FRAGILE

Another candidate for my favorite Yes album. Even though it was said to be patched together quickly, it does show nearly everything this incarnation of the band had to offer, together and seperately, thanks to the solo pieces, which all have their own distinct moods and styles, from the tone color poem that is Wakeman's "Cans and Brahms", to Anderson's exultant "We Have Heaven", to Bruford's avant-garde free jazz puzzle piece, "Five Per Cent For Nothing", to the multi-layered pysychedelic journey of Squire's "The Fish" to the arabesque for guitar of Howe's "Mood For a Day", all of these brief diversions glue the alternately beautiful and jamming "Roundabout", the psychedelic hard rock and classical "South Side of the Sky", the tougue-in-cheek hippie pop song "Long Distance Runaround", and the undebatable masterpiece of progressive rock "Heart of the Sunrise" into probably the most fun to listen to Yes album that turns out to be patched together very nicely.