From: Rob <kudla.at.ties.dot.org.not@aol.com>
Subject: Re: Is Yes Still Prog ?
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 98 12:59:01
Message-ID: <353c13fd.425387254@news.supernews.com>
Newsgroups: rec.music.progressive,alt.music.yes
Organization: All USENET -- http://www.Supernews.com

Nic Caciappo <nicbeat@earthlink.net> wrote:
>Question.....
>With "Open Your Eyes", is Yes still considered progressive?
>With "Keys To Ascension 1 + 2" was Yes still progressive?
>When would you say that Yes stopped being progressive?

With "KTA1&2" Yes was prog in the same way bands like Marillion and
Spock's Beard are prog.  "Progressive rock" stopped meaning "rock that
progresses" (or whatever) about 25 years ago when the bands we all
like entrenched mellotrons, volume-pedaled guitar and meter changes
(among other things) into the consciousness of anyone who cared about
"progressive rock", and capes and lasers into the consciousness of the
critics.  Prog became another genre at that point, like metal or
folk-rock.
Even OYE has prog characteristics about it: tweedly analog synths and
an organ solo in "Fortune Seller", meter changes in "The Solution" and
"Universal Garden", and hey, a real live sitar on "Open Your Eyes".*

Are they 'progressing' in the sense of doing something that's never
been done before?  No, not since Relayer, and Genesis hasn't since the
Lamb, and Crimson since LTIA, and artists like Marillion and Rush (and
Rick Wakeman) have never 'progressed' at all.  They did, however,
establish a genre and in the last couple years Yes have produced about
an hour of new material that falls squarely within that genre, which
they hadn't for a long time before that.

Rob

*Well, actually, the sitar is a Coral and the "analog" is a Nord Lead,
but I'm only writing this for the 'pendants' among us.

kudla@ties.org - http://raindog.darkknight.net