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Yes Biography | ||
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Initially Yes was simply a pop group that got very, very ambitious. Their first two albums have some R&B traces, thanks to the more basic styles of guitarist Peter Banks and keyboardist Tony Kaye, who both got weeded out early. Yet the delicate, almost feminine tones of singer Jon Anderson proved an early trademark, along with the jazz leanings of the rhythm section (bassist Chris Squire and drummer Bill Bruford, replaced in 1972 by the heavier-hitting Alan White). With the arrival of guitarist Steve Howe and keyboardist Rick Wakeman, Yes was free to explore the rock-symphony approach they aspired to. Yes Links
Their
ambitions reached a peak on 1973's Tales From Topographic Oceans--a
four-song, lyrically dense double album that even Wakeman found
excessive (he exited for a year, replaced by Patrick Moraz)--yet there
were more than enough lovely and powerful moments to justify the
stretch. Reunited with Wakeman after a year making solo albums, Yes
stripped down to relative basics and made its last great album with
1977's Going For The One. Since then the band's inability to settle on a
permanent lineup, coupled with the inevitable career fatigue, has kept
them from hitting the same peaks. Anderson and Wakeman left in 1979,
replaced by the two members of the Buggles (the resulting album, Drama,
was nowhere near as bad as it could have been). Yes was then laid to
rest until 1983, when Anderson, Kaye, Squire and White formed a new
lineup with guitarist/singer Trevor Rabin. At first Rabin's mainstream
instincts were just what the band needed--the 1983 album 90125 was both
creative and commercial, if not quite the cosmic Yes of old--but wound
up taking far too much control and made Yes sound too ordinary. |
