* * * * * * * * * * ______ ______ ____________ _________ / \ | \ __/ \ __/ \__ _________ | \| \ / |/ _ \ _________ / | // _____ || / \_/ \ |NOTES \ // / \ \\_ \_ | |FROM \ || _____ ___\ \ \_ \_ | |THE \ || / ---/______| \ \_ | |EDGE ___\ || | | /______ __/ \ | |#24 ___/ \ \\ \_ \_ // | | \_____ / ___\ _/ \_ \ \_ _// | ______/ \__ \__/ ___/ \_ \____ | \_/ \__ ___/ \___ _/ \__ \__/ \ \_________/ \_____/ \_ \_____/ \ \_ | \_ | \__ __/ \_____________/ Notes From the Edge #24 October 25, 1991 * * * * * * * * * * IN THIS ISSUE... ================ Notes From The Editor --sorry, the poll has been delayed... GIFs --GIFs in the archives! --ftp addresses too The Server --a comment Assorted Flavors --Yes Story, Yes Years video, Bruford's latest, Vevey, Wakeman in concert Rick Wakeman --"In the Beginning" --Different styles of solo material Trevor Rabin --can you appreciate his style? --his views on Yes, 1989 style Jon Anderson --it's his birthday, anyone have an address for him? Dinner with Yes --a chance of a lifetime Roger Dean --his source of inspiration YesYears --worth the $60 or so? Gregg wants to know! Bootlegs --"In The Roundabout" Nektar --yes, again... Birthdays --all you Scorpios, or would that be Scorpii? Contributors --help! help! We're shrinking! Addresses --as always, + a few changes * * * * * * * * * * NOTES FROM THE EDITOR: ====================== Regarding that interest/opinion poll mentioned in last issue, I haven't a clue. I think Doug dropped off the face of the earth, either that or he's suddenly lost net access--but that's the same thing, right? :-) Anyway, as those of you who were with us last issue know, Doug Bercow had suggested such a poll of NFTE readers, about Yes songs of course, and was supposedly going to taking further suggestions from anyone who wanted to add anything. And then we were going to present the poll this issue. However, I haven't heard from Doug since last issue, so I guess we'll shoot for next issue Doug? Cath V111PBXX@Ubvms.Cc.Buffalo.Edu * * * * * * * * * * YES GIFS: ========= From: IN%"borella@toadflax.eecs.ucdavis.edu" 25-OCT-1991 More good news for Yes Archive Fans... We have GIFs!! 3 pretty darn good ones at that! The covers to Union and Fragile, and the ABWH group picture. The first two are full color and the latter is greyscale. For those of you who don't know much about GIFs (like me two weeks ago), the acronym stands for Graphical Interchange Format and is a standardized method of encoding a digitized picture so that it can be displayed on just about any kind of computer screen. The files are compressed but still tend to be huge. Union is around 300K and Fragile is twice that! Mike Stok has put them in the Yes Archive so you can request them by mail. Since they are so big, he's broken them down into manageable pieces and "uuencoded" them. If you're already familiar with GIFs, you probably don't need to read the rest of this; you'll know what to do. But since I had a tough time figuring out how to actually get the darn things to work, I'm including a quick guide on the how's and why's of GIFs. By uuencoding a file, you change the non-printing characters in the file (the characters you don't see of your keyboard) into printable characters with standard ACSII values. This is necessary since non-printing characters on different computer systems have different values. If you sent an unencoded file by regular mail, it would get garbled. All machines have the same representation of the standard ASCII characters (the characters on your keyboard), so files can be transmitted this way with no loss of data. So when you receive a GIF, you will get one or more files in separate mailings. What you'll have to do is strip out the mail header information and blank lines, then join the files together in the proper order. The mail header of each file will tell you which number it is. Usually the first has a filename extension of .aa, the second has .ab, etc. After you merge all the files correctly, invoke the uudecode program. Most Unix systems (and probably quite a few other systems) have uudecode utilities. The command for uudecoding a file is: uudecode For example, if you want a copy of the Fragile GIF, type: uudecode fragile.uu and the program will make a file called fragile.gif in your directory, which is the actual GIF file. Since these files may be huge, make sure that you have enough room in your account. Now comes the real fun: viewing the file. If you are on a workstation (Sun, HP, SPARC, etc) and run X-Windows, I'm pretty sure you have to convert the GIF to a bitmap before you can put it up in your background. It would probably be best to consult your local guru about this. If you have an IBM PC, you have to download the uuencoded file to your machine THEN uudecode it. Of course, this means you must have the uudecode utility on your PC. Mike has made the C source code for this program available at the server. Since not everyone has a C compiler handy, I'll try to get assembler and BASIC versions put there too. Once you've downloaded and uudecoded the GIF, you can view it with one of many graphics packages. Some of these will convert it to other formats so that you can edit and/or import it into files. In fact, there's probably not that much you CAN'T do with a GIF once you get going. Many of the aforementioned graphics packages are shareware and available by anonymous FTP. Some favorites are: Graphics Workshop (GWS), ViewImage, and Cshow. I'll see what we can do about making these available at the server as well. Other than all that, you're on your own. I hope I got this all right and didn't confuse too many of you. I just started playing with GIFs recently and have had a load of fun, even though I got off to a rough start. In the mean time, if you have any questions about any of the above, or if you have any other Yes or Yes related GIFS, feel free to contact me. I'll probably put a revised version of this text into the server help file for future reference. Thanks to Dave Markfield for providing the GIFs. Enjoy, -Mike Borella borella@toadflax.eecs.ucdavis.edu +++ +++ +++ +++ From: IN%"ea47916@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu" "Eric Adams" 16-OCT-1991 I have yet to scan any more YES gifs in on the U of Il's color scanner but did locate a copy of ABWH available thru ftp to wuarchive.wustl.edu in the /graphics/gif/a subdirectory. Filename abwh, it is in gif format. Eric +++ +++ +++ +++ From: IN%"rb6c+@andrew.cmu.edu" "Richard Stanley Butler" 17-OCT-1991 I don't know if anyone has brought this up yet, but there is an excellent GIF of the ABWH album cover that you can ftp from nic.funet.fi in directory /pub/graphics/gif/a I also think the GIF as backgrounds are great, I would be very interested in getting ahold of some more. (I do not have the Classic Yes one) Rich Butler * * * * * * * * * * RE: THE SERVER: =============== From: IN%"STU_AMPASTER@VAX2.ACS.JMU.EDU" 23-OCT-1991 WOW! WOW!WOW! WOW!WOW!WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I just used the archive server and it was GREAT! it was fast, easy, and complete.....if you have not request material yet, you're in for a treat! Like mike said, don't abuse it, but if you do.... YOU'LL LOVE IT!!!! Thanks to everyone who made this archive use possible ///ampas * * * * * * * * * * NEWS, NOTES, QUESTIONS... ========================= From: IN%"chrisley@oxford.ac.uk" "Ronald L Chrisley" OK, I don't really know if this is news, but: Yes Story has been released over here: a double CD set with some of the remasters from Yes Years plus Make It Easy and Changes Live, or something like that. Anyway, nothing that isn't on Yes Years, as far as I can tell. In an advert for it in Q Magazine, they mentioned "Also released: The Yes Years -- Longform video". Anyone know what this is all about? I assume it isn't the Greatest Video Hits compilation, or is it? ***Regarding the YesYears video, it seems as though a lot of people are still unsure as to what this is. Yes, it is totally different from the Greatest Video Hits video. As far as I have gathered (I have not seen either video yet), the YesYears vid is sort of a biographical sketch/documentary on Yes. --ed. Bruford's album is out here, though I haven't actually seen a copy. I found Vevey, Part 2 on my Going for the One Sessions tape; has anyone found Part 1 in those sessions? I have tickets (front row again) to see Wakeman not 300 yards from my place. But the concert is billed as "Classical Connections II Live". Does anyone know from this title what he will be playing? Is there a Classical Connections II album? What was The Classical Connection album like? Thanks. ***Has Rick *ever* played the states solo? --ed. * * * * * * * * * * "IN THE BEGINNING": =================== From: IN%"artrocker%maple.decnet@pine.circa.ufl.edu" 12-OCT-1991 Regarding Rick Wakeman, I have heard the newest release entitled "In the Beginning." I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that Rick is a Christian (as I am) but I was somewhat disappointed with the album (good thing I borrowed it rather than bought it). For those of you who haven't heard it yet, I was disappointed (as many of you will be IMHO) because it is essentially a narration of scripture with Rick playing some keys in the background. Rick's wife Nina speaks on every track (two of which are over 10 minutes long) and her voice is by far in the forefront. The music that Rick plays is simply to enhance the speaking I suppose, there are no real songs on the cd in my opinion. So if you are looking for something similar to Rick's brilliant church organ work or his incredible songs from the mid 70's, you had better skip "In the Beginning." It is NOTHING like that. Finding it may be a problem, by the way, but it _IS_ a US release. Gregg Brown artrocker@maple.circa.ufl.edu * * * * * * * * * * SOLO ALBUMS FROM RICK: ====================== From: IN%"jmac@wpi.WPI.EDU" 23-OCT-1991 Regarding the list of Rick Wakeman's solo albums: 1. Could someone "categorize" them in terms of musical style (rock vocal/rock instrumental/ classical/new age)? 2. Where can I get them? Other than Six Wives/ Journey/King Arthur, I've found only a few of the Relativity "New Age" recordings in stores. -John MacNeill keyboards/vocals for "Reverse Nubian Quinge" * * * * * * * * * * A YESSY RABIN? ============== From: IN%"jmac@wpi.WPI.EDU" 23-OCT-1991 Also, I'm curious about which Trevor Rabin Yes compositions are favored by NFTE readers. I think Trevor's most "Yessy" song is "I'm Running" from Big Generator. It's one of the strongest songs on the album and one of my favorite songs from 80's Yes (believe it or not, I once saw a marching band perform it!). -John MacNeill keyboards/vocals for "Reverse Nubian Quinge" * * * * * * * * * * TREVOR RABIN ON YES, 1989: ========================== From: IN%"mke@kaberd.rain.com" 12-OCT-1991 Found an article I'd cut out of the local paper a couple of years ago. Its a short interview with Trevor Rabin. Date of the paper is December 28 1989. Whats interesting about this interview is that it was done around the time of the big feuding between the ABWH and "YES" factions. Here's a few quotes from Rabin. "The next Yes album, well, I won't be on it. At this point, I'm just looking at all the things that've gone down with the band, and it seems good reason not to take part. With the court case and Arista doing cheap shots with Jon's new band, I don't think it's right yet. They wanted me to take Jon's place, for instance. If the band insisted on doing an album, I said I'd step aside. At this point, I've left the band, and they've asked me not to." Obviously he later changed his mind. One of the other interesting things he says in the interview was that he was asked by Steve Howe to join Asia in 1981, and actually jammed with Downes,Howe, Palmer and Wetton. But to quote Rabin, "I returned to England from Los Angeles, where I'd moved, and rehearsed with Asia, but I just didn't think it felt right. I said I didn't want to join, and I didn't know where the next pennies were coming from." Most of the rest of the article deals with the reforming of Yes before 90125, and is fairly well known by most fans. The stuff quoted above though doesn't seem to be general knowledge. mke@kaberd.rain.com (Mike Miller) * * * * * * * * * * AN ADDRESS FOR JON ANDERSON? ============================ From: IN%"AAVASQUEZ@stthomas.edu" 11-OCT-1991 This one's just an information note: Does anyone have an address to write to Jon Anderson? Here is a man without which I wouldn't be so into music. I would like to wish him a happy birthday (I'm sure my kids would get a kick out of signing the card, too :) ) If you've got it, please beam it my way. Thanks! --Tony Vasquez ***sorry Tony, I don't have it, but I'm sure someone does. I wouldn't know whether to send it to East end Management which manages Yes, or what--he's bounced around so much lately :-) ...But when you find out, remember it's never too late to send a birthday card! Actually, now that you mention it, could someone who *has* addresses (any or all) for the guys, let everyone know? --ed. * * * * * * * * * * FAIRYTALES DO COME TRUE... ========================== From: IN%"fred@tiger.sri.com" "Dr. Destruction" 14-OCT-1991 Well, I've a got a few anecdotes I thought I'd share as my first contribution to this newsletter. First off, a brief anecdote from my personal experiences with YES. During the peak of the "Big Generator" tour, I had the pleasure of having dinner with the members of YES (Anderson, Squire, Kaye, White and Rabin) at a club in NYC called Columbus. My friend's father is a songwriter/performer and is good friends with the guy who was promoting the tour and co-owns Columbus. He managed to get us backstage passes and a table right next to the fellows at Columbus. It was very interesting to see the interaction of the members of the band during the evening, especially their reactions to our constant attempts at conversation :-) First of all, let me just say that they were all absolute gentlemen and indulged us hanging about for the entire evening. We ended up spending most of the evening with Trevor and Chris, at their table, discussing their performance that night. Trevor was by far the most friendly of the lot: asking *us* more questions than we asked them, he seemed genuinely interested in our feedback and comments. Chris was a bit daunting at first, but soon surprised us with his characteristically dry (for a Brit) sense of humor. When we told Trevor that we ourselves had a band and were playing around NYC quite a bit, he insisted that we go get a tape from our car for him. Talk about having an artistic orgasm. Anyhow, Jon was the strangest. He rapped with us for a while, but was always about six miles out in left field. His lovely wife was right out there with him. Lots of esoteric crystal-healing, peace-love-joy messages flourishing about in his casual conversation. Don't get me wrong, he was a nice guy and very friendly, but I now see right where his lyrics come from! Alan and Tony were off to themselves being surrounded by a horde of women. Trevor told us that Tony had just been through a divorce and was "seeking friendship from the local women"... sure, Tony. Alan was a complete character, frequently going into animated discussions about this or that, and coming over to us to rave about some sort of English beer he was enjoying (Snakebite, I think?). He was still wearing his leopardskin tights from the show, cute. Squire seemed to be the outspoken sage of the group, and struck me as very intelligent (and BIG - that guy must be damn near 6'5" and when he shook my hand it was lost in his large paw). We spent quite a while discussing the physics of the bass and stringed instruments, since I was at that time a Physics major. It was a very enjoyable night, and I came away with a very real sense of respect for these musicians who had, up to that point, been only sounds from a stereo to me. Now, another interesting view of the band from some guys I just met in Los Angeles a few weeks ago. One of the guys from the band I used to be in, and who was with me the night I met the BG YES group, now lives and works in LA doing session recording, commercials, and leading his own band called "The Doctors." He's recently been hanging around and doing some work with Mike and Billy Sherwood, who also live in LA. Mike Sherwood did some of the vocal arrangement work on the ABW&H and Union albums, and Billy Sherwood did some of the harmony vocals on the same, as well as cowriting and singing on "Love Conquers All" from the YES boxed set. Actually, according to Billy he wrote the entire song while Squire slept on the couch behind him... Anyhow, Billy is a huge YES fan, or, more to the point, a huge Chris Squire fan. He has released one album with a band called "World Trade" which sounds so much like a logical extension of the Big Generator album that it's striking! Anyone who likes BG and 90125 should check it out, it's probably the closest thing to new YES you'll hear without it being YES. Yet, for all its YES influence, it has a definite uniqueness which makes it stand on its own as an album. As a historical note, Billy was going to be the additional vocalist for Cinema before Jon rejoined. Trevor wasn't too hip on that idea though, since Billy's vocals are pretty much in the same register as Trevor's, not Jon's. Mike was telling us quite a few funny stories about the ABWH sessions, and how Jon Anderson is, in his opinion, a difficult-to-work-with, conceited, perfectionist bastard. He played us some of the tapes from the sessions, and I can see his point. There's one section where Billy has just put a harmony line down behind Anderson's lead track and he asks "how was that, was that a little crunchy?" to which Anderson replies over the intercom "yes, it's because you suck." It's gotta be tough working with 20 year veterans of the trade... What *I* would like to see is Squire and Billy Sherwood team up to make a solo album, which Billy sort of alluded to (he's written a lot of material for Squire, but doesn't know if or when it'll be used). As for someone's hopes that they make a real "union" album, with all members of the Union tour contributing to all the songs, I can't see this happening. Trevor has a strong sense of where he wants to go, and it seems quite apart from the way that the Union merger would take him. When I was speaking with him, he was still hesitant to call himself a member of YES rather than his own creative entity, at the time he was finishing "Can't Look Away" and seemed very enthusiastic about it. Unless he's had a great change of heart, or Squire has convinced him otherwise, I don't see him agreeing to work with the ABWH camp. I love YES in most all of its incarnations (ABWH being possibly the only exception), but I'd rather see everyone moving forward instead of trying to recreate the genius of the past; it seems that the only way to attain true artistry in music is to follow your gut feeling, not a success formula. Cheers, Fred True fred@tiger.sri.com * * * * * * * * * * ROGER DEAN'S INSPIRATION: ========================= From: IN%"krothman@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu" "Ken Rothman" 16-OCT-1991 >From the October 31st _Rolling Stone_: Rick Griffin: "In 1969 I was just out of college and broke; I could not even afford a record player. Passing by a record shop in this condition, I saw Rick Griffin's design for _Aoxomoxoa_. It was alien, disturbingly beautiful and strangely complete. It was not just the first album I bought for its cover but the first album I ever bought. I still get a thrill looking at it. It was and is a major inspiration. I started collecting albums for their covers (and still do). Seven years later, in 1976, Storm Thorgerson and I compiled and edited the first _Album_Cover_Album_. We put _Aoxomoxoa_ on the cover. Rick Griffin's death is a personal and cultural tragedy. By any standards, Griffin is a great and important artist." Roger Dean Brighton, East Sussex, England _ _ | Ken Rothman | | krothman@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu rothman@binah.cc.brandeis.edu | | ST891075@pip.cc.brandeis.edu krothman@whitebase.ukp.com | * * * * * * * * * * HELP! TO BUY OR NOT TO BUY YESYEARS? ==================================== From: IN%"artrocker%maple.decnet@pine.circa.ufl.edu" 12-OCT-1991 Hello everyone. This is my first post so please bear with me. I, like everyone on this list, am an avid Yes fan. Unfortunately I only found out about Yes two years ago (fall 1989) so I am not that familiar with every song. I have managed slowly to collect most of their songs and I know just about all of the Yes history as far as release dates, lineups, etc. What I don't know is whether I should buy Yesyears or not. When I saw it on the first day it was released back in August shortly after I saw Yes for the first time in Miami, FL (July 3), I said to myself, "Boy, I _have_ to get this!" However, after recently reading NFTE I see some disappointment in the set. I would really appreciate some of you that have either heard or own the box to send me some e-mail expressing your opinions on Yesyears (pros and cons, please). About 6 weeks ago I decided to continue my cd collection rather than save for the compilation set because you often lose the best songs with compilations. So far I have (on cd): the Yes Album, Fragile, Tormato, Drama, Classic Yes, 90125, Big Generator, ABWH, and Union. On cassette I have Going for the One and Close to the Edge. That leaves only Yes, Time and a Word, and Relayer as studio releases for me to get my hands on as far as I know (other than two new tracks on _Yesterdays_). Please tell me if Yes has any other songs. Gregg Brown artrocker@maple.circa.ufl.edu * * * * * * * * * * IN THE ROUNDABOUT--A BOOTLEG: ============================= From: IN%"heydt@eniac.seas.upenn.edu" 16-OCT-1991 There is an ABWH bootleg I recently purchased in NYC. It is called "In the Roundabout". It is done by "Chance" records of Illinois (Good name for a bootleg company) and it was from their California leg of the tour. Surprising the quality is decent. There is my tid bit of generosity Bye, bye Paul ***(happy birthday Paul --ed.) * * * * * * * * * * BACK TO NEKTAR, AGAIN! ====================== From: IN%"david@shadow.ait.com" 17-OCT-1991 Whoops! Screwed up. They were in fact from England. Finally saw Song of Seven for $23. I have to go listen to that again to see if I want to spend that kind of money on it (I seem to remember not being crazy about it...). David Kuznick david@ait.com * * * * * * * * * * WHAT DID YOU WISH FOR??? ======================== Well, here we are again, wishing you all happy birthday...hope it is! Happy Birthday, today, to Jon Anderson. Would I be sitting here right now if he'd never existed??? I doubt it!! :-) So happy day Jon, and everyone else. October ------- 25 *Jon Anderson* 26 Karl Oberjohn 27 Paul Heydt 28 Neal Dillman 30 Ed Weiland 31 Kevin Nigh November -------- 2 William MacDonald 3 Jeffrey Anbinder 3 Scott Raby 5 Su Misra 5 Tim Meekins * * * * * * * * * * CONTRIBUTORS: ============= Mike Borella, Eric Adams, Rich Butler, Aaron Pasternack, Ron Chrisley, Gregg Brown, John MacNeil, Mike Miller, Tony Vasquez, Fred True, Ken Rothman, Paul Heydt, David Kuznick * * * * * * * * * * THOSE ALL-IMPORTANT ADDRESSES: ============================== New Subscribers, Contributions, Questions/Comments/Criticism: Cathy Leak V111PBXX@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU NFTE Server (Lyrics, Backissues, Discography, Rarities, Surveys): Automated. For help send subject line "send main help", or refer to NFTE #21 YES-ARCHIVE@MEIKO.COM NFTE Server problems: Mike Borella BORELLA@TOADFLAX.EECS.UCDAVIS.EDU Mike Stok MIKE@MEIKO.COM Additions/Corrections to the Rarities List: Dave Markfield ILWN500@INDYCMS.IUPUI.EDU Additions/Corrections to the Discography, Lyrics, & GIFs: Mike Borella BORELLA@TOADFLAX.EECS.UCDAVIS.EDU For Import CD's (last resort): Joe Pizzirusso JOEP@CBMVAX.CBM.COMMODORE.COM ******************************************************************************** --< END OF NOTES FROM THE EDGE #24 >-- ********************************************************************************