Yes - Yessongs
|
List Price: Our Price: $7.58 You Save: $7.36 (49%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Yes - Yessongs
Movie Review: Close to the Best
Summary: 5 Stars
If you are interested in Yes, perhaps this DVD will take you past "I've Seen All Good People." This is a wonderful performance of a wonderful band--a must have for any true Yesfan.Movie Review: Awesome
Summary: 5 Stars
Im a big "Yes" fan and I thought this DVD was GREAT!! Early "Yes" footage is awesome with great soundMovie Review: Magnifico, but.....
Summary: 4 Stars
My love of classic Yes -- particularly the live performances of "Close to the Edge" and "Yours Is No Disgrace," on the old Yessongs album, led me to purchase this visual DVD, in part because I needed to actually see Steve Howe's fingers moving over the frets during my favorite parts.
The opening minute or so of "Close to the Edge" on the old live audio album, Yessongs, for example, is, to me, an absolute miracle of guitar playing by Steve Howe -- someone who at his peak in the 1970s combined phenomenal intricacy of rhythm and texture with phenomenal speed, and a sense of unbeatable wildness with classical discipline, and beauty. He was a wonderful fusion of the classic and romantic, the formal and the informal, Vivaldi, Country and the most lovely Rock. So I was disappointed to find that those who filmed the performance rather foolishly filmed, not Steve's fingers on the frets during those moments of incomparable genius during the first minute of so of "Close to the Edge" -- instead, unbelievably, the DVD shows a half minute of images of amoebas bifurcating and so on, as one hears the music unfolding in the background. How could they fail to put this man's fingers and face on film at the moment of his remarkable peak?
Similarly, during "Yours Is No Disgrace" when Howe is playing the longish, brilliant rapid cascading run of intricately shaped notes that precedes the first vocals of the song -- to me, perhaps the most glorious guitar run in the history of music -- truly a full quantum leap above all the other great guitar players I've heard -- a run I can only picture to you by asking you to combine an image of the delicacy and sense of vastness of the greatest impressionist paintings (seen in person), together with an image of the greatest, fastest action or chase sequences you ever saw in any Hollywood blockbuster. Unbelievable drama, brilliantly adept dynamism, indeed heroism, fused with ethereal sublimity. Sometimes, to listen to classic Howe playing guitar, sounds a bit like a classically trained humming bird's invisibly fast wings must be playing the notes, or perhaps it's that time slowed down for Howe, so that despite the incredible speed of the notes, he was able to shape them, and establish remarkably complex rythmic patterns in the midst of that dramatic speed. And above all, so pleasing to the ear (though one might have to listen a couple of times before the beauty of it begins to dawn). And despite all the synthesizers and electronic gizmos available to him and, as I understand, innovated by him, he usually chose a wonderfully raw, pure rock guitar sound.
And what were the filmakers doing during this mighty run of notes by Howe? Incredibly, they were filming not Steve Howe's miraculous fingers working the frets, but Chris Squire, bless him, who was not even doing anything much at that moment. Sheesh.
For those who know the old Yessongs live album/CD, I should note that the performance of Yours Is No Disgrace on that album is not the same as the performance on this DVD. The great longish sort of duet in the middle of the song between Howe and Squire --where Squire interjects every few seconds or so some bass note or other that wonderfully accents Howe's gorgeous lead -- that section, I would say, is not as well done in the concert that was recorded on this DVD -- but it is still great to see Howe on the DVD working out another version (earlier inchoate version?) of the themes worked out so brilliantly on the classic audio recording Yessongs.
For those who love Yes, this DVD is definitely worth it. There are other live performances on DVD, but I haven't got those yet.
Movie Review: A Great Concert Showing the Magic that was YES
Summary: 4 Stars
Performed and recorded a few months after the release of 'Close to the Edge' and the abrupt departure of drummer Bill Bruford, this show represents Yes as it crested on a tidal wave of critical acclaim and creativity.
The standards are all here, of course, with the band performing 'Your Move/All Good People', 'Close to the Edge', 'And You and I', 'Roundabout', 'Yours is No Disgrace' etc. but there are, in my opinion at least, some serious omissions here. Yes would have been well served to have left out Howe's solo rendition of 'Clap' and Wakeman's theatrical 'Excerpts from Six Wives of Henry the VIII' and instead included, for instance, 'Heart of the Sunrise' and 'Siberian Khatru'- both breathtakingly performed on the Yessongs album but, for reasons unknown, not the movie. Likewise, the cheesy special effects interspersed with 'Close to the Edge' are unbelievably annoying, especially when the dry ice and mist encloses the stage and performers during the composition's beautifully ethereal middle section.
The editing and production could have been better with some scenes not properly synchronized with the sound. I also found the looping of the applause track to be disconcerting and an unnecessary form of cheap hype. There are also far too many scenes focusing on Steve Howe - his face, his fingers, his prancing around the stage and not enough of Chris Squire or Rick Wakeman. Alan White is portrayed the least probably to assuage Bill Bruford fans.
The performances themselves are capable but I can never understand why the band insisted on playing each song at double its normal tempo. Combine that with the muddy sound quality and you almost get cacophony at times, the fine points of the band's musicianship pretty much being lost. Listen, for example, as Chris Squire tries to play the intricate bass lines of 'Yours is No Disgrace'. I found myself disappointed as he hurried over the phrasings just to keep up with the rest of the band. Another problem was Steve Howe's free form guitar solo played during the middle of the same tune. Quite frankly, it stinks. His technique is sloppy and downright uninspiring and he appears, at times, to be struggling for ideas but then again, Howe has never been known as a particularly creative improviser, preferring instead, like cohort Chris Squire, to carefully work out and rehearse his solos beforehand.
All criticism aside, this concert, to me, represented a peaking for Yes. Their subsequent work, the many personnel changes, the almost revolving door of band members coming and going, the complacency and boredom that began to set in as the seventies wore on.....These all gradually chipped away at the band's energy and creative hunger and what was known as YES, as it was in 1972, as we see them in concert on this film, soon morphed into something entirely different and unrecognizable. Too bad.
Movie Review: Yes as its best
Summary: 4 Stars
Here we have classic Yes as it best, recorded in 1974. Minus side is poor sound (mono!) and picture quality. But how they play and perform is amazing, especially compared to Symphonick Live in Amsterdam 2001 (please see my review of that concert DVD). In Yessongs band it as its best, playing fiercly, Stewe Howe showing his guitar virtuous and Andertong also very good.The concert is shorter than is Symphonic Live but that concert included new poor songs and poor Howe guitar solo. Yessong is so much more dynamic concert, band playing like prog classic band should play which is why I allow 4 stars despite poor quality of the music and picture. If they would have played beautiful Gates of Delirium I would have given five stars. That song is the only better song in Symphonic live concert compared to ths very dynamic show. If you want to see Yes as their best, sounding and acting like true prog classic please choose this DVD is steand of dry and boring Symphonic live.