HEAVEN & EARTH

After 2011's very acceptable "Fly From Here", which gave Yes' career back some steam, three years later a new release was on the horizon, "Heaven & Earth", the band's nineteenth album and first with Jon Davison on lead vocals replacing Benoit David for health reasons. And the overall feeling the album leaves is that of a wasted opportunity considering the level of its members, with no memorable elements or major attempts to go beyond commonplaces and self- indulgent at times.

The opening "Believe Again" and the resilient "Light of the Ages" are partly spared from the musical orphanage, songs that, although they don't deliver what they seem to promise, have some elaboration and count with the very interesting guitar contributions of Steve Howe, and the beautiful acoustic melody of the emotional "To Ascend" that Jon Davison (yes, it's not Jon Anderson...) sings in the best "Wonderous Stories" style, surely the best piece of the album.

Otherwise, with the very discreet participation of Chris Squire on bass and Alan White on percussion and despite the commendable efforts Howe makes from his place to give more technical richness to the structures, bland and depigmented melodies predominate, such as "The Game", "Step Beyond" and "It Was All We Knew" of accessible AOR- style sonorities, the discreet half-time between soul and blues of "In a World of Our Own", or the jazzy tinges of the concluding "Subway Walls" whose promising orchestrated keyboards by Geoff Downes and some instrumental efforts in between, are not enough to tip the scales positively.

"Heaven & Earth" must be one of the least fortunate albums in Yes' discography, and it is inevitable to wonder how far it makes sense to stretch a brilliant career whose golden years had already passed decades ago.

Expendable.

2/2.5 stars