TOPOGRAPHY: THE YES ANTHOLOGY

This is rather a strange compilation, and certainly not the "Anthology" it purports to be. The album smacks of a record label concocting a mixture of the Yes tracks to which they own the rights, and attempting to present them as some sort of career spanning summary.

The only reason they can get some way towards this is because some of the source albums are live recordings, which include classic material. The reality is though that these versions come from more recent live collections such as "Live from the House of Blues", "Yes- symphonic" and "Keys to ascension 2". On the plus side, this means that we are treated to classics such as "Close to the edge", "The gates of Delirium" and "And you and I". The down side is, we have them already!

The studio tracks come from the later albums "The ladder", "Magnification", and "Open your eyes".

If you are looking for a reason to buy this album, which is admittedly usually to be found at a rock bottom price, it is for the relatively rare Steve Howe pieces "Excerpts from Tales from Topographic Oceans" and "To be over", although these can be found on his solo albums and on other compilations. Since "Yes-symphonic" is only available in DVD format, the inclusion on CD of the aforementioned "Gates of Delirium" is arguably worthwhile too.

As long as you are prepared to take the "Anthology" tag with a huge pinch of salt, this is not a bad way of discovering Yes if you are new to their music. Don't read too much into the newer studio tracks though.

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