CLOSE TO THE EDGE

Oh my god. This is probably one of Yes' perfect albums (Along with a few others). How can three songs be so rocking and so awesome? I will tell you why, because Yes created them, thats why. The album has some nice hard jazz, awesome guitar and bass parts, amazing keyboards (Thanks Rick for coming in a year earlier!) and some awesome drumming from Bill Bruford. Alan White recently joined after Bill left because of musical differences with Jon Anderson, lead vocalist. I feel that Alan has more chemistry with Chris Squire, so thats kind of why I prefer Alan a little more. Anyways, lets get to it!

The album's 18-minute epic, "Close to the Edge" is near perfection. It starts out with a natural sound, like in a rainforest kind of theme, I would guess. There is some slight keyboards that you can hear in the background if you listen closely like I did. Anyways, after about a minute or so, the whole band decides to join for the heaviest jam that you have ever Yes play in your whole life! Steve Howe, guitarist, does probably the best solo ever. The keyboards are so interesting on this song, and the bass guitar reaches the 19th fret and it sounds stunning, to say the least. Anyway, the vocals don't annoy me too much on tihs track, because its mostly instrumental. Not that Jon has a terrible voice, its just that when I gets really high in his vocal range, it can sound really annoying sometimes. But, this song is perfect, and I would not change a thing about it. The next song "And you and I" is pretty good, 10 minutes or so, not bad. Its kind of boring compared to the previous song or the next song, but its supposed to be slower than the rest of the album, I guess. Anyways, the guitar is beautiful, even if it is simple, it sounds stunning. The next song, "Siberian Khatru" is a keeper too. The intro riff is really rockin, and it sounds kind of Country-ish with the vibe that I get from it, but it's a really cool rock song. The vocals are stunning here, Jon turns in a very good performance here. The solo is really interesting sounding as well.

This is probably a perfect album, no flaws anywhere, really. A masterpiece album that every single prog-lover should have.