Categories
Episodes YMP Classic Feed

Dave Watkinson interview – Plaques, A Competition and Warriors in the basement! 344

Dave Watkinson with Simon Barrow at YES50
Dave Watkinson with Simon Barrow at YES50

Produced by Robert Nasir, Jeffrey Crecelius, Wayne Hall, Preston Frazier and Bill Govier

I catch up with Dave Watkinson in a secret Westminster location to talk about YES50, his article about The Warriors in Record Collector magazine and a competition connected with it. Listen for details of how to win yourself a copy of The Warriors live in concert CD!

Also, Mark and I discuss some current Yes topics as well as James Bond themes!

  • What’s going on in the basement?
  • Where is the Yes 50 plaque to be located?
  • Should Yes do a James Bond theme?

Listen to the episode then let us know what you think!

Vote for the 50th Anniversary Fan Convention in the Prog Awards!

Play For Chris 4 on the third anniversary of his passing:

[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsVTyiNr2SM[/embedyt]

Yes50Fanconvention.com is now live!

Geoff Bailie's New Yes Show!
Geoff Bailie’s New Yes Show!

Geoff Bailie’s brand new Yes show! https://progreport.com/radio/
Live at 7pm UK and 10am Eastern Time on Fridays! Then, get it on iTunes/Apple Podcasts.

Become a YMP Patron:

If you would like to support the Yes Music Podcast, there is a Patreon page where you can sign up.

The iOS and Android YMP apps are no longer available unless you have an old version still on your device.


Show notes and links

Get your Yes 50th Anniversary free pass here

Join the 50th Anniversary Facebook group here


Yes Music PodcastYMP patrons:

Robert Nasir | Jeffrey Crecelius | Preston Frazier | Bill Govier | Wayne Hall |

Joseph Cottrell | Michael O’Connor | Paul Tomei | Geoffrey Mason | Lobate Scarp | Fergus Cubbage | Steve Dill | Steve Scott

Paul Wilson | Jamie McQuinn | Miguel Falcão | Ken Fuller | David Pannell | Brian Sullivan | Joost Doesburg | Jeremy North | Tim Stannard | David Watkinson | Steve Roehr | Geoff Baillie | William Hayes | Terence Sadler | Neal Kaforey | Simon Barrow | Dave Owen |

Robert


Please subscribe!

If you are still listening to the podcast on the website, please consider subscribing so you don’t risk missing anything. You can subscribe with an RSS reader, with iTunes, with the iOS Podcasts app, via email updates, via www.stitcher.com on Spreaker.com or via Tunein.com.

Theme music

The music I use is the last movement of Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. This has been used as introduction music at many Yes concerts. My theme music is not take from a live concert – I put it together from the following two creative commons sources: thanvannispen and archive.org

3 replies on “Dave Watkinson interview – Plaques, A Competition and Warriors in the basement! 344”

Thanks for the interview with Dave Watkinson. The 5oth anniversary plaque idea is inspired, and I look forward to being there for the special unveiling. On the two-pence talking point… Should Yes attempt something consciously ‘commercial’ again ? The answer from me is a loud and categorical ‘no’. Whatever they do from here in, Yes should think hard about how to feed the artistic vision that has projected the band’s music forward so vibrantly over the years, and find ways of continuing to honour that. At its finest Yes hasn’t tried to satiate the corporate music machine, but rather to be true to itself first and foremost. If Yes music generated with integrity and soul happens to find a fresh audience and sells beyond expectations, fine. But trying for a ‘hit’ (I’m not going anywhere near that crazy movie idea!) has absolutely nothing to do with what makes Yes music great — though that isn’t to denigrate their more popular side, some of which has been fresh and original. As for the ‘commercial’ scene per se, I think it’s best summarised and deconstructed with forensic irony by Frank Zappa in a fabulous MTV interview from 1984, which I quoted in the chapter of my book looking at Yes ‘after prog’, and which references both the band and Trevor Horn (the latter not altogether flatteringly for his production glossing, though I think Frank would certainly have appreciated Art of Noise’s ‘The Seduction of Claude Debussy’). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eln3J6BxWN0

Excellent post Simon….I particularly like any reference to Frank Zappa ….whilst I am not an obsessive…I own 50 plus albums and numerous concerts on a hard drive. ….what fun. Jon Anderson has stated many times his admiration of Frank. …oh and Simon even mentioned the art of noise…….again I have many of their origin and rereleased recordings….very good.
I greatly enjoyed the interview with David and am looking forward to His Warriors book….and when it happens an updated Perpetual change.Many thanks David for organising the blue plague ….I intend to be there on 3August but my thirteen year old daughter who is a fan of emo/goth music ( which I like too) may be forced to attend too. To be fair she has listened to a lot of YES and says it’s pretty good, but she prefers listening to my Tool, A perfect circle and Queen music.well there is hope yet.
Well done everybody.

I too sometimes wonder if Yes knows its fan base well or cares/needs to. It’s like they’re always looking for the next audience. I can recall the interviews with Chris and Steve pre-production of “Heaven & Earth” and hinting of going for more of an AOR sound. Not a bad thing but it has often left their current fanbase adrift (since 1974 some would argue) I don’t know – they’re damned if they do, and damned if they don’t. I would suggest in this day and digital age they need to look really closely at the Big Big Train model. This is a band who really know their fan base. They know their moods and their interests. Bands can’t afford to see their fans walled off by record labels. Music buyers are a lot closer to these artists than ever before. It’s not so much “letting” these fans talk to you but more importantly listening to the murmur of the crowd. Tapping into and building from that. This is the digital hive age where one negative or disappointment reaction can spread out so damn quickly. I don’t mean you have to bend over backwards to please, but artists have the ability to know what their longstanding fans want generally, and maybe accommodate. And most of us dinosaurs think commercial is mostly crap anyway, so yeah, good luck with that Yes.

Leave a Reply to Simon Barrow Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

The maximum upload file size: 300 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video, document, spreadsheet, interactive, other. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop file here

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.