Trevor Rabin, your opinions

Never rated him as a songwriter,although, Trotsky, I do remember 'Lift me up' from Union. Always liked that song in a kind of cheesy, 'lets all hold our lighters aloft' kind of way.

Yes were a better band with Steve Howe IMO, its as simple as that. Rabin is a good musician, but he's not on the Yes wavelength that most of us are. They were a different and less interesteing band with him. But, its the old Phil Collins principle; I think its unfair to blame him for Yes 'dumbing down' in the 80's. It must have been what they all wanted.

Even Rick Wakemen thought 90125 was a great album, which saved Yes's life. He always looked back wishing he could have been involved with that album.

I like the 90125 album, have to agree with Cesar Inca about that album, with wakeman on board, or another great keyboard player, and some better arrangements it could have been more than the popclassic it became. Mind you, that Tony Kaye wasn't fully aboard also, there was another keyboardist involved aswel (forgot his name), Tony started it, left and returned again at a later stage replacing the intermediate keyboardist. If anyone know the full storie, please reply 

Back on track to Trevor rabin.
Trevor was/is a good guitarist and I like most of his guitarwork on the Yes albums he participated in. On 90125 he was very good, also Talk was a reasonable good effort, He lackes IMO the sophistication in his writing to bring about the magic that was there in the early to mid seventies. But he's not alone to blame for the decline in (progressive) quality. For some reason he became something of a foreman in the band, writing and producing most of the material. Either Jon or Chris should have stepped in, and take artistic control.

He's a very good rock writer, with a slight sensibility toward the textures and pompousity of prog rock, but not an integral progger. That's why he eventually "contaminated" the yes sound for the 80s. Maybe he should have restricted himself to writing and let the others make the arrangements (well, Squire wasn't at his top moment as a writer, and as aperformer he chose the road of merely backing Rabin's riffs). There were so many good ideas in the "90125" album, but with a wrong keyboardist back in the fold and a bassist suffering from creative crisis... ummm... Eddie Jobson was a better option. On the other hand, White was in big shape, expressing his rocking ego with total strength. Imagine that, a phase in Yes history when White is the best old musician and all the spotlight is focused on a great musician who never managed to fully see himself as a part of yes, really. Now, Imagine songs like 'Changes', 'Hearts', 'Final Eyes' and 'I'm Running' with Wakeman and Howe in the band -- they would have introduced more varied keyboard textures and solos, mandolin, pedal steel. Anderson's voice became the sole link between the 80s Yes and the essence rooted in the past. I prefer "Drama", although a wrong vocalist was in the fold by then.

Regards. 

Trevor Rabin is to Yes what Phil Collins was to Genesis, both are talented musicians but POP oriented and lead their respective bands to release the worst albums of their careers.

Iván

Trevor Rabin is a very-talented guy.

"Jack-of-all-Trades" probably sums him up!

90125 is a very strange album for a prog band to have released and this was probably Rabin's commercial sensibilities shining through!