Yes in the 90's

I obsessively listened to Yes' entire discography when Magnification was the newest album they had out. Until the last ten years, 90s was their weakest era imo. Ladder is ok, Talk is the best Rabin album thanks to Endless Dream, KeyStudio is quite good. Union and Open your Eyes did the least for me of all their albums at that time. Union I can't remember anything from despite listening to it over twenty times. Open Your Eyes I don't think I even bothered beyond a few listens, it just didn't have any of the magic.

Imo, keystudio, while a good album on it's own terms, nonetheless seems like a deliberate attempt to recapture the bands glory days not to mention appease their longtime fans (who probably make up at least 70 percent of their fanbase). As such the album seems a bit contrived to me not to mention sounding totally out of place in the 1990s musical landscape. Still, I think it's a good tribute to days gone by. Of course that's all just my opinion.

Psychedelic Paul wrote: YES, it's TIME AND A WORD of well-deserved praise now for THE YES ALBUM that often gets overlooked. YES, it is of course the TALK album. The recording of this album was relatively trouble-free and was recorded, mixed and produced by YES guitarist Trevor Rabin at his home studio in Hollywood, California. The recording of TALK had none of the tensions and surrounding DRAMA of recording the legendary TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS album twenty years earlier, where FRAGILE egos were at stake and a MAGNIFICATION of simmering tempers were often CLOSE TO THE EDGE of boiling over. In the constant RELAYER race of YES line-ups, the personnel for the TALK album were:- Jon Anderson, Trevor Rabin, Chris Squire, Tony Kaye & Alan White. The album was to have featured Rick Wakeman, but he was unable to appear due to "contractual obligations" and he appeared in a re-UNION with his YES bandmates on the following album, KEYS TO ASCENSION in 1996. The TALK album was generally treated like a squashed TORMATO by the music press, but it was well-received by YES fans and was a BIG GENERATOR of album sales, climbing THE LADDER of success to reach No. 20 in the U.K albums chart. The album may not have moved HEAVEN AND EARTH, but if you haven't heard the TALK album before, it may just OPEN YOUR EYES and ears to the sound of one of the best YES albums since the release of GOING FOR THE ONE in 1977 and 90125 in 1983.  The TALK album contains nine YESSONGS and I'm going to FLY FROM HERE now and give the album another listen.

YES, it's TIME AND A WORD of well-deserved praise now for THE YES ALBUM that often gets overlooked. YES, it is of course the TALK album. The recording of this album was relatively trouble-free and was recorded, mixed and produced by YES guitarist Trevor Rabin at his home studio in Hollywood, California. The recording of TALK had none of the tensions and surrounding DRAMA of recording the legendary TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS album twenty years earlier, where FRAGILE egos were at stake and a MAGNIFICATION of simmering tempers were often CLOSE TO THE EDGE of boiling over. In the constant RELAYER race of YES line-ups, the personnel for the TALK album were:- Jon Anderson, Trevor Rabin, Chris Squire, Tony Kaye & Alan White. The album was to have featured Rick Wakeman, but he was unable to appear due to "contractual obligations" and he appeared in a re-UNION with his YES bandmates on the following album, KEYS TO ASCENSION in 1996. The TALK album was generally treated like a squashed TORMATO by the music press, but it was well-received by YES fans and was a BIG GENERATOR of album sales, climbing THE LADDER of success to reach No. 20 in the U.K albums chart. The album may not have moved HEAVEN AND EARTH, but if you haven't heard the TALK album before, it may just OPEN YOUR EYES and ears to the sound of one of the best YES albums since the release of GOING FOR THE ONE in 1977 and 90125 in 1983.  The TALK album contains nine YESSONGS and I'm going to FLY FROM HERE now and give the album another listen. 

Talk is great, it's my fav from the 90s Yes era.

^ No love for Fragile, Tales from Topographic Oceans or Relayer?  

I know that i am kinda late to the party by a couple of years  but i would say that i really like the 90's Yes albums. Union is a really nice album, i think that the fact that a huge number of people collaborated on it intead of just a band of 5 or 6 people really gives a different flavor and perspective to the music. The Keys To Ascension albums I have not listened to in full, but i will say that i have listened to "That, that is" and it is prolly one of my favourite Yes songs of all time. Talk is not on Spotify so i have not listened to it yet, i am prolly gonna need to find somewhere i can buy it one vinyl or CD. As for Open Your Eyes, yes, it sounded very poppy, but i think that a lot of the tunes in it were very catchy. Of course, catchy pop songs are definently not what you are looking for when you listen to yes, but i still found it pretty good, i really liked the happy upbeat vibes in the album. I will say that the last song was complete trash though, idk what idiot would put 2 minutes of silence in the middle of a song, and then just put in nothing but bird sounds and small snippets of other songs for frickin 15 minutes! Still, other than that song, the album is pretty good. As for The Ladder, I think that it was also very good, i loved the positive vibes in the album. All in all, i think that Yes' 90's albums were very differant than Yes' 70's albums, but they were still amazing albums, prolly better than what most bands made in their prime years. I think that anyone reading this should definently give them all a listen.

I can take or leave 90's Yesm although I did enjoy the Talk album. Endless Dream is fantastic.

I do have a soft spot for Lift me Up from Union, although it does sound like a John Farnham cheese on toast fest.

The 90s were Yes's least inspired years, you have two uneven albums - Union and The Ladder, a decent album with Talk and the godawful and bland Open Your Eyes.


Edited by Cristi - April 21 2022 at 14:34