90125

Hearing Owner of a Lonely Heart still makes me happy. It is not the Classic-Rock goodness, nor the way that it reminds me of a childhood listening to the radio stations my father would pick out, which always played classic rock. It is not the syruppy goodness of the chorus, nor the way that the interplay between Jon Anderson's vocals and Trevor Rabin's actually works quite well.

No, it is because Owner was my 'gateway' track. I never even thought it was that amazing, but I liked it enough to download some more Yes mp3s and see what this band was about. The lead to Does it Really Happen?, which made me curious enough about what these guys were doing to buy some albums. This was the first, and, having no concept that there even was a genre called progressive rock at the time, or that this was Yes' departure from that field, I loved every minute of it.

Having now heard almost the rest of their discography, the only feeling I really get from this album is a feeling of joy that it was what lead me on the path to the rest of their music, and through them, to prog rock in general. There is very little else about this album that still stands out to me. There were dozens of albums released that sounded like this throughout the '80s, and while this one was good, it was not seminal or even the best. (Personally, I'd give that honour to bands like Tears for Fears). Other than perhaps Cinema, there is not much here that would appeal to fans of previous Yes music.

It must have been quite a shock to hear this album for the first time. With the Buggles gone, and Tony Kaye and Jon Anderson back in the fold, this lineup was closer to Yes' classic era. But this album was never meant to be a Yes album, and guitarist Trevor Rabin, who replaces Steve Howe here, took the band in a completely different direction. Thus enters the era of Yes as a New Wave band.

The cover art on this album pretty much perfectly describes the music. Nothing that is really worth a second look.