ABWH's "Dialogue": The Album That Never Was

[ACK!]

With the forthcoming release of Jon Anderson's Watching The Flags That Fly, we will finally get to hear some of the songs intended for the aborted second ABWH album Dialogue.

Has anyone heard these (or others) that were recorded for or intended to be recorded for this never-to-be-released album. Perhaps some Howe demos, etc?? I know some tracks were recorded for Dialogue - some of them ended up on Union and even Steve's solo album Turbulence.

If anyone has heard these songs, please let me know what you think of them.

http://g-ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/51KFquzcRNL._SS500_.jpg

2007 release containing over a dozen unreleased tracks recorded in 1990 by Jon Anderson, who is universally known as the vocalist with the legendary Progressive Rock band Yes. Watching The Flags Fly is a collection of songs recorded in 1990, intended for the second Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman & Howe album, some of which went on to become well known, such as 'Take the Water to the Mountain' which appeared on the Yes Union album. These songs have been traded amongst the large and devoted Yes and Jon Anderson fan base under the title 'Dialogue/We Make Believe' in much lower sound quality. The quality of this release has been improved for this release. 15 tracks. Voiceprint. <<

1. Hold You In My Arms
2. Take The Water To The Mountain
3. After The Storm
4. Watching The Flags That Fly
5. Touch Me Heaven
6. We Make Believe
7. To The Stars
8. Instrumental 1
9. Is It Love?
10. Axis Of Love
11. Instrumental 2
12. Santa Barbara
13. Tall Buildings
14. Looking For The Words
15. Try It Again

[True Believer]

I've had a copy of Dialogue for years - and always loved it. The new release is even better - sound is much improved. My favourite tracks are Santa Barbara, Hold me in your Arms, After the Storm, Watching the Flags that Fly. But I love it all.

Get it!

[relayeire]

It's decent stuff, but meant for serious fans. Mainly keyboards and vocals. Drum machines are used a good bit; though Bill used a lot of electronic drums at the time, these beats are too "steady" to be him. Not a whole lot of guitar. They are really demos, which they would present to the whole group for development. Apparently, that never happened.

The album actually sounds a lot like Page Of Life with Vangelis, which came out like a year later, and has some of the same songs. Beautiful vocals and keys, and a lot of programming, like Jon and Vangelis albums.

I like Tall Buildings. The chorus is clever: "Tall buildings got small people..." You just have to hear it for yourself. This is one of the official bootlegs that I would buy.

[Faceintheplace]

It's a pretty eccentric set of songs. I hear alot of Randy Newman influence in the lyrics. I understand Jon is a Randy fan. Tall Buildings especially seems to have a heavy Randy influence.

I like the music for To the Stars but not the lyrics so much. I think Axis of Love is the strongest song of the lot.

Steve did have a few ABWHII demos ready too. One called Big Love I've never heard, another Southern Accent I have in two versions. One with vocals, another that was insturmental off Quantum Guitar. I have the Quantum Guitar version on a free cd that came with an issue of Uncut. It sounds like the same backing track from the vocal demo with a new guitar part put over it that plays the vocal melody.

The Perfect Union boot also has some ABWH II demos. It has a few early versions of Without Hope. I might be wrong but it sounds like Wakeman and Howe were actually on them. One version is keyboard dominated and sounds very Wakeman. The other has very few keyboard parts like the Union album version but far more guitar parts and a middle 8 taken out of the Union version that gives the song more structure.

[Wakey's #1 Fan]

...another thread about it...I'm really interested in this album.
I googled the whole afternoon for the line-up of ABWH 2. And every page I found said that it was Jon, Rick, Steve and Bill on it.