What does 2025 hold for Yes fans?

I believe 7 Yesmen have releases or live dates announced for 2025: Jon Anderson (Band Geeks live album and tour), Bill Bruford (Pete RothTrio shows), Rick Wakeman (solo shows), Geoff Downes (Asia live), Trevor Horn (onefestival appearance announced), Billy Sherwood (on Dave Kerzner’s Genesistribute album), and Jon Davison (at John Lodge live shows).

Although without announced dates, there are various other projects expected in 2025. How confident we can be of these actually happening varies, but I think we can have strong expectations for: a new Yes album and tour, a new Downes Braide Association album, and a new Rick Wakeman solo piano album.

More up in the air, but possible, is plenty more. There are three albums with Billy Sherwood that look like good bets for 2025: exo-X-xeno’s (also with Patrick Moraz); a new CIRCA: album (also with Tony Kaye and Jay Schellen); and an album with Dave Kerzner and Fernando Perdomo. There is a whole suite of Jon Anderson projects that might appear, with various follow-up albums (Anderson Stolt 2; 1000 Hands: Chapter 2; and a second studio album with the Band Geeks) and maybe the eventual realisation of some very long-running projects, Zamran (dating back at least to 2000) and Chagall (from 1980!). Other projects we could see include a new Asia album and more touring; maybe another Trevor Horn album; and various projects with Oliver Wakeman (maybe a tour, but more probably a release).

Can we put any firmer timelines or expectations on some of those? We know Yes have been working on a new album for a while and it is now expected in 2025. Can we narrow down that window? Probably not! An announcement early in the new year wouldn’t surprise me. There is a report that DBA are looking at a summer release for their next album. Management and everybody else will want some space (months) between releasing the new DBA and Yes albums, I’d guess. If DBA think a summer release is viable, that would fit with a Yes album coming in spring and an announcement in the new year.

On the other hand, the Yes Music Podcast in December said Paul K Joyce is "currently working on the next Yes album". If we interpret that literally, that means recording sessions haven’t finished, but are nearing the end. There were two orchestral recording sessions for Mirror to the Sky, held on 29 April and 11 May 2022. The album’s first single came 10 March 2023, with album release in May 2023. If Joyce was doing recording sessions in December 2024, that implies a release deep into the second half of 2025. If DBA think the summer is clear, does that mean a winter Yes release?

I don’t know. Yes run a tight ship and there are few leaks. If I had to bet, I’d guess spring, but time will tell if that’s wishful thinking.

Do we have any idea what the album might be like? It’s the same team as on Mirror to the Sky, including Joyce and I presume Schwartz. The band rushed straight from The Quest into Mirror to the Sky, leading to the shortest gap between two Yes albums since the odd circumstances of Keys to Ascension 2 and Open Your Eyes. But album number three in this series has taken longer. That’s partly to do with touring returning to normal levels after COVID-19. Does that mean something obviously a continuation of the previous two albums, or has more time meant more evolution? Howe has talked of writing six songs in late 2019 that were then all used over The Quest and Mirror to the Sky. With that body of work used up, does that imply something different for the new album?

Another Yes tour is almost inevitable. There have been rumours of a US tour in the first half of 2025. It may depend on when the album comes out.

We also have that new DBA album to look forward to. Before then, we’ve had a scattering of Asia dates already announced across two continents. I presume we will see more substantial touring; new singer/bassist Harry Whitley has talked about a West Coast US tour. Whitley has also said that the new line-up will be working on a new album, although his comments suggest they have not started writing yet, so that implies a release is going to be late 2025 or, more likely, into 2026.

Anderson has announced the release of a live album with the Geeks, Live – Perpetual Change, out in March 2025, and an associated US tour leg. They are clearly eager to make it over to Europe, but we’ve not seen any dates yet. While Anderson had initially spoken of not doing another album with the Geeks, the positive artistic and commercial reaction to True seems to have changed his mind and he has started on a second studio album with them. That might be out before the end of 2025 if they get their skates on, although again I expect 2026 is more likely. But Anderson also has multiple other projects in play. Before True’s success took over his plans, he had seemed more focused on Zamran, hoping to release a Chapter One in 2025, and staging “Chagall” as a musical. Work has been continuing off and on towards a second Anderson/Stolt album and Anderson has mooted a 2025 release for that too. 1000 Hands: Chapter Two appears close to completion. It’s an extraordinary flowering of creativity to have so many projects lined up. The albums all seem plausible for 2025, although the finances of stage musicals are much harder to arrange.

Most obviously missing from this list is Trevor Rabin. He had talked of another solo album to follow Rio and possible touring, but it’s been a while since we’ve heard anything.

All the above does presume a certain degree of geopolitical stability. In recent years, COVID-19 was world-changing, while the Russian invasion of Ukraine impacted some eastern European touring plans (although of course the effects on the music industry were minor compared to the wider tragedies of both). Hopefully 2025 won’t bring anything similar, but if Donald Trump actually went through with a US invasion of Panama or Greenland, that would probably mean no UK-based bands visiting the US, while his tariff proposals and any retaliation by other countries could also hit touring plans.

Anderson: app or album?

Jon Anderson is a visionary. You can't be a Yes fan and dismiss Anderson's central role as an ideas man in the band. So if Anderson has some seemingly crazy idea for how to do things, I think it's worth stopping and thinking about what he's proposing.

Much of what Anderson has been proposing recently has been a move away from albums. This goes back to when he was last in Yes. After disappointing sales for Magnification, Anderson talked of leaving the album format and presenting new music in other forms. Back then, he talked of doing that live and then in DVDs, as he did with his own music and the "Tour of the Universe" DVD.

But in recent years, he's focused on new media. There were ideas for a Zamran video game. And now, Anderson talks about releasing new music in an app that allows you to explore a virtual world.

So, it's an idea. Hard to know exactly what it would mean until we see and hear it. But I'm unconvinced so far. I'm a fan of the music and what technology has done is made it easier and more convenient to hear music. Making the music only available through an app goes against that trend. It makes it harder to access the music, constraining how you can hear it. However, I wondered what you all think, and so I ran a poll on the Where Are They Now? site, asking, "Jon Anderson has discussed various ways of releasing new music. Which would you prefer he do..."

(Physical) album releases: 88 (77%)
Individual pieces of music released digitally: 11 (10%)
New material included in live DVDs: 6 (5%)
Release regular new music as part of an app where you interact with a virtual world: 5 (4%)
Other: 4 (4%)

(The 'others' included one suggestion for high resolution digital releases, and three comments about the music rather than the format.)

As I suspected, us fans are a conservative bunch when it comes to formats. Three quarters want old fashioned album releases (as would be my preference too). The app idea got a mere 4% support. Maybe we'd all be wowed by whatever app Anderson can come up with, but it doesn't look like a strong marketing position to start by annoying 95% of your consumers. Do an app, but stick the material on a CD while you're at it, please...?

2010: A preview

Yes have just begun their February tour leg and we're into the second month of 2010. So what will the year bring?

Plans for the first half of the year are becoming clearer. Chris Squire has finished recording for his collaboration with Steve Hackett, with Hackett expected to complete work on the album this month. Steve Howe, likewise, appears to have finished recording for the new Asia album, Omega, with Wetton and Downes completing work on it also this month for a release in April. No release date has been given for 'Squackett' but around April seems plausible.

Yes, as I said, are back on tour, and that takes up most of February. There has been much fan angst about when they might record their promised new album. Howe is busy most of March touring with his Trio (and we can make a guess that an expected live release will come out around the same time) and then he's back touring with Asia April-May and July-August. We know Asia are taking time off from September (with Wetton talking of doing a solo album then), so the fear was any significant progress on a Yes album would be delayed until then. However, in a couple of recent interviews, Squire has said that they have been individually working on ideas after his, Howe and O. Wakeman's preliminary meeting in October 2009, and that they will start serious work, seemingly studio work, in March, straight after February touring. In one interview, he talked of taking "a good shot at it" in March/April/May and a possible release before the end of the year.

This clearly clashes with some of Howe's touring commitments. That said, Howe does not need to be present at every day of recording. There's not much of March free, but his announced Asia commitments are not until near the end of April. Depending on what further Asia touring is announced, he may also have more than a month between Japanese and North American dates. That could mean an album is finished before summer gets going, leaving the latter half of the year for Yes to tour in support. On the other hand, it is perhaps wise not to be too optimistic about progress: Howe has previously described Squire as speaking too early on plans.

If Yes are busy through the first half of the year, that ties up White, David and O. Wakeman too. If there are breaks in activity... well, David has talked of a new Mystery album, while O. Wakeman has a backlog of solo projects and other collaborations. There have been hints of some kind of re-launch for the White band, who have been mostly inactive since their 2006 debut.

Away from the current band members, Rick Wakeman has announced some solo dates for the year. He's had two recent new release (Always with You and the 3CD Past, Present and Future), but live work remains focused on nostalgia and he continues to try to organise big extravaganzas like last year's The Six Wives of Henry VIII at Hampton Court.

Yoso, albeit not with that name, was to have begun at the beginning of 2009 with the planned Bobby Kimball/CIRCA: tour of Italy, cancelled at the last minute. The band gestated through most of 2009, but an album is now recorded and expected early this year, and three lives dates were played with the obligatory DVD also expected early this year. Sherwood is optimistic about substantial touring, a breakthrough CIRCA: never managed.

Some indications of the long-awaited new Trevor Rabin solo album emerged last year. Will it finally come to fruition in 2010? Can we detect a slight slowing down in his film score work, which would fit with solo album activity?

2010 will be the first year without a new Bill Bruford release and the second year of his retirement. Futher lectures have already been announced, as have further re-releases.

The biggest question mark over what 2010 might bring is around Jon Anderson. Talk last year of a possible reconciliation with Yes did not last long, but it remains a possibility. Rick Wakeman has talked of doing a US tour of his duo show with Anderson and an album release, which has been on hold since 2006.

Following a band closely, one comes to a conclusion that musical talent is not enough. Any act or solo artist needs more than talent, more than the music, to be able to reach a substantial audience. For example, while I think Peter Banks retains the talent, I am not expecting him to do much in 2010 given these last few years he has struggled to find a context in which he is able to play to an audience, live or on record.

Is Jon Anderson in a similar position? Multiple collaborations keep popping up on MySpace and the occasional new solo piece appears as a digital single or bonus track, but the major statement album that fans want, like the long-awaited Zamran sequel to Olias..., remains elusive. Other projects get mentioned and never appear; for example, the Dream Dancing collaboration with Fritz Heede was expected on Voiceprint in 2009 but appears caught in limbo, as do further volumes in The Lost Tapes series.

The music business is in a poor state at present, with sales dropping year on year and still few effective models for the digital age. The music business also remains largely hostile to prog. Are those conditions and, of course, Anderson's own health problems holding him back? On the other hand, occasional grumbles from his numerous online collaborators suggest perhaps the lack of releases has more to do with Anderson's temperament.

What Anderson has released of late has been pretty poor to my ears. "Music is God" and "Never Ever", both available on iTunes, are some of his worst work for me. Yet some recent collaborations appearing on Facebook and elsewhere sound much stronger, and the flurry of activity around these perhaps suggests that 2010 will finally see some major projects appear.

Henry