(50 Kb)	Jon Smith
(17 Kb)	Yesman Lee
(19 Kb)	Jason
(69 Kb)	Gustavo Munoz
(27 Kb)	Jens Fischer
(14 Kb)	Hams Palmer

			(Post Review)

Jim Rollner:

Until I actually held the 'Talk' CD in my hands, I had no idea who was going to be on this album. Without the help of the internet in those days, I'd read in USA Today or something that the album was coming out, but, they hadn't mentioned who was still in the band! Frankly, I was really hoping that it was still the eight man band from 'Union,' making a proper album - though, even in my ignorant bliss, I realized that this was wishful thinking at best.

I've since heard an interview with Jon done during his South American (I think?) tour in '92 or '93 (?) where he mentions that Tony Kaye AND Rick Wakeman are still in the band and that the music they're working on for the new album requires two keyboardists!

They had their production/stage manger under the drum riser on the Talk tour. His name was Robbie Eagle. He lives in Denver and has worked with King Crimson and the B-52s (I know weird combo). Also the Boxing Gandhi's. He played some keys, but mostly played sampled background tracks to fill in sound. Met him in Little Rock, AR through his brother John.

I. CONCERTSONICS

Yes will be introducing 'Concertsonics'. This will enable those sitting in certain areas to receive what they say is 'an exceptionally distinctive, high-quality mix of enhanced audio through a personal "Walkman Style" portable radio with headphones.' Unfortunately if you're sitting outside the main area then the sound may be slightly out of phase; since this is an experiment and Yes only recently received FCC approval to do this they were not able to sell tickets accordingly, so those who already have purchased tickets will not really know if they are sitting in the correct area. This is assembled in conjunction with longtime Yes sound associates Clair Bros Audio.

In addition there will be radio promotions where listeners can win tickets in these sections along with headphones and FM receivers.

Here's more info from the press release:

1. What exactly is Concertsonics?

An experimental broadcast of the show's live audio program. Ticket buyers in the pre-arranged section who have headphones and an FM receiver will be able to tune in and hear the special stereo broadcast of the show. They will experience a new dimension in sound unheard before in a live concert environment.

2. Which seats will receive this transmission?

Optimally, a designated section of seats approximately 25 feet deep by approximately 60 - 80 feet wide. Other areas may receive the broadcast but the audio time delay will only be correct for the designated area.

3. How much extra will it cost me to participate?

Nothing extra if you own the headsets and FM receiver or win them as part of a radio station promotion. The ticket price is not increased in any way for the qualifying sections.

4. Has anyone done this before?

No. Not in a concert hall environment.

5. Can I keep the headphones?

If you win the headphones and FM receiver they are yours to keep.

6. Why is Yes doing this?

Innovation has always been something that Yes has strived for. Yes are always interested in giving their audience production values never before experienced.

7. What can I expect?

Very clean audio with good stereo effects and almost no blurring of the sonics by the room and audience.

8. What if my tickets aren't in the headphone area?

You may still be able to hear the broadcast, but it may sound a little "echoey" or out of sync outside the designated area.

9. Am I obligated to listen to the whole show with the headphones?

No. The system is designated to enhance the show and may be used at your preference.

10. Do the headsets need to be exactly like the ones they are giving away on the radio?

The system will work best if the headsets match those issued by YES/The Radio Station, but others may work also. Generally, as a rule of thumb, superior quality earphones and receivers should be used such as a Sony SRF-M43 AM/FM Walkman Radio. If you use anything else, you are on your own. This is why we call this an experiment. As a minimum requirement, however, your receiver should have two AA batteries, not one.

11. Can I bring a boom box?

No.

I heard on the radio this morning (as I was waking up, so forgive me for any misinformation in this post) that there will be a "special" mix broadcast over low power FM. Concert goers will either be given radio receivers and headphones or will be allowed to bring FM radios to listen to the special ix. This seems like a problem, having people bringing in their Walkmen into the concert hall and taping the "Special" mix right at the show! Also, it is unlikely, but they might have problems with the wireless guitar and bass systems that Rabin and Squire use. Finally, I think that the PA system will drown out anything you could hear in your headphones. I hazily remember the idea being that you could get a better sound out of the headphones than the PA. I can't imagine how they will get this to work successfully.

Is it me, or are the Yes ticket prices a bit high this tour?

Now, granted, it was 3 years ago, but when I saw Yes on the Yesshows '91 tour, tickets were $22.50. Not only was it a great price, but you had 8 members of Yes playing IN THE ROUND, a perfect show...

THIS time around, you have Yes-West, 90125-band, The Trevor Revue, Cinema, or *whatever* the hell you wanna call them, for $29.50!!! That seems *very* high, in my opinion. Are they not expecting to sell many tickets, and are therefore raising prices?

Maybe they are taking Pink Floyd's lead. When I saw Pink Floyd on April 22, tickets were $32.50 apiece, and that was for sub-par seats. Yes West can, by no means, be compared with Pink Floyd or, for that matter, the 8-member Union band.

*sigh* maybe they know that we'll pay for tickets no matter what, who knows.

ALAN WHITE INTERVIEW by Mike Tiano
Copyright � 1994 Notes From The Edge #122/Jeff Hunnicutt and Mike Tiano.
All rights reserved.
(Used with permission)
MOT: The band on this last tour is the tightest I've seen in years, but despite this a lot of the venues didn't seem to sell that well from what we've heard from people on the Internet. Some online fans said they didn't know about the show until practically the last minute. Did the problem lie in promotion?

AW: I think we fell into a trap this year. The band has always been a steady selling kind of act, and obviously with tours like UNION where they want to see the spectacle of everybody playing together we sold a lot more tickets. We decided this time to do it with this format, so what I believe is we fell into the trap; there's been like five bands, you know, the Eagles, Pink Floyd, those kind of concerts that have been charging enormous figures for tickets, like eighty-five, a hundred dollars, and stuff like that. So we fell into the trap of the people, the extra people, other than the cult fans that come to our concerts, to see what the band is all about that couldn't afford it, basically. I think we ran into that pretty much right through the tour. Funnily enough in South America the band did great, and in Japan the band did great too. Plus in Japan we played a couple of new areas we'd never played before which were kind of a little bit slack, but most of the gigs there were very good because the album did very well in Japan. But I think we fell into the trap of just too many people out in the market and they could only decide to go to a certain amount of concerts that year, and I think a lot of Yes fans came and enjoyed what we were doing. But it was slack, we must admit that, but apparently we were doing same or if not better business than a lot of bands that were out at the same time. But obviously we like to see the places full.

MOT: What about those fans who say they didn't know about the show until close to show date?

AW: That confuses me because it's not our job and we hear these things all the time, that on the business end of things people are not doing their job, and it's usually the local promoters that that is allocated to, and if they see that a concert is going to do this much business because they see what the reaction is to the tickets going on sale sometimes instead of putting more money into it they just don't put any money into it because they knew the nature and the climate of what the business was like that summer, and they all talk to each other, all of these promoters. So once you see these guys talking to each other and stuff like that, and they say, 'Well, it's a little slack on Yes, and do I spend more money here, or do I not spend any money,' kind of thing, and I think we fell into that trap too, this summer.

MOT: Do you think it affected the band, seeing these venues weren't all that full?

AW: No. I don't think it affected the band at all because every night the band played as tight and had a good time on stage because this band doesn't get affected by things like a lack of audience. Most nights you know you see if it's a half house or something like that, that's fine for us; it's when it's like 800 people we start getting worried, or something like that, but it's never really been like that, we always play to the full because I think everybody in the band has a reputation individually and a standard to live up to between each other and collectively together towards the public that has to be respected so I think every night we come up with a good...so, no, I don't think it affected us. I think Jon got a little, kind of dismayed about some of the lack of attendances at one time, but at the same time he was totally, every night he was there singing and he's totally into the band from this tour; I mean he's totally into everybody's playing and everything the band was doing collectively together. I think Jon thought that this tour is one of the best tours we've ever done.

MOT: So Jon might be a little down before the show but once he hit the stage he gave it his all...

AW: No, this has been for Jon, two or three years more than I have but it's like a big part of your life, and Yes is a big part of our lives, he just wanted to see at this point in time a little maneuvering, a little change just to make this an ongoing thing, which it is, we're now formulating other stuff. It's like kind of regrouping and say, OK, that formula didn't work here so we'll try this formula, but I think it's a collective kind of thing.

MOT: What for you were the high points of the tour?

AW: Basically going on stage. We've traveled so much and we've been to so many places so many times that for me actually getting up on stage every night and performing music and feeling it being played so well every night and everybody performing is kind of a high point of every day for me, and I think that culminated at the end of something like 80 shows we did, we're still performing as good as was in the first two weeks--it takes a week to warm up--but then the standard was really high, the musicianship stayed all the way till the end of the tour.

MOT: We noticed the set list tended to shrink a bit as the tour went on, what was the reason for that?

AW: It was, all of a sudden we'd run into a gig whereby we had to get the gear off stage by a certain time, or we had to be off stage by a certain time, and we'd just run into time problems with whether we had an intermission or not, and every gig was individually different, we asked whether we had an intermissioncthat night, or whether we had to cut the intermission, what time we had to be offstage because of union problems; so once we'd done that we had like an A, B, C, D set kind of thing, we'd choose each night which set we were doing and if it was a really important gig we'd do like the A set, and if then we can do an intermission that night--there were all kinds of combinations so every night before the show we'd say to each other, what set is it tonight, A, B, C, D, or whatever. So you may have just caught some shorter sets, or people's reaction to shorter sets or longer sets. For instance in South America we didn't go on stage till 10:00 every night, we'd play until 1:00 in the morning, and in Japan we started 6 and come off the stage at 8:30 [because] it was basically being governed by people around us, not the band themselves, because the band always likes to give everybody their money's worth, and we did for an awful lot of shows.

MOT: I recall when you played here [George, WA] someone was yelling out, 'Play till sunset, play till sunset!' But what people don't understand is if you play after a particular time then you have to start paying...

AW: We don't, the promoter does, and then ultimately it affects the Premier promoter, the guy that's running the whole tour. Really, it wouldn't affect us except I think contractually at the end of the day when it comes down to all the bookkeeping, they'd say at this gig we had to pay $10,000 because you went on for an extra minute, and things like that happen, so every day we had the production manager stand there and say you've got three minutes, two minutes...in Japan, I saw him standing at the side of the stage and I told Trevor, cut the solo down, and we watched the clock; in Japan it's an absolute fortune if you stay overtime. So, I mean, that's the reason why a lot of that came down. I think inherent in that kind of question is the fact why we didn't play--there's also a lot of material that people thought we should play that we couldn't that we just didn't have the time to do.

MOT: Did you play 'State of Play' anyplace in the tour?

AW: Yeah, I think we played it in the first week, in about two or three gigs, which was good, it was sounding really good, but my problem...one of the most problematic kind of things about playing that on stage was because it has a hip-hop skip kind of style with a very laid-back heavy kind of style, and to play the two it could be done with a computer with a sequence going and then I can play the live drums to it, so I had to kind of sample it and it never exactly sounded exactly like it should have for the song which it probably would have gotten to the stage where it did. But it was a song that was a little weaker unfortunately on stage than some of the other material, so that's why we passed on it, but at the same time we could go right now and just play it and it'd sound great. It's just a question of what was right for the time and we had to drop something and that one wasn't quite coming up to the mark.

MOT: It was reported that at YesFest Jon said the band had rehearsed some songs from DRAMA, is that true?

AW: No. I've never heard Jon sing anything from DRAMA.

MOT: Were there any other songs rehearsed that didn't make it onto the tour?

AW: Let me see...I don't know, we went through a lot of stuff...no I don't think so, I think pretty much, that was pretty much what we rehearsed because we came through an absolute kind of list that we didn't have the time to get into anything else.

MOT: What about ConcertSonics, so you think that was a success?

AW: You know, I thought it was a great idea and I saw a lot of interest in it and I heard a lot of great reaction to it, but I never ever saw that many people using it, at least in the first twenty rows, which may have been a fact that they had too much of the PA coming at them or something like that, but I thought it was initially a great idea. Unfortunately--you can get a lot of clarity through it but--I think basically a lot of people would start listening to the show and then they'd end up taking of them off because they had to do something and just forget to put them back on, kind of thing. I thought it was not a big success, but I think people became aware of what was happening and I thought it was a start to something that could be big in the future.

MOT: Part of the problem I had with it at the Gorge was that I couldn't get the reception to come in, and you're there to see the show, and you don't want to spend a lot of time fiddling, so you're missing what's going on...

AW: Messing around, yeah...yeah, just taking the time to do it...

MOT: You're not paying attention to what's going on stage, you're paying attention to trying to get it on the radio...

AW: Did they announce it beforehand?

MOT: I heard there were some places where they didn't announce it.

AW: Really...well, I don't know, that's sort of out of my jurisdiction [chuckles], I never, ever heard them announce it but apparently they did it before every show.

MOT: I take it it didn't bother the band that this was an opportunity for people to actually record the show?

AW: No, basically, because the quality would be of radio quality; I mean it would be a memento, but you could never do anything with it, I don't think, you can get some guy to try to sell it as a bootleg but I don't think you'd ever make it to that point. Plus we've got tapes of nearly every show, so I think eventually we may do a live album out of this tour because there's some great gigs, some fantastic gigs we did

Forgotten Yesterdays © 1996-2007 All rights reserved. Pete Whipple - petew@chartertn.net

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