Yes Studio Albums - Best To Worst

Rednight wrote: Jonathan68 wrote: 01) The Yes Album 02) Close To The Edge 03) Fragile 04) Drama 05) Going For The One 06) 90125 07) Relayer 08) Time And A Word 09) ABWH 10) Talk 11) The Ladder 12) Yes 13) Tormato 14) Magnification 15) Keys To Ascension 2 16) Big Generator 17) Fly From Here 18) Tales From Topographic Oceans 19) Union 20) Heaven & Earth 21) Keys To Ascension 22) Open Your Eyes This list is flawed beyond argumentation.The Ladder before Tormato, Magnification, Tales', and Open Your Eyes? Utterly laughable. Also 90215 before Relayer? You gotta' be kidding. It belongs in the lower 10. But I guess it's to each his own.

^ well, I figured rednight wasn't going to say sorry, so I might as well do it.

I may disagree with your assessment of Soon, but I don't think that's a reason to insult you. I just wanted to know why.

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: [QUOTE=emigre80][QUOTE=Ivan_Melgar_M] Tastes are not universal. Iván

Apparently, and your tastes are in your mouth. If you had any taste, you'd see that Soon was the perfect calm after the magnificent storm that preceded it. Please think your comments through.

emigre80 wrote: Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: Lets see: 1.- Relayer (Despite Soon) 2.- CttE 3.- Yes Album 4.- Drama 5.- Fragile Don't care too much about the rest   DESPITE SOON?   How on earth could anyone object to one of the most beautiful pieces of music EVER?  I mean, maybe you're  not crazy about it, but "despite"?   Please explain.

For me:

Lets see:

I don't deserve to be on this forum for the little attention I've given Yes.

5 * Relayer, Close To The Edge, Tales From Topographic Oceans, The Yes Album, Fragile
4* Going For The One, Talk, Big Generator, Fly From Here, Drama, Keys To Ascension Studio, Union, 90125, Magnification
3* Tormato, Time And A Word, Yes, The Ladder, ABWH, Yes Symphonic
1* Heaven And Earth

Open Your yes which, ironically I've not heard as PA people really discourage me with near unanimous disapproval. ;)

It may be the remastered and expanded ABWH might boost it but the lack of Squire's presence and the repression of Levin's sound make it a nice prog rock album but a tad insipid, worse was to come. The first two are Yes finding their ambitious feet the top rung is the most amazing stuff. Tormato has quite a few excellent songs but as a band effort of cohesion it's not happening. Circus is dreadfully twee.

The other 4 star albums have a lot of terrific ideas and show how versatile and robust Yes can be. More than their fans it seems. Trevor Rabin's renamed Cinema (oh what's in a name) underlined how dogmatic and reactionary the Fragile fans can be. Great songs, the epics are there but more brief and re expressed over several songs. This is apparent on Union - I found Side 2 (I had the tape then) to be the epic piece (just not indicated as such) while side 1 had all the songs. A rather good album let down by audience perception of the politics involved.

Magnification has  a lot of very nice material but the MOR sentimentality that appeared on the Ladder was appearing on some well performed material. I do not like MOR sentimentality. What I like is the Yours Is No Disgrace intensity you get from the unedited versions on Progeny. Steve Howe leading Yes in a blazing version featuring music I'd not heard before. It may be that keeping things confined to the studio might omit the best bits.

As for insipid - Heaven And Earth (fine title, but the material has all the strength of a used tissue).

Thought I'd include the Yes Symphonic album - sort of unplugged in the studio with David (as he then was ) Palmer doing the orchestrations. I like it, plus I also think it is quite good (not the same thing) and it's likely to be overlooked. This was made at The Kinks Konk studio, just down the raod freom me at the time. Not that such a fact has any relevance, it's just bonus content.

Speaking of which and to (try to add) depth and thirst for knowledge here how are we PA Yesfans enjoying the remasters and what do we think of all the bonus tracks? Like e'm? Or should they be anthologized outside of the album identity. This probably does not apply to content on DVDs.