UNION

And so 1991's Union was born. This is effectively two bands performing on the same album. Jon Anderson rejoined Trevor Rabin's Yes while still fronting the ABWH material. (Squire also provided backing vocals on a few of the ABWH songs.) No song on this album has all eight members playing at once, though all eight would play a few songs together on the ensuing tour.

If that background sounds like a recipe for disaster to you, you'd be correct. Union is an ungodly, unfocused, overblown, poorly-written, and poorly-produced morass. In my personal ranking, I'd put this as their third-worst.

From its opening notes, Union signals a continuation of the sound palette of ABWH mixed with Trevor Rabin's hyper-80s songwriting style. Imagine the worst parts of Big Generator with ABWH's lack of focus, and it's clear why Rick Wakeman derisively calls this album Onion. The choruses are huge and cheesy. Listening to this album for this retrospective (for the first time in years) was a genuine challenge. Most of the songs here are in the five-to-seven-minute range, and they all feel so, so much longer.

In doing research for this piece, I found that most of Howe's and Wakeman's parts were overdubbed with session musicians, and that goes a long way in explaining the aggressively generic nature of this album. It's almost a parody of '80s hard rock at many points.

Yes did earn another Grammy nomination for Best Rock Instrumental from this album with the song "Masquerade". But that's because it's a Steve Howe solo acoustic piece. Rabin didn't write it, and Anderson couldn't cheese it up. It's a nice enough little song, but it's not up to par with Howe's classic acoustic pieces of "Mood for a Day" and "Clap".

"Saving My Heart" is a relative high point on Union, insofar as it has an identifiable melody, and the chorus is pretty strong. It's a stupid piece of pure pop, but I'll take what crumbs of enjoyment I can get out of this album.

Union is a 70-minute monstrosity that serves as a testament to how poorly Rabin's songwriting style has aged, how important it is to select enjoyable synth tones, and the importance of band chemistry. Union's mega-Yes were fractious at best, and so much of this album feels paint-by-numbers. Following the Union tour, the BWH of ABWH left the group, returning Yes to its 90125/Big Generator lineup.

Review originally posted here: theeliteextremophile.com/2019/03/24/deep-dive-yes/