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Episode 24 – ‘Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe’

CD purchased 1989 (Click to enlarge)

The twenty-fourth episode of the Yes Music Podcast featuring the quasi-Yes studio album, ‘Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe’.

  • Is this a Yes album and does it matter?
  • No Chris Squire, no Yes?
  • Should this have been a more permanent line up?

Listen and see if you agree with me then let me know by leaving a comment or contacting me via the different routes on the right hand side!

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What I missed out

I meant to mention the art work on ABWH but missed it out by mistake. It’s by Roger Dean and is, in fact, my favourite of his paintings. Clearly, this was an attempt to link the album as closely to 70s era Yes as possible – like the fact that live shows by ABWH were entitled, ‘An Evening of Yes Music Plus.’

Show links

Simmons electronic drums:
Tam-tam/gong:

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

9 replies on “Episode 24 – ‘Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe’”

Hello Kevin great show totally enjoyed this show especially due to the fact about the liner note’sand asking me why and who are all the extra people.I remembered when I went and seen this show we had great seats like 5th row center and it was the first time that I had ever seen Jon Anderson singing Time and Word as he was walking up the right side and I was like oh my he is a very small man I just was shocked.The show was awesome excellent point with Mr Bill and disco style drum kit I think I remember my former brother in law at the time worked for some music group here in the states and he a laser disc and that show that was before DVD we were still in the VHS stage of things when that CD came out and they made some videos from that album the one I remember the most was Lon Lost Brother Of Mine and they were decked out in like cave man / Indian style motif it was crazy funny I thought. I like the idea of guessing whats up next can’t wait always enjoy the show.Keep up the great work and we will see you next week
Regards
Paul

So glad you enjoyed the show, Paul. I’m very jealous that you got to see ‘An Evening of Yes Music Plus’. That must have been amazing.

The band have a history of unconventional videos don’t they?

I hope you’ll also enjoy this week’s show which I am enjoying putting together now.

I believe the Downes credit from Brother Of Mine is from Steve and Geoffrey writing together for Asia. I believe the song was originally called Barren Land. If you listen to Steve’s demos on his Homebrew CDs you will notice that most of the compositions from ABWH came from Steve’s demos. Most notably Brother Of Mine, Quartet and Order Of The Universe.

Thanks for the information, Scott. There’s quite a bit of an Asia vibe on the record, I think. I’ll make a point of searching out those Steve demos.

Hey Kevin. I’ve always assumed that the “ever piercing power play machine” was Jon’s reference to Yeswest which, I guess, he had just left, “with a vengeance”. I understand that making Big Generator wasn’t the most fulfilling experience for him!

Fascinating! Yes that makes a lot of sense – and even if it isn’t true, let’s pretend it is 😉 Thanks for the comment!

The reference IS to Jon not wanting to chase chart success any longer, be free of the tyranny of the “power play machine”. Quite a lot of the lyrics of the album pertain to this. I’ve got quite a lot of documentation of interviews from the time and this was a clear theme.

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