Poll: Which was your favourite 'new' song from the 2010 sessions?

Between Fly from Here - Return Trip and now From a Page, we've had multiple 'new' songs from the 2010 sessions released. So I asked which was your favourite, and 60 of you replied.


1. "To the Moment" 48% (29 votes)
2. "The Gift of Love" 30% (18 votes)
3. "Words on a Page" 10% (6 votes)
4. "From the Turn of a Card" 8% (5 votes)
5. "Don't Take No for an Answer" 3% (2 votes)

The choice of "To the Moment" for promo for From a Page is justified, with a clear win.

Next Yes album "sooner rather than later"

In a new Billboard interview, Squire talks about making the next Yes studio album "sooner rather than later" and there are unconfirmed rumours on Yesfans.com of a specific timeline leading up to a spring/summer 2013 release. Yet there has been a certain scepticism among Yes fans about how quickly Yes might produce a follow-up to Fly from Here. I suggest this comes from two sources.

First, critics of the David-fronted band basically question this Yes's viability as recording artists. They struggle to believe that this band is capable of making an album and/or that anyone would want to release such a thing. However, such critics confuse what they want with what is likely to happen. However many fans were undoubtedly lost when Anderson was left behind, Fly from Here sold well and Frontiers want more.

I have more sympathy for the second reason for scepticism, those who look at recent history. It took ten years to produce Fly from Here, some way, so it will probably take ten years before we get the next album. However, I would argue that we have to consider why there was a ten year delay.

Much of that delay, in the post-Magnification period, was due to the tensions between Anderson/Wakeman and Howe/Squire/White. Those tensions are now outside the band. Throughout that post-Magnification period, Howe/Squire/White appeared keen to continue the traditional record/tour/record/tour cycle, so it should be no surprise to see them return to that model.

Critics of the current line-up sometimes characterise them as ruthlessly and recklessly rushing into a Yes without Anderson, but actually I think a chunk of the delay in producing Fly from Here was because of Howe/Squire/White's tentativeness in moving ahead without Anderson. They spent years before taking the plunge and deliberately didn't rush into making an album. It seems likely that that tentativeness has probably now gone.

So, I would say we should look not at the period since Magnification but just slightly earlier, the period before Magnification. From Howe's return in the mid-nineties through to Magnification, the band was in that record/tour/record/tour cycle with the longest gap between records of 24 months from The Ladder to Magnification. Indeed, they did this while jumping between record labels. With greater stability through the relationship with Frontiers, it seems to me quite unsurprising that we should see a new album around mid-2013.

The Big Poll: What was the best studio album of the last 12 months featuring multiple Yes men?

I wasn't certain whether to run this poll. This is a Yes fan site, so you would kinda expect a Yes album to easily defeat non-Yes albums. Why bother having the vote? But what exactly is and is not a Yes album remains contentious for some, with Fly from Here sporting only 60% (Howe/Squire/White) of what we call the classic line-up and The Living Tree, of course, featuring the other 40% (Anderson/Wakeman). So perhaps we should expect 60% of the vote for Fly from Here and 40% for The Living Tree?

But if I was going to have a poll of Fly from Here vs. The Living Tree, it seemed unfair to overlook other "spin-offs" involving multiple Yesmen, so, with a one year time frame, that adds CIRCA: (Kaye/Sherwood). And the final wildcard, released (most places) about the same time as Fly from Here and on the same label, is John Wetton's Raised in Captivity, which Wetton made in close collaboration with Sherwood and which features guest appearnaces from Kaye again and from Geoff Downes.

So, four albums, one labelled Yes, but three infused with the Yes spirit, and all four featuring multiple Yesmen: that seems like a fair poll on a Yes fan site. There seems no a priori reason why the album that says Yes on the cover would necessarily win against this competition.

The poll was clearly popular with a total of 170 187 votes. [Edit: The poll stayed up longer than intended, so I give the final results below.] And the result?

Yes: Fly from Here -- 163 (87%)
Anderson & Wakeman: The Living Tree -- 18 (10%)
CIRCA: And So On -- 4 (2%)
John Wetton: Raised in Captivity -- 2 (1%)

That appears like a comprehensive victory for Fly from Here. Some do prefer The Living Tree, but they're in a quite small minority. CIRCA: and Raised in Captivity avoid the embarrassment of getting zero votes, but this result doesn't suggest they've made much impact on Yes fans.

The Living Tree won the poll of best Yes-related album of the second half of 2010, and albums by Anderson and Wakeman have done well in those polls, so it's not that The Living Tree is unloved (or that Anderson/Wakeman fans have deserted the website), but Fly from Here does appear to have bested it.

With The Living Tree In Concert Part One due next month and the Anderson/Wakeman/Rabin project still on the horizon, we'll see how they do against other big Yes-related projects (like Levin Torn White, Squackett, Rabin's Jackaranda, Howe's Time and a new Mystery album) in future polls.

Poll: Best track on Fly from Here

And our latest poll results, for your favourite track on Fly from Here, are as follows. There were 124 votes:

"Into the Storm"	30	24%
"Fly From Here Pt II - Sad Night at the Airfield"	25	20%
"Fly From Here Pt I - We Can Fly"	16	13%
"The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be"	14	11%
"Hour of Need"	11	9%
"Life on a Film Set"	10	8%
"Fly From Here Pt III - Madman at the Screens"	8	6%
"Fly From Here - Overture"	3	2%
"Fly From Here Pt IV - Bumpy Ride"	3	2%
"Fly From Here Pt V - We Can Fly Reprise"	3	2%
"Solitaire"	1	1%

So, perhaps no surprise that "Into the Storm", picked out as a highlight in so many reviews, has come out top with about a quarter of the total vote, although cumulatively the "Fly from Here" suite amassed about half the total vote (61 votes; 49%).

The one piece so far played live, the single "We Can Fly", comes in third with 13% of the vote, beaten by Part II. Surprisingly, "The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be" came fourth, despite having attracted some criticism in reviews.

I can't remember now whether I voted myself for "Hour of Need" or "Fly from Here - Overture"!

What should Yes play live in July?

Results to a quickie poll on the main site, I asked what should be the focus for the forthcoming Yes tour, and your answers (82 votes in total) were:

Play songs from the new album, Fly from Here: 46.3 votes
Play more from Drama: 12.3
Play neglected pieces from the late 1990s/2000s: 8.5
Play neglected pieces from the 1970s: 6.8
Play neglected pieces from the YesWest era: 4
Play neglected pieces from the Banks era: 1
Play the 'greatest hits': 1
More solo spots for each band member: 1

So, that's pretty conclusive. Some reports have suggested a focus on Fly from Here and Drama, which will please fans. However, in a recent Billboard interview, Squire described the tour with Styx as, "more of a summer shed, rock 'n' roll-y tour and we'll have to obviously play Yes songs people are familiar with and squeeze it all into 90 minutes." He did add, "Later on [referring to the European leg] we'll hopefully go into a format where we have a longer playing time, so we'll be presenting more of the new album."

Fly from Here released (in Japan at least)

Fly from Here, the new Yes album, is now out, at least in Japan. European release is due 1 July and US/Canada follows 12 July. (German site Musicload.de reportedly already have the album available digitally, but in Germany only.)

The Japanese release has a bonus track of a longer version of "Hour of Need". At 6:46, it's more than twice as long as the regular 3:07 version. Fans outside Japan will have to decide for themselves whether it's worth paying the extra for an import copy for that additional three minutes and thirty-nine seconds of music! (I remember buying Keystudio solely to hear the otherwise unavailable "Lightning", Wakeman's intro to "Children of Light", and that's less than a minute long, so I'm in no position to pass judgement.) I've yet to hear the longer version myself.

Several retailers (e.g. CD Universe, HMV Japan) are reporting that the Japanese release has a second bonus track, described as "a rare track, which was going to be included in the album "DRAMA."" This is not the case. They are mistaken; possibly it's a garbled reference to the title track. There's just the "full-length" version of "Hour of Need".

The first reviews of the album, aside from my own one (available here) that is, are beginning to appear and I expect we'll also see a range of interviews with the band members to accompany promotional efforts. Sales indicators seem reasonably good so far, with the album as high as #50 at Amazon.com (US), #98 at Amazon.jp (Japan), #56 at Amazon.co.uk and #26 at Amazon.ca (Canada).

And, of course, the US tour begins in a few weeks and Downes' live return to the band. There's a poll on the website front page asking what you think the set list should focus on.

Riding a Tiger – A Review of Fly from Here

I have been fortunate to hear a friend’s review copy of Yes’s new album, Fly from Here. Do you want the short version of this review? Purr purr purr.

“Armies of angels are starting to fall”

What to expect? It’s been ten years since the last studio album from Yes, Magnification. Ten years before that was Union, ten years before Union was Drama, ten years before Drama was Time and a Word. If Yes changed so much over those previous intervals, what can we expect now with Fly from Here?

Fly from Here is also only the second time that Yes has released an album without Jon Anderson, arguably the central songwriter in the band’s history as well as a most distinctive vocalist. The decision to continue without Anderson in 2008 was hugely controversial and online spaces still rage with the debate.

On tour with Asia in May, Steve Howe and Geoff Downes said Fly from Here was like a cross between Close to the Edge and 90125. Close to the Edge, perhaps Yes’s greatest album, possibly even the greatest progressive rock album of all. 90125, the band’s most commercially successful release and a whole new sound. A cross between them? Talk about shooting high. Well, I don’t think Fly from Here is remotely like a cross between Close to the Edge and 90125.

I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t this. In an interview in the first quarter of this year, Howe said, “I don’t think [the album]’s very predictable. I think people are going to go, “Ouch! Ooh!,” in surprise.” Steve Howe is right.

Ooh!

In a good way.

“As stupid now as were at first”

It will sound like Drama, that’s what a lot of people have said, and the band encouraged those comparisons. It doesn’t, mostly. There are points of comparison. “Into the Storm” has something of the same quality. Parts of the title track too. But I think Fly from Here is closer to the album the band would have made after Drama had they stayed together. We’ve got “We Can Fly from Here”, which we know was intended for that project. We’ve got a second Buggles demo: “Life on a Film Set” is “Riding a Tide”, a c. 1981 demo, one of the bonus tracks on the 2010 re-release of The Buggles' Adventures in Modern Recording. But “Fly from Here” and “Life on a Film Set” don’t sound like Drama; they sound like a development from Drama.

With Jon Anderson gone and Trevor Horn brought in, some critics have prejudicially disparaged Fly from Here as a Trevor Horn album with Yes as a backing band. There are moments that perhaps point in that direction. A Horn/Downes vision of Yes predominates on a song like “Life on a Film Set”. This works fine for me. When Adventures in Modern Recording was re-released and everybody focused on the two-part demo of “We Can Fly from Here”, I remember raving about “Riding a Tide” and saying it sounded very Yessy, so it’s no surprise I like it here too.

“Fly from Here” has become a 23-minute epic, but the way it’s constructed isn’t like “Gates of Delirium” or “The Revealing Science of God”. There’s an explicit “Overture”, not something Yes has done before. It reminds me, to make an odd comparison, of the Trevor Horn-produced album Tenement Symphony by Marc Almond. To go through the epic in detail, after the overture is “Part I We Can Fly”: this is pretty much the song as we know it. “Part II Sad Night at the Airfield” is based on the demo “Part 2” on Adventures in Modern Recording, although it has been developed and extended. “Part III Madman at the Screens” is a variation on the secondary theme introduced in the latter half of “Part II”. “Part IV Bumpy Ride” introduces a new theme, but also re-visits an additional theme introduced latterly in “Part III”. Then “Part V We Can Fly Reprise” is, as the title says, a reprise of the “We Can Fly” main theme as the big finale. The Overture and Parts I and II could stand as separate pieces: indeed, they could have been on the album separated by other tracks, as Horn did with the two parts of the “We Can Fly from Here” demo on Adventures in Modern Recording. Parts III, IV and V then run together more and are less free-standing.

“From some other part of me”

But there’s another side to this album (terminology that seems appropriate for the first Yes album to be released on LP in some while). This is not the third Buggles album. On songs like “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be”, “Hour of Need” and “Into the Storm”, and even within the title epic (e.g., “Part IV Bumpy Ride”), there’s a sound, a quality, that is all about Chris Squire, Steve Howe and, indeed, Benoît David.

But not always quite how you expect.

By the way, to respond to some online speculation based on the song titles. No, “Hour of Need” has nothing to do with the piece of the same name on Steve Howe's Spectrum, as far as I can tell. But, yes, “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be” is something of a ballad.

“Somewhere a fire is breaking out”

Chris Hosford, a.k.a. Frumious B, a well-known online fan, suggested Fly from Here would be all instrumental fireworks, like on Drama, but without the core songwriting ability Anderson brought. It’s not. It’s almost the opposite of that. There are some great songs here, and the band have often held back on the fireworks.

Given Howe has complained about how his guitar parts were withheld or removed from albums like Magnification, Union and ABWH, I too thought Fly from Here would be like Drama or The Yes Album, drenched in Howe’s guitar playing. But it’s not. He’s there, he’s distinctive, he has solos, but the music is left alone when needed, by all the instrumentalists. There’s space and sparseness when needed. Howe uses a lot of acoustic and steel guitar; he almost does bluegrass on “Hour of Need”. There’s less cheesegrater.

“Remember what has been achieved”

The Yes cheesegrater is an analogy the band invented. Consider Drama as an example: it’s the idea of how these basic songs from The Buggles and Squire went through the cheesegrater and became Yessified. A process that’s also happened to many Jon Anderson songs on other albums. But Fly from Here does something more subtle. “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be”, “Life on a Film Set” and “Hour of Need” haven’t been through a grater. They represent a multiplicity of different visions for Yes, yet with a continuity of sound as well. This continuity isn't as crude as a cheesegrater. They have been infused in a water bath like a Heston Blumenthal pudding. They, I suggest, represent where Chris Squire and Steve Howe are as composers today and where the whole band are as performers.

While one song has been turned into an epic, you’ve then got “Hour of Need” that, contrary to its name, is the shortest piece on the album at 3:07 (although a longer version is included as a bonus track on the Japanese release). “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be” and “Life on a Film Set” are 5 minutes apiece. “Hour of Need” feels like a much longer piece: it’s got the ingredients, I've not heard the extended version, but it’s easy to imagine earlier incarnations of Yes stretching “Hour of Need” and these other songs to 7, 8, 12-minute pieces with filigrees and reprises, but on Fly from Here, they are compact jewels. Although I’d be happy for them to have gone on longer myself!

I’m guessing “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be” is going to be similar to Squackett. The song dates back to 2006/7 and writing sessions for a Chris Squire solo album. The album as such has been abandoned, with much of the material migrating to the Squackett project. That explains the contribution of Gerard Johnson, who was involved with these sessions, having previously been in The Syn with Squire, and before that a collaborator of Peter Banks'. Simon Sessler contributed to the lyrics.

“That’s when I start to be the man you’ve always seen in me”

There are more familiar Yesisms here too. There’s a jaunty angularity in “Into the Storm” and “Bumpy Ride” that remind me of Tormato. The use of contrasting vocal sections, again notable on “Into the Storm”, is very Yes, as Squire takes a prominent second vocalist role.

There are also comparisons possible with Asia with similarities to some of Howe’s compositions for the band like “Wish I’d Known All Along” or “Through My Veins”, although Howe opts for more Yessy lyrics on “Hour of Need” compared to the relationship angst of his Asia songs. Howe and Downes’ instrumental interplay here reminds me of recent Asia (e.g. “Wish I’d Known All Along” again). Downes came in last to this project, replacing Oliver Wakeman half way through the album sessions, but his stamp is on this album and there are so many places were you can’t imagine Oliver Wakeman’s style working. Albeit largely through recycled Buggles material, Downes is more prominent in the writing credits than Yes's keyboardists usually are. And this is some of Downes’ best work. So often just what the music needs, not more or less. Occasionally, there's a bit of a 1970s style, a bit Jeff Wayne or ELO, that style of keyboard playing.

Bits of Wakeman's work have been used in the final mix, but what is unclear. There's a short keyboard solo on “Hour of Need” which might be him. In fact, “Hour of Need” is probably the piece where it's easiest to imagine a Jon Anderson and Rick Wakeman version.

“There’s no-one sleeping, no-one awake”

I’ve not discussed the lyrics yet. Some feared the band would try to ape Anderson’s lyrical style. They haven’t. The lyrics and indeed vocal melodies are very different to what Anderson would do. They are, in some ways, quite un-Yes-like, more so than even Drama’s, yet they still encapsulate some familiar themes of positivity and striving for betterment, pleas for a better world through personal action. I think Howe's lyrical influence one can hear in songs like “Birthright”, “Spirit of Survival” or chunks of Tales from Topographic Oceans comes through on “Hour of Need”. There’s a romantic and humanist element from Squire on “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be”. That humanist strand to Yes’s lyrics, which Stuart Chambers discussed at some length in his book “Yes: An Endless Dream”, comes through in “Into the Storm” as well. There’s also a narrative style that I presume comes from Horn in “Fly from Here”. There’s another influence though, references to angels and heaven, not in a religious way, but a mythopoeic one. And there’s some clever wordplay, some arresting lines, although there are also points where the lyrics are weaker, like the rhyming in “Hour of Need”.

“In the dark / While the obvious isn't clear”

A special note about “Life on a Film Set”, as I’ve used its line “Riding a tiger” to title this review. If Panthers are fans of Drama, I say we continue the big cat metaphor and fans of Fly from Here have to be tigers. But I’m also wondering about the abortive Greg Lake/Geoff Downes collaboration in 1988 called Ride the Tiger: did Downes name it after this song?

“Something not so superficial / Like something I can really do without”

Some also feared that David’s vocals would ape Anderson’s. David’s role in Yes before now has been to fill Anderson’s shoes and how he sings Anderson’s Yes songs is not how he sings in Mystery. Again, fear not. David is not imitating Anderson here at all. In places, he’s singing parts Horn first did and that influence comes through with the staccato fashion Horn sometimes has (see “Life on a Film Set”), but David sings these parts better than Horn. Mostly this is David singing as himself, as he does in Mystery. In fact, better than he does in Mystery, this is great work from David.

There’s also lots of harmony, and a fair amount of lead, vocals from Squire. This is used in contrasting sections effectively on pieces like “Into the Storm”. There was uncertainty about whether Horn might have any vocal role: he doesn’t take any leads, but I think I can hear him in the backing vocals, at least on “Fly from Here”.

There’s lots I haven’t mentioned. What about Alan White? This is not an album full of in-your-face drumming. There isn’t anything like the intro to “Changes”. But there’s plenty of nice drumming throughout and rhythmic ideas. “Solitaire”, Howe’s acoustic solo. It’s a nice acoustic solo, what you’d expect from Howe, fits on the album. The production... The production is, of course, impeccable. Everything is clear, multiple layers of music. What one would expect from Horn. I could say more about “The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be”, how it’s almost almost Fleetwood Mac-ish.

“I want to be the one who’s always there beside you / But we both must face the dawn / Alone”

In detail, it’s not what I expected, it’s not hugely like this or that prior Yes album. Broadly, it’s uplifting, it’s positive, it’s memorable, it’s what Yes music should be. It’s got those dramatic, instrumental moments: “Fly from Here Part V: We Can Fly Reprise” and a moment in “Part III Madman at the Screens” kill me. And the same for some vocal sections, like the “Armies of angels...” section in “Into the Storm”.

It’s an album worth immersing oneself in. Much of it on first and second listen was odd, confusing and even off-putting. It took me a few listens, but all the pieces grab me now. I’ve been going around humming them. I love it.

“Lonely eyes watch as the moon shines down”

There is no Jon Anderson on this album. Even Drama has echoes from Anderson’s influence. There is nothing here that has anything to do with him. OK, there’s a vocal line in “Hour of Need” which maybe is a bit Anderson-ish, but that’s it. Yes music has been made of so many components and obviously nearly all Yes fans are going to be fans of what Jon brought to the table, so some are, I’m sure, going to find out how much they miss him with Fly from Here. But this is a new Yes. This is, despite the use of two 30-year old songs, an album about Yes in 2011. I don’t think you can love this album without accepting that.

To finish, let’s put this is some context. In my opinion, and I’m sure you’re all going to have your own opinions soon enough, but for me... OK, it’s not as good as the average Yes album in the 1971-1981 period, but then little is. But this is better than the average Yes album in the 1991-2001 period. (Of course, that’s a period with a couple of albums that really drag the average down!) I think it’s a better album than Anderson/Wakeman’s The Living Tree, Jon Anderson’s Survival and Other Stories, Asia’s Omega, CIRCA: 2007, Mystery’s One Among the Living, The Syn’s Big Sky, White’s White and John Wetton’s Raised in Captivity, and most of those are good albums. If this was a brand new band, with no history, I’d be looking forward to their next album.

So, now they’ve got back into the album habit, let’s hope their next album is soon and not another 10 year wait!

Full release details, album credits and links to samples are on the news page, as you’d expect.

Fly from Captivity

Fevered excitement is the order of the day online with Yes's new album Fly from Here so close, and new details emerging very day. I've just put track times up on the news site and below. There's a great high resolution image of Dean's album cover here where you can really see the detail, like the two panthers in the trees. Speaking of panthers, I'm hearing the first few comments from people who have heard the album: it's like Drama, and it's not like Drama...

But let's not overlook some other Yes-related projects coming out shortly. After a great debut album, Mars Hollow are shortly to release their second album, produced by Billy Sherwood — more on that in due course. And then there's John Wetton's Raised in Captivity, produced/mixed/co-written/co-performed by Sherwood and out at the same time as Fly from Here. Frontiers have released three snippets of the album (see on the news site under Sherwood) and that distinctive Sherwood sound can be heard, suggesting this is perhaps as much a "John Wetton & Billy Sherwood" album as a John Wetton solo album.


Fly from Here
side A:
1. Fly From Here - Overture (1:54)
2. Fly From Here Pt I - We Can Fly (6:01)
3. Fly From Here Pt II - Sad Night at the Airfield (6:42)
4. Fly From Here Pt III - Madman at the Screens (5:17)
5. Fly From Here Pt IV - Bumpy Ride (2:15)
6. Fly From Here Pt V - We Can Fly Reprise (1:48)

side B:
7. The Man You Always Wanted Me to Be (5:13)
8. Life on a Film Set (5:12)
9. Hour of Need (3:08)
10. Solitaire (3:30) [Howe solo]
11. Into the Storm (6:54)

Yes vs. AWR - timelines

When people talk about the possible Anderson Wakeman Rabin album and the competition this alt-Yes offers to Fly from Here, they tend to stress how we can enjoy both and this is not a contest. And they're right. But, you know, it's much more fun to look at it as a contest! I thought it would be interesting to look at timelines.

The new Yes as we know it was announced in September 2008 (although the idea of Yes moving on without Anderson was mooted as early as June 2008 in the initial panicked reaction to Anderson's ill health). That same month, the idea of doing an album at some point is mentioned in interviews. We'll take September 2008 as the starting date.

The idea of Anderson Wakeman Rabin, or Anderson Bruford Wakeman Rabin as the initial plan was, dates back to February 2010. Wakeman, without naming names, first described the project and plans for an album that month.

But it's one thing to moot doing an album at some point. That's not the same as really starting work. Of course, musicians are of always writing and often use older ideas, so this is difficult to assess. Still, let's try to identify when we first see serious and collaborative work towards an album. For Yes, that would seem to be September 2009 when Squire, Howe and O. Wakeman gathered to exchange ideas specifically for a new album. With AWR, it would appear to be January 2011, when Anderson first says that he and Wakeman have written material for the project (whereas his 2010 interviews talk of writing in the future). So, this first step took 12 months for Yes and 11 months for AWR.

For Yes, recording sessions began in October 2010, another 13 months on. Recording finished in February 2011 (3 months more) and the album was mastered in May 2011 for a June 2011 release. Presuming that happens to plan, that's 3 months from recording finished, 6 months from recording beginning, 19 months from joint writing beginning, 31 months from the project beginning.

AWR started later. To stay one month ahead of Yes, they need to start recording by February 2012 and aim for a September 2012 release. OK then, clock ticking...

Over 3 years is a respectable stint for any Yes keyboardist

Oliver Wakeman is playing his last few shows with Yes. He is to be replaced by Geoff Downes, presumably as soon as the current Rite of Spring tour ends.

Yes has always had a high rate of keyboardist turnover. Tony Kaye lasted just over 3 years initially. His replacement was of course Oliver's dad, but Rick lasted less time, leaving after 2 years and 8 months. Next came Patrick Moraz for an even shorter spell: 2 years, 1 month.

Rick was back, but only for just over 3 years, before the shortest spell of the keyboardists we usually count, Geoff Downes, at a bit under a year.

Tony Kaye then returned... or rather joined Cinema, which became Yes. He seems to have been in the band for around a year before leaving, being replaced by Eddie Jobson for a few months, and then returning. Kaye was then continuously in Yes for by far the longest period of any keyboardist, another 11 years.

Counting ABWH as well, Rick had his longest spell in Yes of around 4 years from the beginnings of ABWH to the end of the Union tour. Given there were plans for him to be involved in Talk, maybe we should count that as longer. After Kaye's departure, Rick again returned, but this time quite briefly, about 1.5 years. Igor Khoroshev lasted about 3 years. Rick's latest stint in the band was for 2 years, 2 months.

Compared to these previous Yes keyboardists, Oliver has done pretty well. He's been in the band about three and a third years, although the cancellation of the 2008 tour meant his earlier months weren't very busy. (Even if you count only from the beginning of rehearsals for the In the Present tour, Oliver is still on 2 years, 5 months.)

Oliver's period in the band is longer than all but one of his father's; longer than Kaye's first time round; longer than Downes, Moraz, Khoroshev or Jobson. Any Yes keyboardist who gets to 3 years should probably be looking over their shoulder(!); only Tony Kaye has done substantially better.

What marks Oliver out, however, is the possibility that he won't appear on any studio material. While we now know Downes is the main keyboardist on Fly from Here, it's unclear whether any of Oliver's work will be used.

Switching keyboardists while making an album is familiar territory for Yes. Rick first came in when the band were working towards Fragile. Moraz began the Going for the One sessions, only for Rick to return. We've even had one Yes album before capturing a transition: Billy Sherwood plays most of the keys on Open Your Eyes. Igor Khoroshev was then recruited and appears on a few of the tracks.

If Oliver isn't on Fly from Here, however, the only precedent for someone touring as a member of the band but not seeing a studio release is Tony O'Reilly's few months as drummer in 1968.

The other lessons here are that Downes perhaps deserves another go at the job more than most ex-keyboardists, given how brief his first time was, and most Yes keyboardists get to come back at some point! In the mean time, here's good luck to Oliver for his career after Yes.

Plotting out the Yes year

If you can pull yourself away from the global news from Japan and Libya, the Yes news is coming thick and fast. The new, expanded & remastered ABWH from Gonzo is now available, and the current band are on tour, with the rest of the year beginning to become clear.

[Edit: And the latest Chris Squire interview confirms Downes will be the main keyboardist on Fly from Here.]

Now-4 Apr: Rite of Spring tour continues.

Apr: Finish the new Yes album, Fly from Here: recording appears to have been completed, although final overdubs wouldn't be a surprise and there's then the mixing, mastering etc.

28 Apr-26 May: Asia tour North, South and Central America. This may leave Squire with time to move forward the Squackett release. White is at a charity show on 30 Apr, and there is his mystery project with Tony Levin and possibly David Torn to fit in somewhere.

28-30 May: Two Yes shows, with Asia opening, in Mexico. Recently announced and still something of a puzzle. Will there be further Yes touring around these two shows? Will these shows debut Fly from Here material? What do these shows tell us about the ongoing uncertainty and rumours as to Downes' involvement on the new album and the possibility of his replacing O. Wakeman?

Jun: Unclear... but presumably some promotional activity for the new album.

Jul: Approximate release date for Fly from Here. Trevor Rabin's long-awaited new solo album is also due in the summer, as is an Anderson Wakeman Project 360 tour live release.

Jul/Aug: Yes North American tour with Styx.

Sep/Oct: Unclear, but one report suggested a South American tour by Yes around Sep. There's probably a Japan tour at some point, but whether in this period or later (early 2012?), we don't know. CIRCA: tour Europe. Howe has a solo release planned for Sep. Anderson & Wakeman may be playing Canada, and possibly the US and Europe, around Oct.

Nov/Dec: Yes European tour.

Dec: Asia possibly re-group to start work on their next album.

2012: I'm guessing now, but Asia will be celebrating the 30th anniversary of Asia, so another solo album and a new round of touring presumably. Howe has hinted at spending more time on solo projects in 2012. However, continued touring by Yes also seems likely.

It's not clear when the Anderson Wakeman Rabin project might get going. Could be this year, could be 2012.