Going for the One

[jcraig]

Awaken is the song that gives us the best of the talent each member had to give at the time of the recording. Each time I have heard this song live I have been blessed to be in the room and to have that experience all over again. You see the passion from the guys and the care that goes into the performance of it. I'm hard line Rick Wakeman fan and the care that he takes in his arranging of the keyboard parts and the power behind the pipe organ make this song the best Yes song they have ever written.

[Thoughtbecontact]

I couldn't agree with you more. But you know what makes something the "best" particularly with a group of guys as talented as Yes is, is relative to each individual listening to the song. So what is the best for you, may not be the best for the person sitting next to you.

[Sheerah]

I grabbed my GFTO jewel case so that I could listen to it on the drive home from work tonight.

So, I'm all watered up to hear it. I open up the jewel case and the friggin CD is not in there!!!!!!!!

Where is my CD?
How much does this suck?

[Earl Grey]

The whole album is faultless... And Awaken is the axis.

Turn Of The Century does it for me too though... Another one of those yessongs unlike no other...

This is my third favorite YES album, only surpassed (for me) by CTTE and Relayer. But sometimes Relayer and GFTO switch around in my order of preference.

A fine document... and I couldn't imagine a world without Awaken. The crown jewel.

Earl:yesbird:

[Earl Grey]

One more thing...

I wish the band would have Roger Dean re-do the cover for the next release...
I know many of you Yesfems quite like the original cover! Ok... they can put out the 'Ass' cover, and an alternate Dean cover as well!

Earl:yesbird:

[PO]

GFTO is a great album. The CD-R I made from my purchased copy only has 5 songs on it, though.

I never cared for Parallels. It's okay, but the bass part is pretty formulaic, and that is what carries the verses. I just never found it too catchy. All you need is the open string, 3rd, and 5th fret on a guitar, which is a veeeery standard Rock thing to do. Smoke on the Water uses this same formula. Formula, formula !! Steve's work on this song is what save's it.

Other than that, I thought I was the only one who loved Awaken for the longest time! Turn of the Century has some of their most avant-garde classical that I have ever heard them do. Brilliant.

[Earl Grey]

I like Parallells, as a rave-up. It isn't the most complicated thing on the album (Uriah Heep could have played it! Oops! Sorry!), but it works as an emotional piece for me. Plus, you gotta give Wakey at least one Romp on the Vevy Organ!

Earl:yesbird:

[Dances w/PURPLE]

I think of Going for the One when I am running for my morning coffee. AGACK...someone pour me a hot cup and put me out of my misery.

[jarfas]

Going For The One is the best album I've ever heard. Wonderful music for 40 minutes. Awaken is the best song of the progressive rock history.

[yes_angel]

G F T O


my ultimate fav. every song on this is pure heaven.

[Thoughtbecontact]

What else can one say about the album that produced Awaken? Sheer joy!

[Sheerah]

I love all of it except for the title song.

[R'tanys]

My favorite album. I love it all. Can't wait to get the remaster.

[tardistraveler]

I adore Turn of the Century - such a beautiful, romantic piece. And the guitar work is stunning.

Parallels too - may not be the most musically complex song, but I do love the lyrics - very positive!

And Awaken - what can you say? It uplifts my soul each time I hear it!

This is one CD that stays in my car - sometimes plays for weeks on end!

[Earl Grey]

Parallells is the grat 'dark horse' of the album... It isn't the most complex song that YES ever did, but there's something so unique about hearing the Vevey organ blasting away as a rock instrument! I love it.

I'm with you tardis: this winds up in my CD player, and I hate to extract it for anything. Tormato winds up in there quite a bit as well, but GFTO is the superior album for sure.

Tormato has it's faults, but I haven't heard anything but the sublime on GFTO.

Earl:yesbird:

[tardistraveler]

Yes, Earl, my son can attest to how much I play GFTO! He finally said, "Mom, can we please play something else?" I said "Sure, pick something". Of course, the only CD's in the car were Yes and Steve Howe! So, he settled on Not Necessarily Acoustic!

Hey, I'm training him right!

[illusion]

One of my younger brother's friends described the title track as "cowboy music". I don't know if it is or not, but IMo it's very boring.

Turn Of The Century is great. Amen to Alan for this one!

Parallels is very powerful. I have to turn the speakers up when listening to this one. The first Yes track I ever heard too - will forever hold a place in my heart.

Wonderous Stories strikes me as being very Jon orientated. Despite the fact it's simple, the ideas work quite well.

Awaken is bloody fantastic.

This album seems to have less of the synths and more of the "natural" sound - lots of piano, a harp, a lute etc (or at least I think it's a lute that Jon has in the Wonderous Stories video).

[tardistraveler]

Well, GFTO - title track - my be "cowboy music" to you - but to someone who has grown up in Nashville, Tennessee it's like no cowboy music I've ever heard!

Yes, Steve's guitar riffs are a bit country in this one, but if you listen to much of his solo stuff, he has a flair for the genre that is unique and classy.

And you've got to love the lyric:

"Now the verses I've sang don't add much weight
to the story in my head
so I'm thinking I should go and write a punch line
But they're so hard to find in my cosmic mind
so I think I'll take a look out of the window"

A throwaway line as only Yes could do it!

[Jackaranda]

Parallells is the grat 'dark horse' of the album... It isn't the most complex song that YES ever did, but there's something so unique about hearing the Vevey organ blasting away as a rock instrument! I love it.


Earl:yesbird:

I'm very much into Parallels these days.

[CybrKhatru]

For many moons both Tasia and I had "Close To The Edge/Going For The One" CDRs in our respective vehicles. Both albums fit very nicely onto one CD.

And, very appropriate somehow to have a CD which begins with CTTE, and closes with Awaken. Sometimes, after Awaken, a few minutes of silence is called for....it's often hard to hear anything else after it, 'cuase it is so sublime.

Gonna have to do that again!

--Matt

[Yes2Yes]

I saw the version that Neil(Neilius) posted on You Tube and enjoyed it very much.

[YYY]

GTFO Sessions check out of of them .THis one has a duo of Steve and Chris doing Dylan

http://youtube.com/watch?v=GozWRlqB1Xg&mode=related&search=

[Hex]

Thank you for pointing me towards these!

[F.C.]

Don't get me wrong, it's a bloody gear album, but I probably like it for the opposite reasons that you lads do. First of all, "Parallels" gets my vote as best song. It's a bleedin' rocker with pipe organs! Who'd think of such a grand idea but Yes? Unfortunately, therein lies the problem: the mixing is erratic and the pipe organ drowns out everything. (I wonder if they've fixed this on the Rhino remaster, 'cos if I'm to complain about this platter, it's that it's got a bad mix job and the drums are buried. A lot of things are in fact. Rick's piano on "GFTO", the band's percussions on "Awaken"--those who've seen the making of GFTO video or the excerpt of it on Yesyears might remember it, plenty of things are quite a cat to waft through, you never get to hear everything they're doing).

Secondly, I think "Awaken" is awfully overrated. Not a bad song per se, but with the four themes contained in it, I'd cut it down to seven minutes easily. I might be saying blasphemy, but I prefer the Tales songs--Awaken sounds like a jam for Steve near these (with a break for a percussion/pipe organ solo) and they have a trance inducing charm of their own that "Awaken" doesn't have.

[yes_angel]

GTFO Sessions check out of of them .THis one has a duo of Steve and Chris doing Dylan

http://youtube.com/watch?v=GozWRlqB1Xg&mode=related&search=wow!!! thats awesome!! very cool and so young!

[RobAdams]

If you imagine the GFTO album as a dairy farm, then you could imagine AWAKEN as a massive milking machine. TURN OF THE CENTURY is the feed. WONDEROUS STORIES is the farmer. PARALELS is a tractor and GFTO is the fertilizer. I like this whole album very a lot much!!!

[yes_angel]

same here Rob