BIRTH OF THE NEW YES
IT wasn't quite The Day The Earth Stood Still.
But Yes caused a tremor with an upheaval last week which resounded throughout rock.
Tony Kaye's departure and the intake of tall, blonde giant of the keyboards Rick Wakeman, was a traumatic episode which upset not a few admirers of the band.
But the aural evidence of the new Yes, now taking shape in feverish activity at the recording studios, is proof that the surgical operation and subsequent grafting, was a bold plunge for new life.
It happened to them once before, when Pete Banks was replaced by Steve Howe. During the last year the band have improved tremendously, not merely becoming more polished, but crystalising their music into a highly polished beauty, rare among groups.
With the success of their third album and exciting prospects in America, it was time for them to stop and take a look at the future. They wanted to introduce new material, new sounds, and expand the Yes style.
Founder member Tony, was not into the new Yes, and during their debut trip to the States, it became apparent a change would have to come.
TONY told the MM: " I'd not been happy with the band for a year. I wasn't getting into the music they were playing and the direction they were going. I found myself being left out and it was difficult to get my ideas across. And socially I wasn't mixing with the others. I like to go out and meet people when we have finished a gig. The others liked to go back to their hotel rooms. And the three guitarists -- Steve, Chris and Jon -- would be working out new numbers, which was difficult for me, only able to play organ on stage. So the rest were getting it together and I wasn't part of it.
OUT: Tony Kaye"All this started quite a long time ago. When we first got the new band together, it was happy and creative. But later, we weren't writing, or in the studios, just doing concerts, and there was not time for me to practice.
" Now I have the chance to do some sessions and play with other people. In the last six months I have really got into playing at home, and writing and recording. I'm deciding what I want to play on my own and not just as a unit with Yes."
"I quite dig what was puts down on the last LP but I'm not very happy with the stuff I played. The way I feel at the moment, I want to rest from being on the road and business scenes. I just want time to think. I've been on the road and playing for six years.
"Yeah, yeah. I feel disappointed at leaving as a founder member. It's a good band, playing its own music. But now I want to do something different. I think the split will do us both a lot of good. Anyone can change, and it's happened to us. They wanted me to play Moog and Mellotron and other keyboards, but I just wanted to play organ."
SAID Yes lead vocalist Jon Anderson, "The split was a bit strange and a freaky thing. Tony is a tremendous guy and in the years we were together he was very efficient and great for the band. Getting Steve in changed us and visiting the States gave us greater realisation of the potential. We wanted a more colourful sound and Tony was content to groove along, which was nice. But we knew how good Rick was, and he has proved tremendous. It's so exciting to work with somebody like him, I think he's been bottled up in the past and now it's all pouring out. It was very hard to make the change, but we shall be friends with Tony.
"There is something about Rick that turned me on completely. He's very enthusiastic and very talented and already it feels as if he has been in the band for years. Him and Steve get on very well.
"The band will always carry on, and if one person lags, then there's got to be a change. It's very strange that the next LP title is 'Fragile!' We just want to create the best music we can."
Work on the new album has already begun and last week the MM was privileged to attend one of the sessions at Advision's 16-track studio in London.
Steve in a black tee-shirt frowned over his guitar, as Jon conducted, and played a lithe and leaping line with Rick, while Chris and Bill phased in their ideas. It was complicated. They made mistakes. Re-thought endings. Re-played passages over and over.
But even the monotony and mechanics of rehearsal-recording could not shroud the spirit.
They all came pouring out of the studio to listen to a take " Bill, the snare drum is a bit damp. Could you take the stuff off," said Eddie. "It I sounds beautiful to me!" said Bill.
The piece being worked out was tentatively titled "Heart Of The Sunrise" in three parts. Jon objected to something Bill was playing on cymbals. "You can't start playing Chinese music during that! At the moment -- it's all noise."
Bill: "Oh man -- it's a beautiful sound! But you can't hear the guitar at all. Good heavens, I'm getting heated and cross. This is getting silly."
RICK WAKEMAN talked about his ideas on where Yes were heading and why he split from the Strawbs after being in the band for nearly 15 months.
It was In July last year that Rick first came to light after the Strawbs' first solo concert in London at Queen Elizabeth Hall. At the time people were asking how long they could keep the skinny long blond-haired keyboard player.
IN: Rick Wakeman"I couldn't understand at the time, I mean you take a job because you like what you are offered, and if you are lucky enough to get a job you are really interested in you don't think about leaving it," said Rick.
When did he first think that he would be leaving the Strawbs? "It started about seven months ago when for some unknown reason the Strawbs thought that I was going to leave them. I had had a lot of offers to join other bands, and not told them -- which I suppose was the wrong thing to do. Everything that has happened with Yes has happened in the last month.
" Chris Squire phoned me about a month ago, he asked me if I'd like to join Yes. We arranged a blow, and frankly I was knocked out with what they were doing.
"Then Steve Howe rang me a few days later at 1:30 in the morning after I had been in bed for about an hour after 36 hours without sleep, which wasn't the best time to catch me. I was very untogether, but completely knocked out by the fact that they wanted me to join Yes, and by the ideas they had for 'Fragile' and the live show," said Rick.
" I think they are moving into what I can only describe as orchestral rock. You've had the heavy bands such as Cream and the Who, now we are trying to move on one stage further into orchestral rock. I think we have the same excitement that heavy rock generated, but what Yes are doing is a hell of a lot more complicated and musically refined.
"Every bar is thought out when the song is formulated. Once the whole thing is together you can play it as you feel it, but there is a solid backbone and arrangement to work from. We're working 18 hours a day recording and rehearsing, and some of the things that are coming out are just -- well, they're silly."
"You know Steve (Howe) will get a really fast riff, and instead of just the guitar taking it we're putting it out together. When we finish we just have to laugh, it's frighteningly impossible. I don't really know how to explain it.
"The way Yes think is amazing too, Bill is not a drummer and Chris is not a bass player - can you follow that. Jon doesn't think like a singer either, they all think like musicians. Suggest a straight bass line to Chris and you might as well forget about it before you start," said Rick.
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