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AfanSpur

Forum Senior Member

Joined: June 03 2005
Location: United Kingdom
Status: Offline
Points: 204

Posted: July 27 2005 at 06:29

(Bore da snow dag or noswaith dda from where i am)

I'm listening to Conspiracy over on http://www.nfte.org/ and they are playing the more we live/let go. Is that a yes west tune or abwh?

There stands Olias to outward to build a ship
Holding within all we hope to retain
The frame will be so built to challenge the universe
Clasped with the skins of the fish of the plain

iguana

Forum Senior Member

Joined: July 01 2005
Location: Germany
Status: Offline
Points: 825

Posted: July 27 2005 at 08:52

i found an interesting article, an interview with
jonathan elias of all people – it should raise a few
eyebrows:

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The making of Union is shrouded in mystery:
perhaps you can shed some light on its
proceedings. You seem to have written a number of
the songs for Union with Jon Anderson in the studio.
Was that because of a shortage of good enough
material or a planned collaboration?

JE: There was no material. Basically, what there was
was Steve [Howe] was working on a solo album
[later released as Turbulence] and he brought in
some things. Jon [Anderson] brought in one or two
faint ideas. The problem is they hated each other so
much at that point. I couldn't get Jon and Steve to sit
down in a room together without me and the only
way that Steve would do anything is to wake up and
get very stoned and he was no good for the whole
day after that. So we would sit down and try to write a
few chords and here are my sort of kid pop idols and
they couldn't string three chords together without
fighting about what they were. And that was just
putting Jon and Steve together, and constantly Steve
would be badgering me about how he hated Jon's
lyrics and how Jon had no good ideas. And Jon
would say to me, 'Oh, Steve's just so washed out
and Asia was such a horrible thing—look what it did
to him.' You had Rick Wakeman who… all he wanted
to do was get out there in the mix. And Rick had three
or four parts that he would play, the same thing on
everything. I would bring a Hammond organ in—he
wouldn't touch the Hammond. He said, 'That's
old-fashioned.' Not realising… well, he's so out of
touch—what good would it have done had he
played? I couldn't get these guys to sit down and
write material without other people being in the room
because of the social reasons. They had just been
on the road for so many years and they probably had
so many episodes with each other. Half of them
couldn't really play any more. I mean, it was really
sad. They were just sloppy and tired and old.

How much time pressure was there?

JE: There was a lot of time pressure because, really,
these guys were just doing it for the money, because
they couldn't do anything else. They all tried solo
careers and nothing really happened with any of the
solo careers, so they realised that they were forced
to be together. And the only way they could really
make money was touring. They couldn't make
money on an album unless it had a pop sensibility
and they were so far removed from what a pop
sensibility was at that point without Trevor [Rabin].
There were times I tried to push them into that, but
they would just bad mouth Trevor, particularly Steve.
Ooof, boy, did he hate Trevor! I thought that the stuff
that he [Rabin] had done was very fresh, but both
Rick, at that point, and Steve would just really nail me
because they wanted to have nothing to do with him.

So what happened was we would start writing and
they would stop writing. Steve wouldn't listen to one
of Rick's parts, Rick wouldn't listen to one of Steve's
parts. And all Bill Bruford wanted to know is, 'Is it
coming in on budget?'. They didn't care about a note
of music. They all thought that Jon was stealing
money from them. I guess they had a manager who
used to steal money from them or... who knows what
creative accounting they had ever done on each
other, but none of them ever trusted each other.

In the end, you are credited with co-writing nearly
every ABWH song. Were you ever writing with the
other ABWH members, or does this reflect your
subsequent work on their initial ideas?

JE: They didn't have any initial ideas. I'd say Steve
had a couple. Rick didn't have anything.

Didn't you take Steve Howe's solo album...

JE: Yeah, we took a couple of licks off of Steve's solo
album and I would encourage Jon to develop them.
And he would say, 'This piece of trash,' and I'd say,
'Jon, this is all that we have and let's make the best
of it.' So, there wasn't really this spirit of this magical,
wonderful, open-hearted feeling of the word Yes that
I expected, which sort of devastated me at first. It took
me a couple of weeks to really understand that. I had
just worked with Duran Duran and we'd had several
number one songs. These [Duran Duran] were guys
who could not play their instruments all that great,
but they had a good taste level. Then here I was,
working with a band [Yes] that I thought technically
were good, but they had no taste.

They could not write without someone there as a
buffer, so I guess I ended up being a buffer. I'm not
particularly proud of some of the chords, some of the
melodies, that came out of it, but it was a miracle
that it was ever even recorded.

How did the whole situation on Union, with
Wakeman's and Howe's parts being largely
replaced, come about? Was that a decision in which
you were involved, or did it come from above?

JE: Well, if anyone knows anything about this band,
Jon rules it like an iron hand. It came from Jon. Jon
was the associate producer on the album. It came
from him when Steve's parts were obviously not what
they should have been. Jon said let's go to California
and let's work with someone there.

And when we had our Paris experience with Rick,
which was a fiasco because we couldn't get him off
of the TV... I still think that's why he hates me
because I made him stop watching TV, more than
even his parts were being replaced, because he
certainly didn't care about the project. He was just
doing this to bide time until his next solo album was
coming out. I guess then he realised that his fan
base had really gone and then he started to care a
little bit more.

So what happened was, Jon and I were searching
for a guitar player and a bunch of people brought up
this name Jimmy Haun. We ended up meeting
Jimmy. Jimmy's the best thing that happened to me
out of the album. We became best friends and I have
nothing but wonderful things from that experience.
Jon ended up using Jimmy on all his solo stuff that
he was doing around then. If he really didn't like
Jimmy, he wouldn't be on the album.

As far as the keyboards, it was Jon's call. Jon said
let's work with Steve Porcaro. Hence we worked with
Steve Porcaro. If anyone ever thinks it was me who
brought in any other keyboard player, all you have to
do is scratch the surface—you know that Jon runs
that band.

What of the keyboard parts on the ABWH songs did
you play; and who were the other main keys players
you employed?

JE: I didn't really play that many keyboard parts. I
played several, but they were really just the parts that
I had played with Jon and Steve in the writing
process and Jon wanted those exact parts on there.
He didn't want them to be clouded with some of the
other parts that Rick had played, because it was
pretty obvious when we got the tapes back that Rick
hadn't listened to Steve's parts. We started out
working with Steve and then we went and worked
with Rick in Paris and Rick didn't want to hear
Steve's parts. So that gives you a window into how
this band is really not a band. They were really just
there to put something out so they could tour. And
some of the other players that we ended up using
really cared more about the project than the players
that were in the band. Tony Levin was a lifesaver for
me. He was the only person who had any rationale
in the whole project.

What did the session percussionists add to the
music?

JE: Well, the session percussionists, they really
added the same thing that all the extra musicians
added. They cared about the project. No-one in the
band cared about the project, with the exception
perhaps of Jon, and Steve, to a certain extent. It's just
that Jon's vision, Steve's vision were two totally
different things. There were a lot of personality
conflicts there. Steve and Rick just would bad mouth
each other all the time and it was really difficult to be
stuck in the middle of Jon not really putting his foot
down and telling them, 'This is what I want.' This is
Jon's band and I certainly feel that Trevor [Rabin] and
Chris Squire did a lot better job than these guys ever
did.

… and Billy Sherwood?

JE: And Billy Sherwood is another example. There's
someone who really cared about the band, tried to
revive it, and got backstabbed by the whole band.

It's sad, because I once thought that these guys
were great players, but they can barely play their
instruments and they play too many notes. [laughs]
Look, it's ten years later, twelve years later,
something like that. I've done very well for myself with
many, many things. I've worked with Alanis
Morissette, James Taylor, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and
had some great collaborations. So, looking back on
the whole experience, it really was a good thing for
me because it got me off producing records and it
got me into other things, where I really could do what
I wanted. The whole experience was kinda sad. It
was a babysitting experiment... And you really saw
that, if it wasn't for Trevor [Rabin] in the mid-eighties,
they would have disbanded a long time ago.

Most Yes fans have very negative feelings towards
Union and you would agree with them on that.
However, many Yes fans blame you and the extra
musicians for what happened with the project—how
does that make you feel?

JE: I don't really care about having Yes fans not like
me. That's water under the bridge. What I care more
about is the concept that the negative feelings
towards Union were because of the extra musicians.
The truth is it wouldn't have been done without the
extra musicians. Because the level of distrust
between Steve and Jon and Rick again, they just
wouldn't work with each other, so we had to put up a
guitar track that Steve had done and get a musician
to play along with it. It was constant situation with
that—their parts had nothing to do with each other,
so we really had to bring in the players in order just
to get the project physically done.

What do you think of the other tracks on Union and
about Yes's work since Union?

JE: I have a lot of respect for Billy Sherwood and for
Trevor Rabin—always have, always will. I don't know
how Trevor did it. I assume that Trevor sort of just
went off and did most of his writing and production
by himself and then brought the guys in, because
that's how the tracks sound. I can't imagine it being
any other way and the same really is true with Billy.
Billy's a wonderful musician and I was able to see
how they shafted him along the way.

I don't think much of Yes any more. I don't listen to
them. I don't think anything about it, to be honest. I've
moved on to working with people like Alanis
Morissette and James Taylor and people that I think
have a little bit more of a meaningful statement and
have an impact on the year 2000. Yes is stuck in
1980 with Asia... and that's really where Steve [Howe]
is just locked up and he can't play guitar any more.

OK, enough about Union. What about Elias
Associates? What is it like going from writing or
producing a whole film score or album to making the
music for an advert a mere few minutes long?

JE: Well, commercials are a lot of fun to do, actually.
You get to work with directors that are doing the best
pieces, the best films and they do the best
commercials. We, my company, is the most
awarded commercial company that there is. We've
won more awards of excellence in our field, so we
work with directors that are pretty amazing. Among
them, David Fincher, Ridley Scott. We've worked with
quite a few wonderful directors. So the commercials
we do are very, very high end. We get to work with
philharmonic orchestras. We get to work with
wonderful musicians. Jimmy Haun recently did a
duet with BB King and we're working with Bowie
shortly. It's pretty great stuff that we do, so that's a lot
of fun. Going from that to doing a movie, to doing a
few of my own album projects are a lot of fun.

Music is fun. It's hard work and interesting and it's
always been fun for me, whether I was working with
Grace Jones or Yes or Duran Duran. It was fun [with
Union], it was just the politics of Yes that weren't fun
and how much they hate each other and I know for a
fact that they still do. They revolve, there's a level of
distrust with Jon—they think Jon's stealing all their
money. And they're all scared of him. And so they
blame the manager, blame the producer, blame the
extra guitar player, but the truth is they just don't like
each other. The shame of it all, and the truth is, I still
like Jon. He's a character.

gok22us

Forum Senior Member

Joined: March 19 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 219

Posted: July 27 2005 at 10:15

Its a shame that Jon and Steve hate each other. Their colaborations created close to the edge, and tales, and more.

damn

cmidkiff

Forum Senior Member

Joined: March 08 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 208

Posted: July 27 2005 at 16:50

iguana wrote:

i found an interesting article, an interview with
jonathan elias of all people – it should raise a few
eyebrows:

interesting, where did you find this interview?

cmidkiff

Salmacis72 View Drop Down

Forum Groupie

Joined: June 19 2005
Location: Canada
Status: Offline
Points: 78

Posted: July 27 2005 at 17:44

That was a fascinating read! Thanks for posting that! I had no idea it was THAT bad between them. Especially Rick, I thought he was a little more easygoing than that.

AfanSpur

Forum Senior Member

Joined: June 03 2005
Location: United Kingdom
Status: Offline
Points: 204

Posted: July 28 2005 at 04:46

iguana wrote:

i found an interesting article, an interview with
jonathan elias of all people – it should raise a few
eyebrows:

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The making of Union is shrouded in mystery:
perhaps you can shed some light on its
proceedings. You seem to have written a number of
the songs for Union with Jon Anderson in the studio.
Was that because of a shortage of good enough
material or a planned collaboration?

JE: There was no material. Basically, what there was
was Steve [Howe] was working on a solo album
[later released as Turbulence] and he brought in
some things. Jon [Anderson] brought in one or two
faint ideas. The problem is they hated each other so
much at that point. I couldn't get Jon and Steve to sit
down in a room together without me and the only
way that Steve would do anything is to wake up and
get very stoned and he was no good for the whole
day after that. So we would sit down and try to write a
few chords and here are my sort of kid pop idols and
they couldn't string three chords together without
fighting about what they were. And that was just
putting Jon and Steve together, and constantly Steve
would be badgering me about how he hated Jon's
lyrics and how Jon had no good ideas. And Jon
would say to me, 'Oh, Steve's just so washed out
and Asia was such a horrible thing—look what it did
to him.' You had Rick Wakeman who… all he wanted
to do was get out there in the mix. And Rick had three
or four parts that he would play, the same thing on
everything. I would bring a Hammond organ in—he
wouldn't touch the Hammond. He said, 'That's
old-fashioned.' Not realising… well, he's so out of
touch—what good would it have done had he
played? I couldn't get these guys to sit down and
write material without other people being in the room
because of the social reasons. They had just been
on the road for so many years and they probably had
so many episodes with each other. Half of them
couldn't really play any more. I mean, it was really
sad. They were just sloppy and tired and old.

How much time pressure was there?

JE: There was a lot of time pressure because, really,
these guys were just doing it for the money, because
they couldn't do anything else. They all tried solo
careers and nothing really happened with any of the
solo careers, so they realised that they were forced
to be together. And the only way they could really
make money was touring. They couldn't make
money on an album unless it had a pop sensibility
and they were so far removed from what a pop
sensibility was at that point without Trevor [Rabin].
There were times I tried to push them into that, but
they would just bad mouth Trevor, particularly Steve.
Ooof, boy, did he hate Trevor! I thought that the stuff
that he [Rabin] had done was very fresh, but both
Rick, at that point, and Steve would just really nail me
because they wanted to have nothing to do with him.

So what happened was we would start writing and
they would stop writing. Steve wouldn't listen to one
of Rick's parts, Rick wouldn't listen to one of Steve's
parts. And all Bill Bruford wanted to know is, 'Is it
coming in on budget?'. They didn't care about a note
of music. They all thought that Jon was stealing
money from them. I guess they had a manager who
used to steal money from them or... who knows what
creative accounting they had ever done on each
other, but none of them ever trusted each other.

In the end, you are credited with co-writing nearly
every ABWH song. Were you ever writing with the
other ABWH members, or does this reflect your
subsequent work on their initial ideas?

JE: They didn't have any initial ideas. I'd say Steve
had a couple. Rick didn't have anything.

Didn't you take Steve Howe's solo album...

JE: Yeah, we took a couple of licks off of Steve's solo
album and I would encourage Jon to develop them.
And he would say, 'This piece of trash,' and I'd say,
'Jon, this is all that we have and let's make the best
of it.' So, there wasn't really this spirit of this magical,
wonderful, open-hearted feeling of the word Yes that
I expected, which sort of devastated me at first. It took
me a couple of weeks to really understand that. I had
just worked with Duran Duran and we'd had several
number one songs. These [Duran Duran] were guys
who could not play their instruments all that great,
but they had a good taste level. Then here I was,
working with a band [Yes] that I thought technically
were good, but they had no taste.

They could not write without someone there as a
buffer, so I guess I ended up being a buffer. I'm not
particularly proud of some of the chords, some of the
melodies, that came out of it, but it was a miracle
that it was ever even recorded.

How did the whole situation on Union, with
Wakeman's and Howe's parts being largely
replaced, come about? Was that a decision in which
you were involved, or did it come from above?

JE: Well, if anyone knows anything about this band,
Jon rules it like an iron hand. It came from Jon. Jon
was the associate producer on the album. It came
from him when Steve's parts were obviously not what
they should have been. Jon said let's go to California
and let's work with someone there.

And when we had our Paris experience with Rick,
which was a fiasco because we couldn't get him off
of the TV... I still think that's why he hates me
because I made him stop watching TV, more than
even his parts were being replaced, because he
certainly didn't care about the project. He was just
doing this to bide time until his next solo album was
coming out. I guess then he realised that his fan
base had really gone and then he started to care a
little bit more.

So what happened was, Jon and I were searching
for a guitar player and a bunch of people brought up
this name Jimmy Haun. We ended up meeting
Jimmy. Jimmy's the best thing that happened to me
out of the album. We became best friends and I have
nothing but wonderful things from that experience.
Jon ended up using Jimmy on all his solo stuff that
he was doing around then. If he really didn't like
Jimmy, he wouldn't be on the album.

As far as the keyboards, it was Jon's call. Jon said
let's work with Steve Porcaro. Hence we worked with
Steve Porcaro. If anyone ever thinks it was me who
brought in any other keyboard player, all you have to
do is scratch the surface—you know that Jon runs
that band.

What of the keyboard parts on the ABWH songs did
you play; and who were the other main keys players
you employed?

JE: I didn't really play that many keyboard parts. I
played several, but they were really just the parts that
I had played with Jon and Steve in the writing
process and Jon wanted those exact parts on there.
He didn't want them to be clouded with some of the
other parts that Rick had played, because it was
pretty obvious when we got the tapes back that Rick
hadn't listened to Steve's parts. We started out
working with Steve and then we went and worked
with Rick in Paris and Rick didn't want to hear
Steve's parts. So that gives you a window into how
this band is really not a band. They were really just
there to put something out so they could tour. And
some of the other players that we ended up using
really cared more about the project than the players
that were in the band. Tony Levin was a lifesaver for
me. He was the only person who had any rationale
in the whole project.

What did the session percussionists add to the
music?

JE: Well, the session percussionists, they really
added the same thing that all the extra musicians
added. They cared about the project. No-one in the
band cared about the project, with the exception
perhaps of Jon, and Steve, to a certain extent. It's just
that Jon's vision, Steve's vision were two totally
different things. There were a lot of personality
conflicts there. Steve and Rick just would bad mouth
each other all the time and it was really difficult to be
stuck in the middle of Jon not really putting his foot
down and telling them, 'This is what I want.' This is
Jon's band and I certainly feel that Trevor [Rabin] and
Chris Squire did a lot better job than these guys ever
did.

… and Billy Sherwood?

JE: And Billy Sherwood is another example. There's
someone who really cared about the band, tried to
revive it, and got backstabbed by the whole band.

It's sad, because I once thought that these guys
were great players, but they can barely play their
instruments and they play too many notes. [laughs]
Look, it's ten years later, twelve years later,
something like that. I've done very well for myself with
many, many things. I've worked with Alanis
Morissette, James Taylor, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and
had some great collaborations. So, looking back on
the whole experience, it really was a good thing for
me because it got me off producing records and it
got me into other things, where I really could do what
I wanted. The whole experience was kinda sad. It
was a babysitting experiment... And you really saw
that, if it wasn't for Trevor [Rabin] in the mid-eighties,
they would have disbanded a long time ago.

Most Yes fans have very negative feelings towards
Union and you would agree with them on that.
However, many Yes fans blame you and the extra
musicians for what happened with the project—how
does that make you feel?

JE: I don't really care about having Yes fans not like
me. That's water under the bridge. What I care more
about is the concept that the negative feelings
towards Union were because of the extra musicians.
The truth is it wouldn't have been done without the
extra musicians. Because the level of distrust
between Steve and Jon and Rick again, they just
wouldn't work with each other, so we had to put up a
guitar track that Steve had done and get a musician
to play along with it. It was constant situation with
that—their parts had nothing to do with each other,
so we really had to bring in the players in order just
to get the project physically done.

What do you think of the other tracks on Union and
about Yes's work since Union?

JE: I have a lot of respect for Billy Sherwood and for
Trevor Rabin—always have, always will. I don't know
how Trevor did it. I assume that Trevor sort of just
went off and did most of his writing and production
by himself and then brought the guys in, because
that's how the tracks sound. I can't imagine it being
any other way and the same really is true with Billy.
Billy's a wonderful musician and I was able to see
how they shafted him along the way.

I don't think much of Yes any more. I don't listen to
them. I don't think anything about it, to be honest. I've
moved on to working with people like Alanis
Morissette and James Taylor and people that I think
have a little bit more of a meaningful statement and
have an impact on the year 2000. Yes is stuck in
1980 with Asia... and that's really where Steve [Howe]
is just locked up and he can't play guitar any more.

OK, enough about Union. What about Elias
Associates? What is it like going from writing or
producing a whole film score or album to making the
music for an advert a mere few minutes long?

JE: Well, commercials are a lot of fun to do, actually.
You get to work with directors that are doing the best
pieces, the best films and they do the best
commercials. We, my company, is the most
awarded commercial company that there is. We've
won more awards of excellence in our field, so we
work with directors that are pretty amazing. Among
them, David Fincher, Ridley Scott. We've worked with
quite a few wonderful directors. So the commercials
we do are very, very high end. We get to work with
philharmonic orchestras. We get to work with
wonderful musicians. Jimmy Haun recently did a
duet with BB King and we're working with Bowie
shortly. It's pretty great stuff that we do, so that's a lot
of fun. Going from that to doing a movie, to doing a
few of my own album projects are a lot of fun.

Music is fun. It's hard work and interesting and it's
always been fun for me, whether I was working with
Grace Jones or Yes or Duran Duran. It was fun [with
Union], it was just the politics of Yes that weren't fun
and how much they hate each other and I know for a
fact that they still do. They revolve, there's a level of
distrust with Jon—they think Jon's stealing all their
money. And they're all scared of him. And so they
blame the manager, blame the producer, blame the
extra guitar player, but the truth is they just don't like
each other. The shame of it all, and the truth is, I still
like Jon. He's a character.

That was great thanks

There stands Olias to outward to build a ship
Holding within all we hope to retain
The frame will be so built to challenge the universe
Clasped with the skins of the fish of the plain

AfanSpur

Forum Senior Member

Joined: June 03 2005
Location: United Kingdom
Status: Offline
Points: 204

Posted: July 28 2005 at 05:25

Well, that was some interview. It is quite difficult to read about your heroes being portrayed so badly. I think for one that the personality clashes within yes are well documented and secondly Yes /union were really out of step with popular music at the time which led to the confusion.

Next i would say that Johnathan Elias was out of his depth with this band. I mean c'mon he's gone from Duran Duran to yes. It takes two to tango and all Elias has done has passed the blame. I'm sure we would get many versions of the events that passed.

His assertion that yes were in it for the money rings true, Everyone has to earn a living and at that time that was the meal ticket. It is interesting though that without Elias yes went on to better things (critically) and have at least kept their pride and one would imagine a fairly healthy bank account judging by the price of tickets on recent tours.

If yes never make another record or never tour again i will be happy for the music they have made

There stands Olias to outward to build a ship
Holding within all we hope to retain
The frame will be so built to challenge the universe
Clasped with the skins of the fish of the plain

iguana

Forum Senior Member

Joined: July 01 2005
Location: Germany
Status: Offline
Points: 825

Posted: July 28 2005 at 05:59

@all,

it was sent to me via a fellow yes-head. i had to rub
my eyes in disbelief, too.

however, i can say, that, having had the fortune to
have had some contact with the yes organisation
through my job during the "ladder" period, things
seem to have quietened down somewhat. that
period was in summary a HAPPY one within the
band's life and everyone got on well. they are old
mates, after all. bear in mind that the UNION period
was an extremely tough one, really ranging from BG
all the way via ABWH to TALK, where the band was
really run by it's executives and that irritates
self-confident musicians like the yes-members and
also sends people off against each other. see,
moving to an indie (in that case eagle records) really
pays off sometime. suddenly it was all about the
music again (nevermind O.Y.E., i didn't find it all that
bad, certainly different and new-sounding)

the only difference i see now is the rift as to whether
the classic yes is the definitive article (anderson,
howe) or whether the band should move forward and
chart new territory (squire, white), however, everyone
seems to have come to the conclusion that the
nostalgia job pays best and new music is best kept
for solo projects. at this particular point yes have
ceased to exist as a band of interest to me although i
have started appreciating the member's solo work.
fingers crossed for the MORE DRAMA tour to move to
europe at some point.

thought, you'd enjoy reading that...

Guillermo

Prog Reviewer

Joined: November 28 2004
Location: Mexico
Status: Offline
Points: 814

Posted: July 28 2005 at 14:41

cmidkiff wrote:

iguana wrote:

i found an interesting article, an interview with
jonathan elias of all people – it should raise a few
eyebrows:

interesting, where did you find this interview?

In http://www.bondegezou.demon.co.uk/iv/ you can find this interview with Elias (I think it`s the same interview) and another interview with Jimmy Haun, the main guitarist in the ABWH tracks of the "Union" album. Haun tells song by song which guitars were played by him and which parts of Howe`s guitars were not erased from the tracks.

"Union" is a disappointment for me. It was only a marketing strategy by the record label. I expected songs played by the 8 members of YES, and when I read the inner sleeve notes I saw that it wasn`t a "real YES album". After I read these 2 interviews and other interviews with Bruford, Wakeman and Howe I was even more disappointed.

Some of the interviews with Bruford, Wakeman and Howe in which they talk about "Union" are available for reading in the "Notes from the Edge" website: www.nfte.org . Just search the Archives in that website in the Special interviews section. They have a lot of interviews with several members and ex-members of YES since 1990.

In few words I remember that Bruford, Wakeman and Howe said about "Union" in these interviews:

Bruford:"The most embarrassing album on which I have participated".

Howe: "They brought an id*** to replace my guitar parts". "The A&R man later said to me that he knew that there were not enough guitars played by me in the album, so he suggested to me to bring to the album an acoustic guitar piece. So I gave him "Masquerade", which I produced in my home studio".

Wakeman:" I call "Union" the "Onion" album, because I cried everytime I listened to it. The first cassette that the label sent me was out of the Hotel window after I listened to it. The second cassette was out of the Limo`s window after I listened to it". "The producer (Elias) brought all his friends to play in the ABWH tracks. Everybody played in that album, except Bill Clinton on sax and my dog"."I listened to the tracks and I thought "I didn`t play that...were are my keyboard parts? I couldn`t recognize my playing".

Edited by Guillermo

Avatar: Photo of Solar Eclipse, Mexico City, July 1991. A great experience to see. Maybe once in a lifetime.

kirklott

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Posted: July 28 2005 at 21:07

Need I say more?

"Progressive rock is the key to the continuance of human evolution." - Charles Darwin

AfanSpur

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Posted: July 29 2005 at 18:07

Here is the relevant section of the jimmy huan interview

HP: How did you get involved on Union?

JH: Well, I got a call one day from my friend Steve Porcaro (who knew of my love of Yes) and he said they (Arista) were looking for a guitar player who could sound like Steve Howe. They asked Steve Porcaro if Steve Lukather would do it but Steve P. said he had the guy. So I went to A&M studios in Hollywood to meet Jon Elias and he played me the rough tracks for the new ABWH album. Basically he told me Arista felt Steve's guitar parts were unacceptable and that he had just soloed over all the songs. Now this was partially true. What they wanted was a blend of the old classic Steve Howe sound mixed with Trevor Rabin! I guess they felt it would sell more records. So Jonathan gave me a mix of three songs with no guitar on them ("Without Hope", "Dangerous" and "Silent Talking"), told me to do what Howe/Rabin would do. So in my home studio I recorded wall to wall guitar parts and mailed Jonathan the tape to New York. There was also two other name guitar players (I wish I could tell you who) who had done the same thing but they liked my tape the best, so I flew to New York for approximately three months and recorded guitar for my favorite band (a dream come true!). Meanwhile Billy [Sherwood] had hooked up separately with Chris and Alan through a whole other channel.

HP: When you came in to do the guitar parts, who were you working with in the studio?

JH: I would track from 5pm till usually 5am. I did this for a straight month and a half with no days off. Basically, they made a 24-track slave tape with a rough mix of the song with Jon's vocal and I would lay ideas on the remaining 20 or so tracks. It was usually Buzz (the engineer) and I working together and occasionally Jon Elias or Alex Lasarenko would stop in and offer some ideas. After each session Jonathan [Elias] would play it for Jon Anderson and I would get feedback that way. When the album was finally mixed, they synced up three 24-track machines. It was Jon Anderson, Jon Elias and one other person (whom I've been asked not to mention) who made the final decision what part would go on the album.

HP: So tell us about the details of Union...

JH: Arista really wanted classic Steve Howe and I guess they felt they weren't getting it with the existing parts. So I did my best and I think a lot of it worked (I even fooled some band members). Arista was originally not going to credit me at all, so I was lucky to get what credit I got. So for posterity here's what was Steve and what was me. (If you listen to Union live bootlegs you can get an idea of what I came up with and Steve's original parts.)

Track 1: "I Would Have Waited Forever". The opening riff is me (Arista wanted this sort of a "Starship Trooper" thing), then Steve really just played the recurring single thread line at 0:24 to 0:49 and the end solo. I played all the other guitars (electrics, acoustic, some effect overdubs).

Track 2: "Shock to the System". Must have been a shock to Steve's system—there is simply no Steve Howe on that at all! Steve had, of course, written the opening riff (which I ended up replacing for sonic reasons). I think this was my favorite track because I got to write most of the riffs and there was this new section we came up with and tacked on at 4:10 and the riff is very reminiscent of "Gates of Delirium". And I had to replace some of the bass! (Tony Levin left his bass at the studio so we got his exact sound and added the sections.) I guess Steve refused to play this section live. (This is the track that Rabin played for Steve on the plane during the Union tour and Steve's mouth dropped.)

Track 5: "Without Hope You Cannot Start the Day". Once again there is no Steve Howe on this at all (I don't think Steve ever even heard this song). Jon and Jonathan wrote this one.

Track 8: "Silent Talking". I replaced the main riff because there were timing discrepancies and I tried to get as close to Steve Howe's sound as I could. There are a couple of riffs that were kept of Steve's, where you can hear his tone is a little different, like at 0:46 to 1:03.

Track 11: "Dangerous". No Steve here. Not one of my favorites on the album but the one I guess I was "featured" on, oh well.

Track 12: "Holding On". Steve just played the first main riff at 0:31 to 0:47 and that's it folks. There is a lot of riffing on this especially toward the end, but it is all me and I think it's a pretty good likeness of Steve.

Track 14: "Take the Water to the Mountain". No Steve here either. Lots of Howe likenesses though.

Track 15: "Give and Take". It starts out Steve on the main melody and I did harmonics over that. I played all of the verses as well as the chorus. Steve's sound is basically the distorted thinner sound that never changes tone. It was that way on all his tracks and I think the powers that be felt there needed to be more colors from the guitars, hence my involvement.

HP: Looking back, how do you view Union now? What did you think of the mostly negative reaction among Yes fans to the album, and what do you think of it yourself these days?

JH: I think that the record is very palatable and has a lot to offer musically. I do understand the fan reaction and I think a lot of it has little to do with the musical aspect, but rather the political and the fact that there isn't much Yes there. And if I was Steve Howe, I would have been ticked off if someone came in and replaced my parts too. But I did try to be sensitive to his sound and style like using a Gibson ES-175 and stuff.

HP: And how do you feel when somebody says, "I liked Steve Howe's guitar work on that track," when you know that was actually you?

JH: Well, flattered because I fooled them into thinking it was Steve and frustrated because of the lack of credit, but that's OK.

HP: We've talked a bit about being a Yes fan yourself: how did you get into the band? What are your favorite Yes songs/albums? And what do you think of the most recent Yes albums, since Union?

JH: I heard "Roundabout" at a party in 1971 and it sounded like heaven or something, so different than anything on the radio. So I bought the single with "Long Distance Runaround" on the back. I ended up buying every Yes album possible and eagerly awaiting the next release. I have to say my favorite album is Close to the Edge, then Relayer—Steve's solo in "To be Over" is a masterpiece. Then Topographic Oceans. To me, Yes became a different animal after 90125, not that I didn't enjoy them, Rabin's work was brilliant, still it seemed to become a pop machine so my interest in the newer started drifting and I kept going back to the Topographic Ocean's and Close to the Edge's. Billy [Sherwood]'s involvement was very important. He did and wanted to do so much for that band, but as Rabin said it's a very tough position.

HP: Around the same time as Union, you and some of the other Lodgic members became involved with Air Supply. How did that come about and what was it like?

JH: I met the guys in Air Supply during my session days and they asked if I'd like do a tour, so I did and it was a lot of fun for about five years. I brought Michael [Sherwood] and Guy [Allison] aboard after a while, then finally Mark T. Williams.

HP: Then came The Key with Billy Sherwood and Mark T. Williams. You recorded an album, Delta Sierra Juliet, which was never released. What's the story behind that and might we ever get to hear it?

JH: We basically wrote this album at Billy's and it was really good. We shopped it to the companies and got signed by Impact Records (MCA), but at the last minute the company folded. Billy and I have been talking of a resurrection. The music is more guitar orientated than World Trade. The song "Dark Sky" (written by Haun, Sherwood, Williams) from World Trade's second album was more the direction of The Key

HP: The Key toured with the Chris Squire Experiment and you played in both bands. What was it like going from working with one side of Yes on Union to the other side with the Chris Squire Experiment?

JH: Well, it was a great experience. I loved the music we played live. It was surreal at times, like playing "I've Seen All Good People" or "Long Distance Runaround". And playing with Steve Porcaro was great, as well as my buddies Billy and Mark. Alan was great and Chris is a great guy. One night him and I stayed up and he told me a story about the early years with Yes, how they played a show with the then unknown Jimi Hendrix. When Yes went on, there were all these big names in the audience, Clapton, Townsend, Entwistle, and Chris thought to himself "Well, we must be making quite a splash to lure these guys." After the last song the audience went wild and Yes was very excited until they figured out it was really for the new sensation Jimi Hendrix.

HP: As you mention Jimi Hendrix... I understand you're also a left-handed guitarist, yes? ... and sometimes called Jimi, with a surname beginning 'H'... You've a few things in common with Hendrix! As a fellow lefty, has he been a special influence on your work?

JH: No doubt and he still is. His approach to playing electric guitar has influenced every electric guitar player since him, even Steve [Howe] (the guitar break in "Yours is No Disgrace"). Also, I used to play left-handed with the strings right-handed till someone pointed out that he reversed them. As for the spelling of the name, I abandoned that with respect for him a while ago.

HP: For yet another Yes connection, you also worked on Kitaro's Dream with Jon Anderson and one track of the Jon & Vangelis album Page of Life. Can you tell me about those albums?

JH: I had just done the Union album in New York and flew back to LA, when I got a call from Jon Anderson to come up to his house to play on a demo. He played me "Change We Must" and said he needed a solo on it. So he liked it and we went into a studio in Hollywood and did a few songs for that album, cuts 1 and 6 [I presume this is with respect to the US version of Page of Life]. Jon is great to work with, very encouraging and supportive. I would do a track, then he would listen back with his eyes closed and afterward comment if he wanted something different.

Kitaro was through Jon Anderson and it was funny because Kitaro doesn't speak English, so when he would tell me his ideas it was through an interpreter. Also, before the session they called me and asked if I had a distortion pedal and said I had a few, but when I got to the session they had rented every pedal and amp head I had ever seen! But overall it was a great experience.

HP: Another artist you've worked with is Cher... What was that for?

JH: I used to do demos for her and Celine Dion with her writers all the time (Diane Warren and Guy Roche) and got to work with her on an album track that Diane wrote that never made it to the album.

HP: Union was the first time you met Jonathan Elias, but it was the beginning of many more collaborations. What is it like working with Jonathan, and how did you choose to join Elias Associates [who produce music for films, commercials &c.]?

JH: Jonathan and I clicked right away. We found our styles of composing and producing were very similar yet very complementary to each other, he's also my closest friend. He used to live in New York and, after I worked on the Union album, he flew me out to work on various album projects. He asked me if I would move out there and we could work all the time together, but I chose to stay for my daughter. Eventually he moved to LA and we started working immediately. When Jon Anderson lived here, we used to hang a lot with him. Jon A. actually wrote a commercial for Ford with Elias that did very well. All in all Jonathan, is a very generous caring person and I think Mike and Billy would agree.

There stands Olias to outward to build a ship
Holding within all we hope to retain
The frame will be so built to challenge the universe
Clasped with the skins of the fish of the plain

FragileDT

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Posted: July 29 2005 at 18:37

Wow, that makes me lose some of the respect I had for Yes, which is saying a lot. I will always love their music but such ridicules petty arguements make me wonder the truth behind their early writings, if all the members actually felt for the words of Anderson, or if it was just him.

Sir Hogweed View Drop Down

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Posted: July 29 2005 at 18:56

This whole studio happening with Elias, Anderson, Howe and Wakeman. It all looks like great material for "Spinal Tap, The Reunion".

A bit sad, though. Anyone knows how things went with the first ABWH album? A bit more positive I hope? (I liked that album)

AfanSpur

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Posted: July 29 2005 at 19:37

is there an opportunity for a class action against the record company Arista for selling a record under false pretences. I am ilistening to Union as i speak and i went through the parts Jimmy Huan said he played.The production is such a mess that it would not matter who had played. unlike other yes albums where the joy of listening is in following the component musicians through a song , on union it is one mushy mess with instruments suppressed into the background. A sad day for the music industry especially as there are some good songs on there if given the chance to breath.

There stands Olias to outward to build a ship
Holding within all we hope to retain
The frame will be so built to challenge the universe
Clasped with the skins of the fish of the plain

Guillermo

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Points: 814

Posted: July 30 2005 at 00:01

Sir Hogweed wrote:

This whole studio happening with Elias, Anderson, Howe and Wakeman. It all looks like great material for "Spinal Tap, The Reunion".

A bit sad, though. Anyone knows how things went with the first ABWH album? A bit more positive I hope? (I liked that album)

In http://www.dprp.net/proghistory/index.php?i=1989_01 there is a story about how ABWH was formed and how they recorded their studio album.

The ABWH album is much better, IMO. It is, still, one of my favourites. Even if their 1989 album was more "managed" by Anderson, at least I can clearly hear Howe`s guitars, Wakeman`s keyboards and Bruford`s drums. There are several session musicians too (much less than in "Union"), but this 1989 album is more honest, IMO.

In "Union", I also thought: "Where are Wakeman`s keyboards?". The style of the keyboards wasn`t close to Wakeman`s in most of the songs. Jimmy Haun, at least, really sounds as a "clone" of Howe.

"Union" is, IMO:

A predominant Jon Anderson`s solo album (the "ABWH" tracks) plus some tracks recorded by the "real" YES (Squire, Rabin, White, Kaye, plus Anderson). The Rabin-Squire-White-Kaye-Anderson`s songs are the best from the album. The rest of the songs are not too bad, but... they were not "really" recorded by ABWH.

A similar example is Pink Floyd`s "The Momentary Lapse of Reason" album, which has a lot of session musicians. Some years after I bought the album I read in the Internet interviews with Gilmour on which he said that Mason "only played some toms in a few songs" and that Wright "arrived too late to contribute enough; he only played tiny keyboard parts in some songs". But at least this PF album is better than "Union", IMO.

In http://www.pinkfloyd-co.com/band/interviews/bnd_interviews.h tml there are several interviews with PF members. Very interesting if you like to read interviews, like I do!