A journey through words and music by Emily Chance

After a lifetime of listening assimilating new music is a quicker process, ironically the challenges of 72/73 from Yes were part of that learning curve. Fly From Here is now very familiar to me and its twists and turns, its subtexts and its subtleties. Several things become clearer. Geoff Downes contribution is much larger than I had first thought he is very much the co architect of the suite and his keyboard style helps shape the sound of the piece as much and possibly more than Steve's Guitar and Chris's Bass. This helps to give the project a sense of uniqueness which was so important given the point in their career and the absence of the co founder of the band. In addition Trevor has encouraged Benoit to really stamp his own style on the Horn/Downes material which comes off brilliantly and of course helps give the music its fresh and distinct style. Many months ago I said Trevor put his thinking cap on between the break in sessions ands decided to make changes...

"A Night At The Symphony" The 13 note intro is full of mystery and expectation repeats twice and we are off. This is no cod prog rock multi keyboard intro it is neat, cinematic and more akin to the intro to the Who’s Baba O'Riley or the repeating harpsichord intro to Smile’s Heros and Villians. This is artful sophisticated pop music and immediately sets the tone of the CD. Part 1 It dissolves and the paean to a forgotten age of turbo prop airliners is with us itself recalling a 25 year olds experience at the Oxford Apollo. But for me a child of the 1950’s I am taken right back to days of living on Royal Air Force airfields and looking up at the aircraft coming in to land when air travel was a mystery, one of these turbo prop liners flew my mother and I to Cyprus to join my father who was ahead of us and opened up my life to all sorts of new experiences. For me this lyric resonates. Geoff states the theme Chris slides round the bass and Benoit beautifully captured by...

To listen to a piece of music released 40 years ago you would expect it to date, not all when I listened to the whole album last week on the North Devon Coast 11 miles from South Molton where it was rehearsed I was astonished at how fresh and timeless it sounded no wonder it still receives such a warm reception when they play excerpts, probably tonight somewhere in the United States.   The Yes Album Bruford/Squire/Howe pound out the opening salvos locked together like musical lovers. Then the first huge bass accent, another and in comes the burning Hammond sound. A slight upward movement and then the first appearance of a synthesiser on a Yes CD and in comes Steve’s beautiful clean guitar lines dancing over the top and at 1.30 the first block vocals. The Yes choir but equal in the mix and then a rotating lick from Steve and we are off. The block vocals now form a call and response with Steve’s guitar injections. At 3.20 the music unwinds and the bass takes up the tune r...

When I listened to Topographic Oceans for the first time in October 1973 my reaction was one of puzzlement and I was clearly mourning the loss of  Bill Bruford. During much of the later part of the seventies I viewed it as a confusing piece of musical architecturer. Then in 2009 I returned to it and was taken mostly by the two inner movements, particularly the Remembering. In recent months I have been encouraged to set free my imagination and dream a little more. I sat down in Sri Lanka with the intention of reviewing the CD during this most fertile period that I have entered. What actually happened is I tipped my mind into the music and let it wash through me. These essays are essentially prose poems which look at the music from a point where I am fusing my aesthetic sensibilties and spiritual feelings spurred on by a new sense of imaginative enquiry and trying to capture simply what I am "hearing" right now. I am no...