DRAMA

The loss of RICK WAKEMAN was sustainable, but could YES survive without founding vocalist JON ANDERSON? The decision to replace the veterans with then-minor leaguers GEOFF DOWNES and TREVOR HORN (aka THE BUGGLES) hardly boded well, but "Drama" turned out to be a better album than "Tormato". (Okay, so that was a pretty low bar to clear.) The quintet returns to the aggressive sound of "Going For The One", with CHRIS SQUIRE and ALAN WHITE in particular providing driving rhythms that were not coincidentally conducive to filling spacious arenas. STEVE HOVE, audibly absent on YES' last album, conjurs up enough of his patented guitar magic to please his supporters, while GEOFF DOWNES does a remarkably good job of filling in the arrangements with an array of sounds. TREVOR HORN, asked to fill the biggest shoes of all, does a pretty fair job of emulating Anderson's airiness (albeit by way of Sting). The arrangements don't always support the epic running times, but there are some fine moments on here: "Run Through the Light", "Into the Lens" and "Does It Really Happen?" would have felt at home on "Going For The One". The material does sound affected on occasion (usually when HORN is allowed to take the spotlight), and "Machine Messiah" reveals some confusion over which direction to take: to embrace the portentous rock exemplified by PINK FLOYD's "The Wall" or incorporate new wave and hard rock elements like THE WHO? Critics are likely to note the concessions to contemporary music that "Drama" makes, but it stays true to the band's history, whether it's the self-referential plug in "Tempus Fugit" or the decision to continue with ANDERSON's imagist lyrics. Though it can be viewed as a last gasp or a last hurrah, "Drama" gives the remaining trio a chance to flash their chops one more time. It effectively ends one chapter, and marks the beginning of another... ASIA.