bataisflow
08-20-2002, 02:41 PM
Don't know if any of you guys saw this interview, but it's pretty interesting. It looks like they are hoping that they are gaining momentum and will be able to play Arena's in some of their bigger cities towards the end of the year. Here is hoping for 15 minute Standing O's at the Garden in December!
Squire recently sat down to discuss Wakeman's return and what he brings to the band, the aforementioned compilation, Yes' touring and recording plans, plus some particularly memorable concerts.
It Did Happen
Chris Squire: The idea [of Wakeman returning] has been percolating just under the surface for a while. We have discussed him coming back before, but then we wanted to go in and do that album with the orchestra -- [the] Magnification album. So, we wanted to do that first. We've been through that phase now and the timing seems good. Plus, he has a pretty busy schedule, and we had to make it work for his schedule, too.
Going After the One
[Wakeman is] the best-known keyboard player that we've had as a Yes member. He had a thriving solo career in the '70s. He sold, I believe, at least 13, 14 million albums each of [The Six Wives of Henry VIII] and Journey to the Center of the Earth. He was a pretty heavy hitter there for a while. I enjoy playing with him -- he's a great player -- and I'm sure it will just bring a general level of excitement.
Onward
Initially, it's going to be the touring and I'm sure we're going to concentrate, obviously, on tracks that [Wakeman] was involved with when he was recording with us in the '70s. We're also going to maintain the promotion on the Magnification album. So he's going to have to learn some of that. During the course of all that going on, we'll obviously see how everything's feeling and presumably there will . . . be some live recording at some point during the tour. And then, if everything's feeling good, I'm sure we'll look at doing some new studio stuff next year.
Every Little Thing
David McLees [Rhino Records' vice president of A&R] is a big Yes fan, and he pretty much had a good idea of what he wanted to have on [In a Word], and obviously he wanted to make it fairly different as possible from the 1991 Yesyears box set. We dug up some previously unreleased material from various stages of Yes' recording career and smarted that up a bit, and that's going to be on there. It's going to have value and interest as an album.
Wonderous Stories
There have been lots of highlights all through Yes' career. I fondly remember a lot of them. They probably outweigh any dark chapters we've had in our career, which haven't really been that dark . . . I remember certain highlights like the [1976 Philadelphia concert] in JFK Stadium where we played to 130,000 people and we had [Peter] Frampton as a backup artist on that tour, so that was handy, as he had just broken with that big hit of his at the time. That was a very memorable occasion. And all the great shows we've done in all the states, in all the major cities, especially [New York's] Madison Square Garden -- we hold some kind of record there for amount of shows for a band. We had nights there where the audience [was] applauding for 15 minutes. We couldn't even start another song because they wouldn't stop applauding. So we've had lots of really high moments and hopefully we'll have them in the future, too.
Long Distance Runaround
Well, in 1997 . . . we decided that we would pretty much put in a five-year commitment to working hard. We hadn't toured as much in the early '90s or the latter part of the '80s; we didn't tour as much as we had done over the last five years. So, here we are in 2002, and we're going to do this tour with Rick and then we're going to do some more shows, hopefully in arenas [toward] the end of the year . . . We'll do some [shows in Europe], Australia, Japan -- anywhere else that wants us. That's the next thing, and we'll see where it leads to then.
Squire recently sat down to discuss Wakeman's return and what he brings to the band, the aforementioned compilation, Yes' touring and recording plans, plus some particularly memorable concerts.
It Did Happen
Chris Squire: The idea [of Wakeman returning] has been percolating just under the surface for a while. We have discussed him coming back before, but then we wanted to go in and do that album with the orchestra -- [the] Magnification album. So, we wanted to do that first. We've been through that phase now and the timing seems good. Plus, he has a pretty busy schedule, and we had to make it work for his schedule, too.
Going After the One
[Wakeman is] the best-known keyboard player that we've had as a Yes member. He had a thriving solo career in the '70s. He sold, I believe, at least 13, 14 million albums each of [The Six Wives of Henry VIII] and Journey to the Center of the Earth. He was a pretty heavy hitter there for a while. I enjoy playing with him -- he's a great player -- and I'm sure it will just bring a general level of excitement.
Onward
Initially, it's going to be the touring and I'm sure we're going to concentrate, obviously, on tracks that [Wakeman] was involved with when he was recording with us in the '70s. We're also going to maintain the promotion on the Magnification album. So he's going to have to learn some of that. During the course of all that going on, we'll obviously see how everything's feeling and presumably there will . . . be some live recording at some point during the tour. And then, if everything's feeling good, I'm sure we'll look at doing some new studio stuff next year.
Every Little Thing
David McLees [Rhino Records' vice president of A&R] is a big Yes fan, and he pretty much had a good idea of what he wanted to have on [In a Word], and obviously he wanted to make it fairly different as possible from the 1991 Yesyears box set. We dug up some previously unreleased material from various stages of Yes' recording career and smarted that up a bit, and that's going to be on there. It's going to have value and interest as an album.
Wonderous Stories
There have been lots of highlights all through Yes' career. I fondly remember a lot of them. They probably outweigh any dark chapters we've had in our career, which haven't really been that dark . . . I remember certain highlights like the [1976 Philadelphia concert] in JFK Stadium where we played to 130,000 people and we had [Peter] Frampton as a backup artist on that tour, so that was handy, as he had just broken with that big hit of his at the time. That was a very memorable occasion. And all the great shows we've done in all the states, in all the major cities, especially [New York's] Madison Square Garden -- we hold some kind of record there for amount of shows for a band. We had nights there where the audience [was] applauding for 15 minutes. We couldn't even start another song because they wouldn't stop applauding. So we've had lots of really high moments and hopefully we'll have them in the future, too.
Long Distance Runaround
Well, in 1997 . . . we decided that we would pretty much put in a five-year commitment to working hard. We hadn't toured as much in the early '90s or the latter part of the '80s; we didn't tour as much as we had done over the last five years. So, here we are in 2002, and we're going to do this tour with Rick and then we're going to do some more shows, hopefully in arenas [toward] the end of the year . . . We'll do some [shows in Europe], Australia, Japan -- anywhere else that wants us. That's the next thing, and we'll see where it leads to then.