Search - Yes :: Word Is Live (W/Dvd)

An Official Bootleg.A mixed bag in sound & performance

Philip A.Cohen | Bay Harbor Islands, Florida United States | 08/27/2005

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Disc one open with two poor sounding mono BBC concert tracks by the original Anderson/Banks/Kaye/Squire/Bruford line-up;musically good,but they sound like they've been taped off the airwaves.Sound quality improves for two Swedish Radio concert tracks recorded shortly after Steve Howe joined the group.Then you get 4 excellent(mono enhanced for stereo) Live tracks from London by the Anderson/Howe/Kaye/Squire/Bruford line-up including "Yours is No Disgrace","I've Seen All Good People",an embryonic 15 minute version of Paul Simon's "America",and a 10 minute rendition of an obscure Rascals tune "It's Love".The group was wise to wait(and add Rick Wakeman) and fine tune the arrangement of "America" before recording it in the studio.The box skips over the 1972-74 period(covered bythe "Yessongs" set),and Disc 2 is almost entirely professionally recorded full-fidelity material by the Anderson/Howe/Wakeman/Squire/White & Anderson/Howe/Moraz/Squire/White line-ups.The only mono track on Disc 2 is "Sweet Dreams",nicely remastered from the unreleased in America "Live at QPR" video(It's been offered on Japanese Laserdisc or spread across two volumes on Hong Kong DVD).Many of the disc two tracks are unreleased selections from the same concerts heard on "Yesshows" 2-CD set.Disc three opens promisingly with two more selections from those concerts,but goes downhill because of sound quality.Three soundboard cassette tracks from a concert by the Horn/Downes/Squire/Howe/White line-up reveal two previously unheard songs,but the source has murky sound,a bad mix and obvious cassette pitch flutter.The set closes with selections recorded on a Westwood One radio concert("Big Generator" tour,I think) by the Anderson/Rabin/Squire/Kaye/White line-up.Good performances marred by a very reverberant mix.If this were a bootleg,we would be raving about it,but I have higher sound quality expectations from Rhino."

Gems Among The Glass

Howie | United States | 08/25/2005

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Well, it's finally here: the long-anticipated "new" live Yes set. The hype was superlative. It caught us hoping beyond hope for those live Yes moments we have heretofore only wished were laid down for posterity:



"Sound Chaser" with Moraz.



"America" with Bruford.



Yet on first listen one gets the sense that this is a box full of colored glass for the masses, with a few diamonds mixed in for the shrewd investor.



One shakes one's head at times and wonders aloud, "Is THIS the Yes that once graced those hallowed halls of yesteryear?"



Well, Yes.



And, No.



Truly, there are moments to marvel at: Disc 1's set with Bruford, Kaye, and Howe is astonishing.



"America" rolls along like an art-rock juggernaut, propelled by Mr. Bill's frenetic stylings (a foreshadowing of his performance years later as a Genesis sideman). It's only after the first 6 minutes have gone by that it hits you: Yes didn't just record this on a whim as a single with Wakeman! They were playing this FOR YEARS with Kaye!



And Kaye gives the song hair!



Wow.



And then we stumble upon "Sound Chaser". The lead-in track to disc two, "Apocalypse", is brilliant live Yes as only Yes can do, but "Sound Chaser" sounds like it was cut by a high-school band on acid.



The guitar solo is great, but the sound is appalling. The desire to share this magic with others, pointing and shouting, "See! See!" is severaly tempered here; it would be almost embarrassing to play this for friends.



You would find yourself sorely tempted to apologize, "They're really much better than this. Really."



This set is for die-hards only, although the packaging, liner notes, et al, lead one to believe that the intention here was to reel in a new layer of fandom for the band.



The packing is slick, although the genius who decided that discs one and two can "nest" together - thus resulting in scratches for both discs over time - should have his head examined.



The artwork is vintage "wimpy" Dean. We've seen much better from Roger - the US AND THEM, SYMPHONIC PINK FLOYD artwork is masterful. Why do recent Yes albums always get Roger's has-beens?



And - to be honest - while most of the stories were interesting, it's time Bill Martin was retired from penning Yes notes. It's amazing how many words the man can use and still not say anything.



So, bring your jewelers eyepiece to the table and prepare to sift through the cheap stuff. You'll find some truly valuable pieces here. It's just unfortunate that the cost is so high, both in dollars and in time spent searching.





-"

Be careful what you wish for

John Connor | USA | 08/24/2005

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Yes, it seems, just did not seem keen to keep great archives of their shows over the years. This box set looks fantastic on paper, 3 full CD's covering '71-'88, but should really be called `The best of Steve Howe's personal collection of live tapes that don't always sound the best'. This set is really for Yes live completeists only, not for the casual live Yes fan. Sound ranges from mono, OK sound to pretty darn good, but not perfect sound. Selection misses a lot of the more popular songs (on purpose though as not to repeat what is already out there) which is fine for the completeist, but not the casual fan.



The 2 BBC tracks are good mono, as are the 2 Gothenburg tracks. The London '71 tracks are gems. They are stereo, but it's hard to tell if they are a mono source with some echo added or not. At the beginning a capella start of Your Move, is that really the halls reverb, or a little studio after effects? Don't know for sure, but a great set of song never the less.



Sweet Dreams on side 2 is a lousy mono version from the QEP show. I do not have the DVD's, but the sound quality on those are routinely panned, and this is right up there with it.



The rest of disk 2 and the first 2 songs of disk 3 show the late `70's Yes akin to the Yesshows album. There are no repeats to the Yesshows album (save for Time and a Word) so, with it, you get the bulk of songs performed in the late `70's. If you expected better quality then the very good but not excellent Yesshows, don't look here. The quality on all this material is very good, but it does sound like it came from old, improperly stored, tapes, cleaned up as best as possible. Ironically the one overlap on both, Detroit '76, sound better by a smige on the re-mastered Yesshows CD! But overall it's as good as what is out there. Soundchaser and Awaken are great highlights. The Big Medley suffers from the too high in the mix Chris Squire (a problem with some of Yesshows), for Long Distance/Fish it is awesome, best Fish I have heard, but ruins Perpetual Change a bit. The Tormato songs are slightly hissy, but great quality if you are a fan of that often panned album.



What I was really looking forward to was getting great live versions of the 2 unreleased, plus best song from the excellent, often overlooked Drama tour. These 3 tracks were broadcast on the radio in what is universally agreed as one of the worst sounding radio broadcasts ever done. I know I recorded it on cassette. Sounds like Steve did too, as these are not much of a quality improvement. Mostly mono sounding and muddled. What a shame. Guess I have to stick to my Return to Drama CD, a quite good, complete audience version of Boston Gardens (not MSG as stated on the cover) show. Looks like that is as good as I am going to get from the Drama tour.



What is really weird is the Houston cuts from '88. Another radio broadcast I recorded live to cassette. These tracks sound worse then my version?!? It's like they ran all the tracks through a reverb unit to make then sound more `live'. Only muddles the whole thing. If you want Rabin Yes, wait for the (eventual) 9021Live DVD release and hope they don't screw up the sound on it! (Don't buy the Brazilian DVD as its stereo and 5.1 mix come from a crappy mono source!)



For the casual Yes fan looking for live Yes, skip this and get the San Luis Obispo shows (Keys to Ascension) which has the classic lineup and fantastic sound quality and more of the classic songs (yes, doctored in the studio a bit, but...). This set is really only for the die hard Yes live completeist.



Oh, it does come with a nice looking booklet, but it's just notables (like Greg Lake) and fans talking about Yes shows in general. No different the comments you can find on the Forgotten Yesterdays site. I would have liked a bit of in depth info on the actual recordings themselves. In fact for the for mentioned Drama tour there is one picture with no comments. Or something from the members themselves, which there is none.



Overall I was hoping for better, but grudgingly satisfied, knowing this is probably as good as I am going to get for a lot of the Yes live material.

"