Trevor Rabin's Jacaranda

This is not the album I expected, but it is a testament to Trevor Rabin that he has delivered something not merely good, but also surprising. Highlights on the album like "Anerley Road" and "Market Street" have Rabin departing from his past rock or film score work, turning instead to jazz influences. There is a restless energy to the music, with arrangements and instrumentation rarely staying still for more than a few bars. Pieces that are four or five minutes long feel epic in terms of the ground they've covered. The usual jazz approach would be a statement of the melody, various solos based on that melody, before a final re-statement. Being close to a one-man band (he plays nearly everything save drums -- full details are on Where Are They Now?), Rabin instead varies instrumentation and arrangements as he explores the core theme of each piece, producing some of the best work of his career.

There is also an eclecticism to the album. There are slower tempo numbers: for example, penultimate track "Zoo Lake" is like an old-time jazz ballad. The short "Spider Boogie" opener does bluegrass. Album finisher "Gazania" is typical of the album's variety: a classical guitar skeleton, with bluegrass interludes and strong piano sections.

Expectant fans have been looking back to Can't Look Away, Rabin's last solo album, or Talk, his last significant non-score project, as possible reference points. The closest we get to those is "Through the Tunnel" and "Me and My Boy", where a heavier rock sound echoes pieces like "Sludge" or "Cinema". Yet we're 18 years from Talk; 23 years from Can't Look Away. 18 years before Talk, Rabin was still in Rabbitt, and given the change from Rabbitt to Talk, we shouldn't be wary of as much change again. Ironically, tracks like "Storks Bill Geranium Waltz" or "Anerley Road" may appeal to fans of the Steve Howe Trio or Time more than fans of Talk or 90125.

What we have heard from Rabin in recent years is a vast amount of film score work, which you could be forgiven for forgetting about. Until, that is, the album completely changes direction with track 6 and the cinematic "Rescue", based on his work for the film "The Guardian". The next track, "Killarney 1 & 2", brings us back towards the style of the rest of the album in its arrangement, if not its instrumentation for this is mostly a solo piano piece on what is mostly a guitarist's album. It is worth noting that the keyboards throughout the album are strong.

Trevor Rabin's Jacaranda has been some time coming, with Rabin busy with film scoring and supporting his son Ryan as his career gets going. Ryan drums on two tracks here, including, as the name suggests, "Me and My Boy". The cover art is by Hannah Hooper, who plays keys in Ryan's band Grouplove. But with the album almost here, Rabin has made some positive comments about the possibility of touring. [9 May: correction of Rabin's comments] If this comes off, it will be a show worth catching.

While I'm here... "Sea of Smiles", the single from Squackett, out on limited edition on 21 April. It's a big, joyful, catchy piece of music: I love it. While there is nice instrumental work, this is melodic rock more than prog. And it feels more 'ackett' than 'Squ': this would not have sounded out of place on Hackett's Beyond the Shrouded Horizon, although Squire's bass and singing are more to the fore than there.

Yesmen outside Yes: poll part 1

With so many people having been through Yes over so many years, it is no surprise that some of them have worked together outside Yes. There are numerous albums with two Yesmen together, including long-running acts like Asia and CIRCA:.

On rarer occasions, we've had three or even more Yesmen on an album. So many Yesmen together obviously attracts the attention of the Yes fan. The results of such collaborations can be like finding a lost Yes song, as with "Spring - Song of Innocence" on Alan White's solo album, Ramshackled, with Anderson and Howe guesting. They can give us something akin to a Yes from an alternate history, like with Chris Squire's Fish Out of Water. Sometimes, the interest is precisely because we hear the Yesmen in a very different context, as with Steve Howe's Portraits of Bob Dylan (both Anderson and Downes guest). And sometimes such albums are just curios, good answers to trivia questions. There are three Yesmen on Frankie Goes to Hollywood's Liverpool (Horn, Howe and Rabin), but I can't detect two of them!

So, which of these albums - albums with three or more Yesmen together outside Yes - are worth getting and which aren't? What do you think? Thus the topic of our latest poll on the Where Are They Now? front page. The poll is split into three. First up are the 1970s albums, most of which came about when the band members guested on each other's albums. We'll move on to part 2, the 1980s and 1990s soon.

What prompted this topic is that there are three forthcoming albums featuring three or more Yesmen each, all on Cleopatra Records.

Cleopatra Records have a business model for tribute albums: pick well-known songs by a well-known act, and record them using an array of guest stars. The result makes for good promo. Keep recording costs low and they sell enough copies to make a profit.

The problem is that the result is often less than the sum of the parts. There have been some good tracks on past Cleopatra tribute albums - I think of Keith Emerson doing Led Zeppelin's "Black Dog", in particular - but most of them have been a disappointment to my ears. For all the big guest star names, their input seems often to be through a quickly done session, with the heavy-lifting done by someone else.

That someone else is often Billy Sherwood, which is why many of these albums end up with multiple Yesmen guesting, including tributes to The Beatles (Abbey Road), Zeppelin (Led Box) and Pink Floyd (notably Back Against the Wall and Return to the Dark Side of the Moon).

But Brian Perrera, head honco at Cleopatra, has been experimenting with the formula. Instead of tribute albums by various guest stars, Cleopatra are now doing covers albums led by a particular artist or act, although still with multiple guest stars as well. Last year we had William Shatner (yes, as in Captain Kirk) doing a sci-fi covers album with Howe and Moraz guesting. Forthcoming is another covers album by Anglo-German prog band Nektar, with Howe, Wakeman and Downes guesting. (Moraz was also billed as to appear on the Nektar album, but isn't on the final track list.)

And now we've got The Prog Collective. Same array of guest stars on a base by Billy Sherwood, but instead of covers, we have original material by Sherwood. At the same time as Sherwood has been working on this, he's also been working on a Supertramp tribute album. Both albums have many of the same guests, with Squire, Wakeman, Kaye and Banks confirmed for both, and Downes on at least The Prog Collective.

We await release dates for all three, but Sherwood's two projects have been delivered to the label and the Nektar album also seems close. And beyond these, Dave Kerzner's Sonic Elements project is offering a very different approach to doing covers: first EP, XYZ—A Tribute to Rush, features Sherwood too, with further Yesmen lined up for later releases. Whether these will be successful experiments or not, time will tell, but it adds to an interesting year already including high-profile releases like Squackett's A Life Within a Day, Trevor Rabin's Jacaranda and Producers' Made in Basing Street.

Poll: Best Yes-related album of the second half of 2011

The second half of 2011 saw the release of several major Yes-related projects: albums with multiple Yesmen (up to three for Raised in Captivity), significant solo releases, new collaborations and a variety of guest appearances, including on an album by a former starship captain. This was also the period, of course, that saw the release of the first new studio album from Yes for over a decade: namely Fly from Here.

However, I decided to keep this poll for the Yes-related releases and leave Fly from Here out. Otherwise, I thought Fly from Here would just swamp everything else. I also decided to include two non-album releases: Jon Anderson's "Open" is a digital-only, one-track single, although at just under 21 minutes in length, it's more like an EP, so I felt it should be included. I was already including King Friday's (physical) EP. Tony Kaye's "End of Innocence" is over twice as long as "Open", nearly 46 minutes, but was put up for free on YouTube. While previous polls in this series have not included tracks made available on a streaming basis, the magnitude of Kaye's opus was such that I felt it warranted inclusion.

110 people voted, and the results were:

1. Jon Anderson: "Open" - 25 (23%)
2. Steve Hackett: Beyond the Shrouded Horizon (w/ Squire) - 21 (19%)
3. Steve Howe: Time - 12 (11%)
4. Anderson Wakeman: The Living Tree In Concert Part One - 10 (9%)
5. Levin - Torn - White (w/ White) - 9 (8%)
6. John Wetton: Raised in Captivity (w/ Sherwood, Kaye, Downes) - 8 (7%)
7= CIRCA:: And So On (w/ Sherwood, Kaye) - 6 (5%)
7= Glass Hammer: Cor Cordium (w/ Davison) - 6 (5%)
9. Billy Sherwood: What was the Question? - 4 (4%)
10. Tony Kaye: "End of Innocence" - 3 (3%)
11= William Shatner: Seeking Major Tom (w/ Howe, Moraz) - 2 (2%)
11= King Crimson: Collectors' Club/DGM Live releases (w/ Bruford) - 2 (2%)
13= Kurt Michaels: Soaring Back to Earth (w/ Sherwood) - 1 (1%)
13= Flaming Row: Elinoire (w/ Sherwood) - 1 (1%)
15. King Friday: "Let the Song Begin" (w/ O. Wakeman) - 0 (0%)

There were no votes for 'other'.

The voting was very close and watching the results come in as exciting as the Republican primary contests! Anderson's "Open" and Beyond the Shrouded Horizon (with Squire guesting on several tracks and a recycled GTR riff earning Howe co-writing credits) were neck-and-neck until a final voting spurt from "Open". Throughout, third place was hotly contested between Time and The Living Tree In Concert Part One, with several albums in contention for 5th.

I'm taking these close results as an indication of a very strong period of Yes-related releases. I think any of the top 5 here could have won the previous poll had it been released in the first half of the year. And these were all on top of Fly from Here!

6th place went to John Wetton's Raised in Captivity (which I gave a bad review earlier). Between that, the latest CIRCA: album and his latest solo album, Sherwood's releases clocked up 18 votes. Add in two guest appearances, and he gets 20 votes, only one less than Shrouded Horizon.

Just before I put this poll up came the news that Jon Davison was now singing with Yes. I, thus, included in the poll his last album with Glass Hammer, Cor Cordium. The album scored a respectable 6 votes.

There's already plenty of projects lined up for the first half of this year, including Trevor Rabin's new solo album, Jacaranda, and the debut from Producers, Made in Basing Street. Given the success in this poll of Beyond the Shrouded Horizon, we can expect Squackett to be welcomed enthusiastically.

Jon Anderson has now won the last three of these polls, with The Living Tree (with Wakeman, of course), Survival and Other Stories and now "Open". Could he make it four out of four? He's talked of working on a follow-up to "Open", another long-form piece, and he's also talked about an album release including "Open", and about a sequel to Survival and Other Stories, which conclusively won best Yes-related album of the first half of 2011. However, Anderson's plans often appear rather fluid and when a next release will appear is unknown. He's also now talking about an album and tour with Marco Sabiu in 2013, which would be a disappointing change of direction for me.

DPRP Poll 2011

The popular Dutch Progressive Rock Page website hold an annual poll; 581 voted in the latest. After a strong performance in the Prog poll, Yes have done well again. Fly from Here is 4th in Best Album, behind Steven Wilson's Grace for Drowning, Dream Theater's A Dramatic Turn of Events and Opeth's Heritage. Steve Hackett's Beyond the Shrouded Horizon (on which Chris Squire guests) came 8th.

Blackfield's Welcome to My DNA, with a track produced by Trevor Horn, was 16th. Cor Cordium, the latest album from Glass Hammer, with Jon Davison on vocals, was 17th. The next appearance by a Yes man is Mars Hollow's The World in Front of Me, produced by Billy Sherwood, at 57th, with nothing else Yes-related in the top 100.

DPRP have a category for Best Individual Track. "Fly from Here" came 4th after Dream Theater's "Breaking All Illusions", Steven Wilson's "Raider II" and Pendragon's "This Green and Pleasant Land". "Fly from Here Pt. 2 - Sad Night at the Airfield" then, on its own, came 23rd. Steve Hackett's "Turn This Island Earth", co-credited to Steve Howe and with Squire on bass, was 38th equal. No other Yes connections in the top 50. Amalgamating over multiple tracks, Yes was the 5th best performing in this category; with Steve Wilson top.

Fly from Here also won Best Artwork, with Cor Cordium 6th and Beyond the Shrouded Horizon, 13th. "Union Live" was 7th Best DVD; Rush's "Time Machine - Live in Cleveland 2011" won. For these categories and everything below, I'm listing anything Yes-related in the top 20, and there was nothing Yes-related in the top 20 Best Concerts. Levin Torn White were 9th equal in the Best Newcomer category.

Mirroring what happened in the Prog poll, Yes and the release of Fly from Here won both Best Happening and Biggest Disappointment. Also in the Biggest Disappointment category were Welcome to My DNA at 4th, and, in 11th equal, Anderson and/or R. Wakeman not rejoining Yes, and poor live performances by Yes.

In terms of individual performances (which had to be based on material released in 2011), Dream Theater were the clear winners, with John Petrucci Favourite Guitarist, Jordan Rudess Favourite Keyboard Player and Mike Mangini Favourite Drummer. Howe was 5th Favourite Guitarist, with Hackett 2nd. Downes was 10th equal for Favourite Keyboard Player, but not a single vote for Rick Wakeman! Alan White was equal 14th for Favourite Drummer.

As in the Prog poll, Benoît David beat Jon Anderson in the Favourite Vocalist category: David was 5th, new Yes vocalist Jon Davison was 14th equal, while Anderson was just 41st equal. Steven Wilson won. Chris Squire was 2nd for Favourite Bass Player, behind Karmakanic's Jones Reingold. Tony Levin was 12th equal in the category for his work on Levin Torn White, and then 17th equal for his work on A Scarcity of Miracles (by Jakszyk, Fripp & Collins).

Poll: What are we looking forward to in 2012?

Last year was a dramatic one for the band with a line-up change and their first new album in a decade. There were highs - Fly from Here sold well, shows at the beginning of the European tour leg saw the band energised and enjoying playing their new material - but there were lows - the joint tour with Styx was not the band at its best, and the European leg ended prematurely with David suffering health problems.

2012 looked as though it would be much calmer: roughly, work on the new Asia album in the first quarter of the year, some sort of touring by Yes (broadly playing the same set as in Europe) in Q2 and Q3, before Asia then tours and celebrates their 30th anniversary in Q4. That may still be the broad outline of the year, but the rollercoaster has started again with Jon Davison coming in as new vocalist, replacing Benoît David.

Mostly held before the Davison news, our latest poll asked what you were most looking forward to in 2012. We had 171 votes and the results are:

Squackett: 49 (27%)
Yes continuing to tour: 37 (21%)
New Anderson/Wakeman: 23 (13%)
Trevor Rabin's Jacaranda: 18 (10%)
New Mystery album: 11 (6%)
Next Jon Anderson solo project: 10 (6%)
Asia 30th anniversary: 8 (4%)
The Buggles return: 6 (3%)
Producers/The Path of Sydney Arthur: 4 (2%)
Journey to the Centre of the Earth live: 3 (2%)
New Billy Sherwood projects: 2 (1%)
Oliver Wakeman's Cultural Vandals: 0 ( 0%)
Other: 8 (4%)
   ... of which, Anderson/Wakeman/Rabin: 5 (3%)

So the voting was very spread, but a clear favourite in the long-awaited Chris Squire/Steve Hackett collaboration. Unlike some Yesmen, releases by Squire (outside Yes) are uncommon and perhaps that's why they attract more interest. Steve Hackett, of course, is well known in his own right, and now has an impressive tally of Yesmen collaborations: obviously with Bill Bruford in Genesis and Steve Howe in GTR, but also Geoff Downes, Trevor Horn, Rick Wakeman, Billy Sherwood and Tony Levin. Squire's guest appearances on Hackett's last two solo albums have whetted the appetite for Squackett.

Yes continuing to tour are second. Further Anderson/Wakeman work is your third choice. 5 people voted for the Anderson/Wakeman/Rabin project, and I presume many more would have had I explicitly included it as an option in the poll. However, the latest reports suggest the project is delayed again and we won't see any activity until 2013, and plenty are sceptical we'll ever see it.

However, Rabin's new album, Jacaranda, is finished and now expected May on Varèse Sarabande. Fifth choice, and above Anderson's next solo project, is the new Mystery album, largely finished, but awaiting a release date. So some Yes fans have clearly taken Benoît David to heart.

Anderson's next solo project gets 10 votes. The two Horn projects expected this year (although details remain unclear) get 10 together: 6 for The Buggles, 4 for Producers.

The Asia anniversary is only in seventh. I was also surprised to see Rick Wakeman's next live extravaganza, this time for Journey to the Centre of the Earth, so far down given the excitement there was around The Six Wives of Henry VIII a couple of years ago.

Since the poll, we've also had news of a possible Rick Wakeman/Tony Levin/Ian Paice project; more details of Billy Sherwood's plans, including guest appearances by Wakeman and Levin on a Supertramp tribute album; and there's the forthcoming Nektar covers album with Howe, Downes, Wakeman and Moraz all guesting.

Benoît beats Jon

Day 5 of the latest Yes line-up change, and the twists and turns have continued. Anderson has said he wasn't asked back and denies any regular communication with Squire: not good news for those hoping for a reunion.

But I want to break away from the David/Davison transition for a moment, because the latest issue of Classic Rock Presents... Prog is out, with the results of their readers' poll. And Yes have done very well: 3rd in Best Band (behind Opeth and Dream Theater, but above the likes of Rush); and 2nd in Best Album (behind Steven Wilson's Grace for Drowning, but above Opeth's Heritage, or albums from Dream Theater and Van der Graaf Generator). However, showing how Yes divides opinion, they also win the Non-Event category.

Perhaps the most notable result in the poll, and the one that will enrage many, is that Benoît David came higher than Jon Anderson in the Best Male Vocalist category. David was 8th, Anderson, 9th and ex-Rick Wakeman vocalist Damian Wilson, 10th. Opeth's Mikael Åkerfeldt won, followed by Pain of Salvation's Daniel Gildenlöw, Steven Wilson and Peter Gabriel.

Anne-Marie Helder, who recently sang on Geoff Downes' Electronica, won Best Female Vocalist. Steve Howe was 3rd in Best Guitarist, after John Petrucci and Steve Hackett. No close Yes connections in the Best Drummer category, won by Gavin Harrison over Mike Portnoy. Squire was 2nd in Best Bassist after Geddy Lee, with Tony Levin coming 8th. Rick Wakeman was 2nd in Best Keyboard Player after Jordan Rudess; Downes came 8th.

The "Union Live" DVD was 9th in Best DVD; Rush's "The Time Machine" won. The King Crimson remasters were 4th in the Best Reissue category. Pink Floyd's Wish You were Here won.

Steven Wilson unsurprisingly won Prog Icon 2011, followed by Gabriel, Portnoy, Neal Morse and then Hackett. Jon Anderson was 10th.

Permanent change

Day 3 of the new line-up. Noise11, who are supporting Yes's Australian tour, carried an interview with Squire this morning. In it, Squire confirms that the change from David to Davison is permanent (or as permanent as anything in the world of Yes).

Davison was only confirmed shortly before the news was announced. That announcement came first via the Japanese promoter, but was on YesWorld's Facebook account in hours, and now this further clarification from Squire. This is all much, much faster than past line-up changes: think back to when Sherwood or Khoroshev left. Yes have entered the information age. And yet some fans are still complaining that we haven't been told enough, and we haven't been told quick enough!

Some further observations on the fan reaction online... Many have asked why the band didn't just cancel dates in April. I don't think most people appreciate the very considerable costs in cancelling a tour at this time. Journalist Jon Kirkman summed it up well on Yesfans.com:

"Take it from me having worked in the industry for more than 35 years you just cannot blow out a whole period of touring without massive problems. The tickets for this tour will have been on sale since the dates were announced and more importantly the deposits will have been paid to the band. Many bands need these deposits to set the tour up etc so short of death and even the Who toured following the death of John Entwistle then the tour will go ahead. Touring at this level just can't be postponed like a pub gig. There is a lot at stake"

What does all this tell us about Yes? The main conclusion that I draw from events is that Howe, Squire and White aren't going to stop. They are the core of the band and they will keep going, come what may. We've seen other bands, like Journey and Starship, which have gone through multiple vocalists. Yes may now find stability with Davison, but if something happens to Davison, they will find someone else.

So, farewell Benoît David. He was in the band for longer than Oliver Wakeman, Igor Khoroshev, Patrick Moraz, Peter Banks or, so far, Geoff Downes (adding his two periods together). (Tell me if I've got my maths wrong on any of those!) However, Moraz and O. Wakeman are the only ones who have appeared on as few or fewer studio albums (and even Moraz had his 1975/6 solo album appearances). I look forward to the new Mystery album, currently being mixed and expected this year, and hopefully many more after that.