Yes reviews

[Mr. Holland]

Lets act "Journalists". Put your review of this album in here......

[Ryan]

i haven't listened to it in a while, but i'll make an attempt at a review. its gonna suck though, because i suck at writing.

What a fine debut album we have here! The opening song, "Beyond and Before" starts off with a one note bass line (the most beautiful one-note bass-line i've ever heard mind you) and then the rest of the insterments kick in. The song has some very pretty vocal harmonys, and the lyrics are really good and poetic. Next is a Byrds cover song, "I see you". i think that its an improvement from the original, and YES puts there own unique styles into it. Yesterday and Today, the next number is a nice little love song; one of the few YES ever wrote. I mean, oh crap. I guess we don't know that yet because its 1969 and the album just came out. nevermind what i just said. the nest couple songs are pretty good too. "looking around has an excellent organ riff, harold land seems as if the lyrics have some important meaning. I'm not sure what the important meaning is, but i like songs that make me think. "there is no heart in harold laaaaaaand!" i like that line. "Every little thing" isn't to bad either. the next song is my least favorite on the album. I guess is it the first song the group has ever written, so you can't expect it to be fantastic. The lyrics are really fruity though. the last song makes up for it though. Survival is by far the best on the album by far. Its also the most prog, and i am a reviewer that actually really loves prog. What a great album.
Go out and buy it if you havn't allready.

k. there ya go.

[the'YES'kid]

I've always liked "Survival", but in general...

I had "Yes" in cassette back in 1994 and didn't liked it.

Then in Vynil & listened to it for a short while and couldn't stand it.

A few months ago recorded a few songs from (the new legal) Napster,
"I see you" & "Yesterday & Today".

For the last days I've been listening to them and I fell in love. I can't wait to buy the whole CD!

[Faceintheplace]

Beyond and Before - great opener, first album, track one, side one and it starts off with a speaker shattering bass figure from Chris Squire, the first of many over the years. Other Yes trademarks come to the fore early on, intricate arrangements with imaginative dynamics changes and flights of fancy lyrics. This tune dates back to Mable Greer's Toyshop, a transition band between The Syn and Yes and is a great example of the British psychadellic scene of the late 60s. At the end of the song yet another Yes tactic is used for the first time, complex music turning into acoustic simplicity, something they'd revisit later on songs like The Ancient and Homeworld.

I See You - a Byrds cover tune that Yes make their own. The song is about two or three times faster and more intense than the Byrds original. Bill Bruford's expert jazz drumming powers this great cover and a breakdown in the middle features a great frantic guitar solo from Peter Banks.

Yesterday and Today - a nice soft mellow love song from Jon. I always really liked the vibraphone work on this song.

Looking Around - a tight dynamic rocker. I always wish I could have seen Yes do this one live I bet Yes used to really lay into it. The new Rhino remaster adds in a few extra bars of music in the middle of the song which improves what was already a great little song.

Harold Land - once again, Yes trademarks start to assert themselves. The intro this one follows similar logic to Close to the Edge. Obviously not as hard or as intense but the arrangemnt style is similar. When I first heard this song in the late 80s the first Gulf War/ middle east crisis was going on so this song's anti-war sentiments really got to me. Excellent playing from Tony Kaye on this one. I love that organ figure thing that starts and ends the piece.

Every Little Thing - easily the best moment from Yes' first album. A short little pop song from an early Beatles album becomes an entirley different monster in Yes' hands. Licks from other Beatles songs fly all over the place, frenetic and frantic drums, bass, guitar and organ topped off by great vocal harmonies. Ace.

Sweetness - Yes' first single was perhaps the least charcteristic thing they could have put it, but its a nice little song anyway. This one reminds me a bit of This Boy and Yes it is by the Beatles. It has that same kind of sustained violin type sound from the guitar.

Survival - The first of Yes' ecological songs, once again great complex arrangements. Great prophetic lyrics at the end with "We're all going somewhere."

I was reading a guitar magazine some time last year and they had this album in an article about great under-rated guitar albums and very rightly so.