WE CAN FLY

It's pretty incredible that such a classic band such as Yes, dormant for 10 years, can return without sounding absolutely dead. We Can Fly, the band's first single and first album in ten years after 2001's Magnification, seems to be a nice fusion between the band's proggier era of the 70s and their poppier era of the 80s and 90s, with some fantastic parts on both the pop and prog spectrum. It has a terribly overpowering AOR atmosphere, very reminiscent of the Styx (who they just happen to be touring with this summer 2011), yet still has a more appealing ambiance to it, care of Geoff Downes keyboard work. It's actually quite funny that Downes reappears in the Yes lineup for this particular release, because this very song is actually an unreleased track from the Drama sessions, Downes' most famous album with the band.

Although the song may have an obvious Drama-esque overtone, it still has a great, fresh new look on the stale 80s Yes that many prog fans had to suffer through. It may not be the most inventive or incredible stuff, but this is still Yes, and luckily some of the unexplored ideas of the 4 minute song should be expanded upon on the album (this track is ~20 minutes on the album), so I look forward to the album with an equal amount of hesitation. The song depicts a slightly revived Yes, but still has me worried they'll try to dip into pop too much. Benoit David's vocal output is very fitting to the music, with his experience in the neo-prog band Mystery really adding a nice lush symphonic feel to the music, which is more akin to that type of vocal style than Anderson's more nasally approach, which fits beautifully pretty much only with the band's classic material. Overall, though, the song is good, and is a nice listen for a fan who hasn't heard new Yes in 10 years. 3 stars.

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