURSELF! *orchestral hit*

OK GUYS
I actually knocked up an edited version of this album, decide for yourself whether or not it's an improvement :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2IIeDJYjOU

Sorry

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2IIeDJYjOU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l49P4F-gpm4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iHKFBlx0t8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SnvkS11K0s

That's very well done. I love those ambient parts in the second track.

I think it was an interesting time for the band, that period. There was a lot of FM radio who would play long-form pieces of music without any advertising. We felt we were on the cutting edge of rock music —- progressive rock —- totally different from the norm. And the FM radio in America —- especially university radio —- was very excited to play “Close to the Edge,” “And You and I,” “Starship Trooper,” and longer pieces. So we felt, well, the door seems to be open. Let’s make some music. And of course, when people get together to make music, you don’t really time it and say, “We should just make four-minute pieces of music.” Or five-minute pieces of music. We were just interested in expanding the music that we dreamed of. It wasn’t like, “Let’s sit down and write twenty-minute pieces of music.” We just started writing. We were actually on tour in Japan and Australia, and we started composing ideas, and before you know it, you’re dreaming of new progressions and ideas that are just different. Like having everyone in the band drumming at once. Or having everybody singing and playing different instruments. Challenging yourself, really.

http://www.examiner.com/article/jon-anderson-of-yes-raids-rock-vault-talks-topographic-oceans-40-years-on

That's a great article!

yeah, that's great. i like this album a whole lot. a lot of people are still stuck in some version of the punk vs. prog false dilemma, even if they don't know it.

That article talks about a prog cruise Jon is participating in, to which a friend replied in an email:

Let me get this straight...

Are you telling me that I have the opportunity to experience the best and worst of prog while enjoying the close-quarters company of some of the most socially awkward old people in all of fandom, and top it all off with the rapid spread of virulent rocket diarrhea?

SIGN ME THE FUCK UP.

...at which point another friend pointed out that Jon and Yes have dueling cruises, prompting him to say:

I just realized that the Yes cruise will have Eddie Jobson, Patrick Moraz, and whoever the current Yes keyboard player is (assuming it's not one of them) all in the same boat, and if it sinks, the keyboard world will be devastated. That's after they get intentionally rammed by the Punk Cruise featuring The Ramones (Legacy), Jello Biafra, and two guys from Stiff Little Fingers.

Prog!

I still listen to that Matt#2 edit of this album, it's deepened my appreciation of the album

Is that to be found elsewhere on this thread? I remember wanting to hear it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2IIeDJYjOU

cool, thanks

pass amongst your memories told returning ways

Revive! Am listening to this as I lie in bed getting over virulent diarrhea I contracted on an intercontinental flight. And I must say: this record hits the spot. I think its poor rep has more to do with the four songs/four sides thing than anything else. It’s no more overwrought or indulgent than anything else in their 70s catalogue — and the lyrics are as equally abstract (“And rearrange your liver to the solid mental grace,” anyone?).

Even when I first discovered this record, I was really taken by the “We walk around the story/Out in the city running free” melody in “The Remembering.” But the melodies are quite strong throughout — “Nou Sommes Du Soileil” is up there w “I get up/I get down” “I feel lost in the city!” and “Soon” for great lyrical Jon moments. The rhapsodic “Relayer…”(!!) section in “The Remembering" is catchy as well. Only “The Ancient” is a bit anemic in the melody department, but even there there’s a great folk section with Howe and the textures are pretty attractive.

To that point, the textures and rhythms throughout are pretty amazing — the disco section in the first half of “The Revealing Science of God” is aces and should have been sampled by now. Wakeman, in particular, sounds great on most of this — his Mellotron is towering and his Minimoog bits have the least pomp of most of his recordings. And Howe, Squire and White sound great on “The Ancient” — almost certainly influenced by Crimson’s “Larks’ Tongues in Aspic Part I."

Their best record? No. But much further up there than I remembered ...

weird, this record actually gave me diarrhea

it has a cool album cover

"the remembering" is up there with "close to the edge" and "gates of delirium". tales as a double album is too much but the best of the other three sides/movements could be spliced into another singular epic jam to rank with YES highest on fire. sometimes i wonder if that's what's at the root of the lingering beef between anderson and howe

This record is at the root of the lingering beef?

i have no idea. imagination is a beefitul thing

I listen to this one straight through all the time and love it. The Steven Wilson remix is the version for me. Honestly, I only listen to his Yes remixes of the albums he's done as my go-to versions these days. They're tremendous.

regular tales front to back is beyond my drug budget. a short-ish jam to break up the four 20-minute long songs would've been tight. pass within and soothe this endless night

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

this is my favorite yes album

I listen to this one straight through all the time and love it. The Steven Wilson remix is the version for me. Honestly, I only listen to his Yes remixes of the albums he's done as my go-to versions these days. They're tremendous.

I like the 2003 mix of this (with the two minutes or so of tweedling at the beginning, before the vocals come in). I don't like the Steven Wilson remix.

That two minutes is CRUCIAL!

(not joking)

I agree 100%.

NTI I found 320s of his stereo remixes on the t0rr3nts. No way in hell can I afford a Blu-Ray Yes discography!

alternate truth / alternate view / surely surely

this album rules and everyone who hates it sucks

This straddles the line between 'posts very much in character' and 'posts very much out of character'.

the wiki page for this is incredibly entertaining

When the band settled into Morgan Studios, Lane and Anderson proceeded to decorate the studio like a farmyard. Squire believed Lane did so as a joke on Anderson as he wished to record in the country. Anderson brought in flowers, pots of greenery, and cut out cows and sheep to make the studio resemble a garden as a typical studio did not "push the envelope about what you're trying to create musically".Wakeman recalled the addition of white picket fences and his keyboards and amplifiers placed on stacks of hay. At the time of recording, heavy metal group Black Sabbath were recording Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (1973) in the adjacent studio. Singer Ozzy Osbourne recalled the Yes studio also had a model cow with electronic udders fitted and a small barn to give the room an "earthy" feel. "About halfway through the album", said Offord, "The cows were covered in graffiti and all the plants had died. That just kind of sums up that whole album". At one point during the recording stage, Anderson wished for a "bathroom sound" effect on his vocals and asked the band's lighting engineer, Michael Tait, to build him a plywood box with tiles stuck onto it. After Tait explained to Anderson that the idea would not work, Tait "built it anyway". Sound engineer Nigel Luby recalled that tiles would fall off the box during recording takes.

Wakeman felt increasingly disenchanted by the album during the recording stage, and spent much of his time drinking and playing darts in the studio bar. He also spent time with Black Sabbath, playing the Minimoog synthesiser on their track "Sabbra Cadabra". Wakeman would not accept money for his contribution, so the band paid him in beer.

In one incident during the last few days of mixing, Anderson left the studio one morning with Offord carrying the tapes. Offord placed them on-top of his car in order to find his car keys, and proceeded to drive away, forgetting about the tapes. They stopped the car to find the tapes had slid off and fallen on the road, causing Anderson to rush back and stop an oncoming bus to save them.

Nous Sommes De Lager

Was this album ever really critically panned? The only real slagging I can think of off the top of my head was a one-star review from... cdnow? sonicnet? one of those allmusic guide precursors whose archives are completely lost to the ages. Other than that I don’t really remember it being received any worse critically than, say, Drama or Tormato.

The Rolling Stone Album Guide of '92 gave it one star, IIRC, and it appears in the Guterman/O'Donnell Worst Rock 'n' Roll Records of All Time book (those guys particularly have it out for prog, saying of Genesis that they were better than most prog bands "i.e., they were boring only 90% of the time").

yeah it was definitely the punching bag du jour of people who don't even like prog in the first place. I think it's fairly well liked these days though it's still seen as being totally ridiculous and the moment where Yes stopped being the Best Band in the World. the criticism for Tormato feels a bit different - nobody was really expecting a great record out of a prog band in 1978. in fact its Going For the One that was the outlier in that regard.

this album rules and everyone who hates it sucks

― american bradass (BradNelson), Wednesday, August 7, 2019 8:32 AM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

she's still right

This is easily a top 50 of all time for me and by far my favorite Yes album

I like the 2003 mix of this (with the two minutes or so of tweedling at the beginning, before the vocals come in).

That two minutes is CRUCIAL!

Originally omitted from the LP at Ahmet Ertegun's request, as if a little bit of atmospheric guitar and wind sounds would be the final straw for the Yes audience.
With that intro intact, there is a mirror image of the last seconds of the album; though there's something to be said for the drama of the LP version, starting right with the vocal.

I heard the dramatic start-from-zero version first, but I still like the 2003 version better.