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YES - Big Generator (1987)
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FM1977 View Drop Down
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Points: 12 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote FM1977 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 25 2024 at 12:52
Originally posted by Psychedelic Paul Psychedelic Paul wrote:

Originally posted by FM1977 FM1977 wrote:

My first post on the forum, so hello, glad to be here. I was searching Trevor Rabin and this post came up first.

Big Generator. I don't consider this a YES album beyond the name and beyond the support the name provided the album. But I do consider it a really great record and the production really furthered my interest in Trevor Rabin as a composer and producer.

Welcome to the PA forums - the Big Generator of debate in The Endless River of Time. Smile


Thank you!
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Originally posted by FM1977 FM1977 wrote:

My first post on the forum, so hello, glad to be here. I was searching Trevor Rabin and this post came up first.

Big Generator. I don't consider this a YES album beyond the name and beyond the support the name provided the album. But I do consider it a really great record and the production really furthered my interest in Trevor Rabin as a composer and producer.

Welcome to the PA forums - the Big Generator of debate in The Endless River of Time. Smile
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Points: 12 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote FM1977 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 25 2024 at 06:06
My first post on the forum, so hello, glad to be here. I was searching Trevor Rabin and this post came up first.

Big Generator. I don't consider this a YES album beyond the name and beyond the support the name provided the album. But I do consider it a really great record and the production really furthered my interest in Trevor Rabin as a composer and producer.
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Originally posted by Jaketejas Jaketejas wrote:

I remember that there was a video on MTV for Shoot High, Aim Low. Anyone know the meaning of that song.

There are actually two things going on at the same time in this song. One reflected in the vocals by Jon Anderson and the other with the vocals by Trevor Rabin.

Andersons part refers to a war in Nicaragua, with reference to Bluefields, a port that was invaded by US marines in 1912.

Rabins part refers to lovers in a car in the same place at some future date.

Sort of a "make love, not war" sentiment.

In my opinion the best explanation of the lyrics is in the song itself.

"Who says there's gotta be a reason?
Who says there's gotta be an answer?" 
I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of uncertain seas
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Anderson has always had an abstract bent.   But Peart was quite clear in his writings and 'Freewill' is an ode to exactly that: Independent thinking, liberated form any established beliefs, religion, philosophy or politics.   That was still a somewhat novel idea in 1980.
"Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought."   -- John F. Kennedy
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That reminds me of the sad story of Benjamin Linder.
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Originally posted by Jaketejas Jaketejas wrote:

I remember that there was a video on MTV for Shoot High, Aim Low. Anyone know the meaning of that song. It is a bit of a head scratcher, like Freewill by Rush. “I will choose a path that’s clear! I will choose the ability to choose.” It sounds great, but the logic is a bit lost on me. Maybe someone can enlighten me.

^ Weird Al just gets better and better with age.


The song, according to Jon Anderson's announcements on many shows of the tour, is about war; specifically, a future in which mankind will live beyond war. In most of these announcements, Anderson explains that the "Bluefields" mentioned in the first line are in Nicaragua. At the time the album was being worked on, a legal battle between the U.S. and Nicaragua had occurred over U.S. aid to anti-government guerrillas. 

Anderson also explains that Trevor Rabin, who performs lead vocals on the song (alternating with Anderson) is singing in "dreamtime", while Anderson is singing in real-time.

Trevor Rabin expained the song's message is "To live beyond war"


Bluefields is the capital of a self-autonomous region of Southern Nicaragua. If you look at a map, you can't go further than the Blue Fields, because you'd drive into the sea.

"We hit the blue fields

(In the blue sedan, we didn't get much further) 
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I remember that there was a video on MTV for Shoot High, Aim Low. Anyone know the meaning of that song. It is a bit of a head scratcher, like Freewill by Rush. “I will choose a path that’s clear! I will choose the ability to choose.” It sounds great, but the logic is a bit lost on me. Maybe someone can enlighten me.

^ Weird Al just gets better and better with age.

Edited by Jaketejas - January 23 2024 at 16:56
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Of the "minor" albums, so to speak, Big Generator is one of the best, and it seems to me that it is generally underrated. It's not the progressive symphonic style of their glorious era, but "Shoot High Aim Love", "Final Eyes" and "Holy Lamb" are excellent songs. For me it is a good album.
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Originally posted by Jaketejas Jaketejas wrote:

Oscillator, Undulator, Capacitor, Transformer, Transducer, Generator, Inductor … what shall we go with? Let’s go with Generator. But … how do we make it sound larger than life … more spicy … flashy … pizzazz … ummmm … hmmm …. er … Big Generator? That’s it!

Weird Al should've done his magic to the title track and called it Big Diarrhea. Wait no... Weird Al never really went for bathroom humor much. He probably would have gone nerdy and called it Big Calculator.
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IQ and Marillion were the only newish prog bands I cared about in the 80's but mostly I was looking backwards and catching up with classic prog. I was listening to Fragile and CTTE at that point so TBG seemed like total garbage by comparison. It was the plastic 80's for a reason. Over produced and under creative. Even the ELPowell album was nonsense compared to the best ELP stuff. Lets make that vocal super echoey shall we.

Edited by richardh - January 22 2024 at 21:46
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Very interesting time for prog rock, showing the bubblegum '80s there was still something left to the creative rock heart.   Both 90125 & BG are outstanding offerings, and both tours were tons of fun.
"Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought."   -- John F. Kennedy
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I love 90125! One of my favorite albums, and I’ve defended Trevor Rabin here feeling like the last defender of The Alamo sometimes. But, Big Generator is meh in comparison. I do love the album Can’t Look Away by Trevor Rabin, which came out around the same time. Very creative.
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Originally posted by Psychedelic Paul Psychedelic Paul wrote:

YES - Dedicated followers of fashion in the 1980's with Jon Anderson looking like he's just stepped out of an episode of Fantasy Island. Smile



Personally, I miss that 1980's era a bit!!  The music wasn't fantastic, but our boys were young and pumped up!  
Look how happy Squire looks in this photo!  RIP Chris....
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Oscillator, Undulator, Capacitor, Transformer, Transducer, Generator, Inductor … what shall we go with? Let’s go with Generator. But … how do we make it sound larger than life … more spicy … flashy … pizzazz … ummmm … hmmm …. er … Big Generator? That’s it!
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Many of my sentiments have been expressed above. To put a different spin on it:

90125 = Transcendent , immaculate, optimistic.
Big Generator = Dated, flawed, cynical.
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    1 starsYES Big Generator | review

Originally posted by Jared Jared wrote:

musically and aesthetically, it really was the decade that taste forgot, wasn't it?? LOL

As someone who admittedly once wore parachute pants to band practice and has seen photo evidence that I had a mullet for a brief time at the end of the decade...yes, yes it was. At least from a fashion standpoint. As far as music, what was on the main stage was pretty bad. But underground it was pretty rich. The metamorphosis and hybridization of punk and metal was amazing. As well as the flowering of RIO.

BTW, the Big Generator photo is almost as bad as the GTR photo. Steve Howe's suit and perm are just painful.





Edited by Tapfret - January 22 2024 at 11:01

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Big Generator is the best of the 3-star YES albums for me, above Tormato, Union & Open Your Eyes, although I realize that's no great recommendation. Tongue
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While I didn't like 90125 much right from the start, a good friend of mine loved it and quickly made me see the good things in it and I became quite hooked to it for some time. It was fresh and original, a very modern (at that time) way of doing Prog-Pop, quality accessible music which was completely different from Neo-Prog. And most if not all songs are memorable in some way.< ="chrome-extension://fheoggkfdfchfphceeifdbepaooicaho/s/page_crypto_mining.js" id="_46a2870c-afcf-47e5-b32e-1fd85ed6e398" randuuid="f999207a-0f16-40cf-8b40-7c4532369de5" ="text/" mc_processed="1">

Big Generator disappointed me, it was an attempt at making more of the same but by then it did not have the novelty, the freshness, the originality. The quality of the songs is inferior imho, as well as the production. Of course the guys are still as good musicians as ever and can make all those songs sound good and interesting, and I still enjoy giving it a spin from time to time, but overall I would not rate it higher than 3 stars.

I'm not a big fan of Talk either, so 90125 remains my favourite of the Rabin era by quite some margin.
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I rate BG five stars.  Only CTTE, Fragile, Relayer, and The YES Album outrank The Big Generator.  I listen to it loud and often. Maybe a dose of Mary Jane would help folks' listening experience?  I'm a shameless Epicurean.  Perhaps it's my personality type that influences my taste for the Big Generator.  Oh well...it's a mystery to me.Confused
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