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YES
Greatest non-hits AT TSONGAS



Prog-rock kingpins Yes have made only one studio album in the past five years, but on stage they’ve tried every trick in the book. They devoted one tour to side-long epics and added an orchestra for another. Two years ago, they reassembled their best line-up, returning star keyboardist Rick Wakeman to the long-running nucleus of guitarist Steve Howe, bassist Chris Squire, drummer Alan White, and singer Jon Anderson. And last Friday at Tsongas Arena in Lowell, they played something of a greatest non-hits set. Going deeper into their catalogue than ever before, they unearthed songs that haven’t been done by this line-up, some that haven’t been done since the ’70s, and a couple not previously played live at all.

That was partly for pragmatic reasons. Yes have released live DVDs of their three previous tours, and they were shooting yet another one in Lowell, so they couldn’t drag out the same songs again. But fans got to drool over obscurities like "Sweet Dreams" (genuine ’60s pop from their pre-fame second album), "Every Little Thing" (the Beatles tune, made even more exuberant than the original), and radically different acoustic versions of the obligatory "Roundabout" and "Owner of a Lonely Heart" (with Wakeman playing the synth-stabs on piano). Most notably, they got to hear "Mind Drive." Released in 1996, on the ultra-obscure live/studio set Keys to Ascension II, the 19-minute epic marked a return to Yes’s mid-’70s style. And given their visionary sci-fi leanings, an ode to the computer age proved right up the band’s alley. Diehards pronounced it their best track in decades, but since the album disappeared in a hurry, "Mind Drive" never got a live hearing. At Tsongas Arena, it became the jumping-off point for a half-hour suite that included the ’70s numbers "South Side of the Sky" and "Turn of the Century." With its shimmering beauty and dramatic themes, the sequence wrapped the essence of prog into one neat package.

For a band on their 35th-anniversary tour, Yes sounded light on their feet, with the fast-fingered Wakeman proving the loose cannon they’d been needing. In fact, the only letdown was the much-touted stage set by their album-cover artist, Roger Dean. Instead of using his usual otherworldly landscapes, he built it around inflatable creatures, the biggest of which were a stylized palm tree and a giant parrot claw. Topographic Margaritaville, anyone?

BY BRETT MILANO

Issue Date: May 21 - 27, 2004
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