The solo tracks on Fragile
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Topic: The solo tracks on Fragile
Posted By: AFlowerKingCrimson
Subject: The solo tracks on Fragile
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 06:58
| Multiple votes are allowed. Up to 5 if necesssary. Lol. |
Replies:
Posted By: VianaProghead
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 07:19
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I really only like of Cans And Brahms” of Wakeman that is an interesting piece of classical music and “Mood For A Day” that is a good piece of acoustic guitar music. The others three tracks are disconnected and don’t deserve make part of this great album. Without these tracks thi scould have been a masterpiece. It's the reason why I gave only 4 stars to the album.
------------- "PROG IS MY FERRARI". Jem Godfrey (Frost*) |
Posted By: progaardvark
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 08:28
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I voted Other. Five Per Cent of Nothing should have been expanded into a 7-minute long instrumental and all the other solo tracks should have been saved for their respective solo albums. All my footprints go in very specific places, especially after getting soaked up by a dish rag. ------------- ---------- i'm shopping for a new oil-cured sinus bag that's a happy bag of lettuce this car smells like cartilage nothing beats a good video about fractions |
Posted By: suitkees
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 08:55
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I like all the solo tracks even five percent, they make the album more interesting, or at least more special. I actually don't understand the aversion against those tracks. I generally like it when a band experiment things and you would expect that progressive rock fans would like that too. It may not necessarily be good or fantastic, but it is at least interesting - and I think that all those solo tracks are interesting and make Fragile special. ------------- The razamataz is a pain in the bum |
Posted By: JD
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 09:26
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It's their mini version of ELP's Works Vol 1.  But seriously, given the intent to highlight each musician individually, and thereby setting up the extended solo stuff live, I get it. And yes, it does break up the momentum of the otherwise, brilliant, other 4 songs. I accept them and don't have a problem with them ------------- Thank you for supporting independently produced music |
Posted By: unclemeat69
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 09:43
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I only really like the Howe, Squire and Anderson ones (Clap is on the Yes Album, the one here is of course Mood For A Day). They do kinda break the flow of the album for me except for The Fish as it flows nicely out of Long Distance Runaround. ------------- Follow your bliss |
Posted By: AJ Junior
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 10:02
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Never really thought about it until people on the internet started complaining. Still a 5-star album for me and one of the greatest of all time. Controversially, my favorite Yes album. I'm still kinda confused as to what the "solo-tracks" even are though. ------------- "Together We Stand, Divided We Fall" |
Posted By: ThamesRoyal
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 10:21
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I like them all, although Cans & Brahms is my least favorite. There's something pub like about that track! |
Posted By: Octopus II
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 10:22
I certainly don't have a problem with them. 
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Posted By: AFlowerKingCrimson
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 10:23
My thoughts exactly which is why I added it as an option. People also complain about I know what I like and more fool me but not as much as the solo stuff on Fragile imo. Fragile is one of my favorite Yes albums but maybe that's partly because it's one of the first I ever heard. The solo tracks are considered to be: Cans and Brahms (Wakeman) We Have Heaven (Anderson) Five Percent For Nothing (Bruford) The Fish (Schilenderia Praemataurus) (Squire) Mood for a Day (Howe)
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AJ Junior wrote:Posted By: TheGazzardian
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 11:18
| They give the album part of its characters. IMO "The Fish" and "We Have Heaven" are the standouts, "Mood For a Day" is good (but I do prefer "Clap" from the Yes Album), "5 Percent for Nothing" is interesting but doesn't hit any emotional notes, and "Cans and Brahms" is ok but the actual Brahms Symphony its from is better, although I get that Wakeman was restricted from composing something for Yes so they had to do some sort of cover. |
Posted By: Steve Wyzard
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 13:26
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I voted for "I accept them and don't have a problem with them". They don't make the album better or worse, and the band's discography would not be as interesting without them. "Mood for a Day" is my favorite of the five. If you'd really like to make this thread interesting, can't it also be said that "Long Distance Runaround" (not to mention "A Venture" from The Yes Album) is also a Jon Anderson solo piece with the rest of the group backing him?
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Posted By: verslibre
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 15:08
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Other: Rick Wakeman rules! ------------- https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_ipg=50&_sop=1&_rdc=1&_ssn=musicosm" rel="nofollow - eBay |
Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 16:14
Fragile must be one of the best sounding albums ever. It's a little bit grainy but equally as clear as a bell. On headphones it rules. I also think that Yes never played better. The interplay is quite extraordinary. Greatest 5 peice line up ever imo. Of course the 3 centre piece tracks rule the album but the rest cannot and does not spoil it. Arguably it's also the most eclectic Yes album and that adds to the fun. 4.999/5  |
Posted By: someone_else
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 16:16
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Options 2, 3, 9, 12 and 13 are applicable for me. But what is C ------------- 
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Posted By: Hrychu
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 17:04
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Yeah. Clap is not on Fragile. The author probably meant Mood for a Day. Honestly, I don't mind the solo tracks that much. I do think 5% for nothing would've been better had it been developed into a full song and also that Cans & Brams has too much of a "muzak" or "street barrel organ" feel for me to enjoy it as much as the fully fleshed out songs on Fragile, like HotS or SSotS.
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Posted By: Zappastolethetowels
Date Posted: October 20 2023 at 17:49
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Idk... this seems a little redundant
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Posted By: Sean Trane
Date Posted: October 21 2023 at 03:13
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Howe's Mood For Day in on Fragile and not Clap, as that's on TYA.  They kind of ruin the album, though I like Anderson's We Have Heaven. Just imagine that we could've had another 9-mins epic instead of those useless pieces : something close to Southside of the Runaround.  Or better yet: S&G's America . ------------- let's just stay above the moral melee prefer the sink to the gutter keep our sand-castle virtues content to be a doer as well as a thinker, prefer lifting our pen rather than un-sheath our sword |
Posted By: Progosopher
Date Posted: October 21 2023 at 13:31
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They help make the album great. ------------- The world of sound is certainly capable of infinite variety and, were our sense developed, of infinite extensions. -- George Santayana, "The Sense of Beauty" |
Posted By: AFlowerKingCrimson
Date Posted: October 21 2023 at 13:53
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Of course I meant Mood for a Day. I fixed it now.
A little trivia though. The initial recording combined both but then Steve decided to make it two tracks which might explain why a live version of Clap is on TYA.
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Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: October 21 2023 at 22:00
Yep maybe but mostly they are not long enough to make a big difference and Chris Squire's offering is rather good so I wouldn't remove that.
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Posted By: Dellinger
Date Posted: October 21 2023 at 22:29
| I never found them to be much of a problem for the quality of the album. Yeah, the group tracks are the ones that make the album great, but the solo ones are either too short to do harm or actually good in their own right. Five Percent is indeed too short, if you get distracted you might actually miss it. We Have Heaven actually sounds nice (even if weird) as an intro track for South Side. Mood for a Day is a very good track by its own right. The Fish, though by itself might sound out of place, actually completes very nicely Long Distance Runaround, both of which sound as if they were one only song, and both of which benefit from being attached to the other. That leaves Wakeman's one, which is perhaps the most forgettable (besides Five Percent), though not particularly bad. Still, I wish he had been able to use what became Catherin of Aragon in Fragile, as I understand was the original intention, but couldn't be done so because Wakeman's own label wouldn't let him have writing credits with Yes (that song actually features the whole Yes instrumental line-up)... that would have made Fragile even greater than it is (though that track would have been sorely missed in Six Wives). |
Posted By: omphaloskepsis
Date Posted: October 22 2023 at 05:21
| I like all the solo tracks even five percent |
Posted By: Hector Enrique
Date Posted: October 22 2023 at 07:45
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I think the album is more interesting with these additions, even some of them I really appreciate. Wakeman's classical arrangement on "Can and Brahms", Howe's virtuosity on "Mood for a Day" and Squire's bass on "Fish" don't seem to me to be disconnected from the backbone themes of the album, even having a life of their own. I love them. ------------- Héctor Enrique |
Posted By: The Dark Elf
Date Posted: October 22 2023 at 08:58
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I've always liked "Mood for a Day" but for the most part Fragile seems more disjointed than The Yes Album or CttE, and I think Fragile is a slightly lesser Yes album sandwiched between two greater albums. Still a very good album, but there are things I ignore on Fragile. ------------- ...a vigorous circular motion hitherto unknown to the people of this area, but destined to take the place of the mud shark in your mythology... |
Posted By: I prophesy disaster
Date Posted: October 22 2023 at 09:44
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"I never thought about it until I saw people complain online". "The Fish (Shindleria Praematurus)" is one of my favorite tracks on the album, "We Have Heaven" serves as an introduction to "South Side Of The Sky", my favourite track on the album, and the others I never really thought about one way or the other. I do love "Fragile" as it is and wouldn't change any of it. ------------- No, I know how to behave in the restaurant now, I don't tear at the meat with my hands. If I've become a man of the world somehow, that's not necessarily to say I'm a worldly man. |
Posted By: richardh
Date Posted: October 22 2023 at 22:25
Interesting stuff He had other tracks that didn't make it onto Six Wives , the record company vetoed 'Henry' because they didn't want to spoil the concept/idea that the album was about the wives and not him. Not sure of time lines but I wonder if that could have made it to Fragile (btw you can find it on the live Wakeman DVD where he performs Six Wives at Hampton Court Palace, highly recommended and one of my most played Blu Rays)
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Posted By: Floydoid
Date Posted: September 09 2024 at 10:45
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I'm not really fussed about the solo tracks, a I have commented elsewhere for my digital playlist of Fragile I've discarded the 5 short solo tracks and tacked on 'America' for a more satisfying listen. ------------- 'We're going to need a bigger swear jar.' |
Posted By: poseído del alba
Date Posted: September 09 2024 at 11:46
| They make the album more interesting. They're actual songs, unlike other albums where the shorter tracks are simply transitions. |
Posted By: Logan
Date Posted: September 09 2024 at 15:38
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I thought I had responded to this topic before, but it must have been a topic with the same theme. Fragile is the most significant Yes album to me (and one of the first albums I ever bought) and I like having those pieces. I like diversity, and while it can interrupt the flow, it's more in a good way. the just juxtaposition can add contrast, dramatic tension and release and heighten a mood. It present varied moods for the day, one might say, and I give it the clap for that (to reference another song, this time by AC/DC). "The Fish (Schindleria praematurus)" is a highlight of the album for me, and it acts like a kind of coda to "Long Distance Runaround". I also love "We Have Heaven" and I love the contrast when going into "South Side of the Sky" as then it hits you harder. I'll vote for they make the album more interesting, and actually they help to make this Yes' best album for me. ------------- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXcp9fYc6K4IKuxIZkenfvukL_Y8VBqzK" rel="nofollow - Duos for fave acts |
Posted By: Dellinger
Date Posted: September 09 2024 at 18:30
A very late reply... I must have missed it when originally written. Yeah, I know the live at Hampton album/DVD... I actually was there, by some very fortunate coincidence (on the previous night to the one recorded for the DVD), and my version of the CD was actually recorded the very night and given at the end of the concert (with really great sound, I don't understand why live albums can take so long to come out if they can actually have them ready in less than an hour). I guess the song that should have been Henry in the original album would have been Defender of the Faith... but are you sure it was that very same song? Or was it just planned back then, but not written until it was time to finally be able to include it for this concert? |
Posted By: Saperlipopette!
Date Posted: September 10 2024 at 00:28
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I voted for both: -I have no issue at all and they make the album great -I accept them and don't have a problem with them Yes will never be among my favorites, but I think Fragile is pretty much perfect for what it is - and a nice, full album experience.
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