9012 LIVE: THE SOLOS

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This album (or mini-L.P.?) was released to promote the then forthcoming VHS video called "9012LIVE". This album could have been better if it was released with more songs played by the entire band and not with the solo performances by each member of the band which were omitted in the video. "Hold on" is a good live version, but Tony Kaye`s keyboards are more in the background.The other song performed by the whole band is "Changes", with very good keyboards by Tony Kaye (with brief additional keyboards by Jon Anderson, as seen in the video) and better mix. The other tracks are performed as solos by each member. Tony Kaye`s solo is brief and it seems that he doesn`t like very much to do this kind of performances on stage.He plays with Trevor Rabin in Rabin`s acoustic guitar solo called "Solly`s Beard", the best of the solos. Jon Anderson`s solo is the "Soon" part of "The Gates of Delirium", played differently with Tony Kaye on keyboards. Chris Squire`s solo is a brief and distorted bass guitar and bass pedals version of "Amazing Grace", followed by "White Fish", which has Chris Squire and Alan White playing their "solos" in a medley of fragments of songs like "The Fish", "Tempus Fuigt", "Sound Chaser" and others. I bought this album in L.P. in 1986, but I only have seen it available on C.D. in a very expensive import version from Japan (which I`m not going to buy, of course).

This was a bit more interesting album than the 90125 studio album, as at least the band does some tunes from their classic days ("Soon"), and the music is played live. Nevertheless, I'm not a fan of this incarnation of the band, and I can't recommend this except to those who like disco pop rock. There may be qualities in this production, that I just cannot recognize due to my tastes.

When I was renewing my car's license plate this month, I noticed that there are now so many different ways to personalize it. I can buy (for an extra fee ranging between thirty and fifty dollars) a license plate that shows what college I have attended, that proclaims I'm a veteran, or that demonstrates support for such diverse organizations as the 4H club or the Freemasons.

Why am I mentioning this in a review of 9012Live? Because, for me, a short message that says "Here I am and this is why I'm different from the other guys driving the same car" pretty much sums up the spirit of this mini-album. This album is Yes's version of a vanity license plate for each member: short, distinctive, and ultimately superficial.

The two live tracks that feature the whole band are quite good. The performance of "Hold On" is solid from start to finish, while I find the tautness of the the technically difficult parts of "Changes" enchanting.

And then we come to the solo tracks where, in the tradition Yes established way back in 1971 when they featured Howe's live solo "The Clap" on a studio album, each band member pops up to say "Here I am and here's why I am different from the other guys." The sad thing about this is that most of the solos were better live because they were presented in context with other music. Making them stand alone and work for themselves seems a cruel thing to do.

"Solly's Beard" is a short guitar solo by Rabin that is technically deft but uninspired. "Soon" proves to fans everywhere that Anderson still has the best textured falsetto in the business in a short outtake from "The Gates of Delirium." "Si" shows why Yes fans who have clamoured for the return of Wakeman time and again never really seemed to miss Kaye that much. Squire's "Amazing Grace" rendition (yes, it's the old church hymn) is an interesting novelty but doesn't showcase the talent that won him the reputation as one of the best bass players ever on "Fragile" or "Close to the Edge." Finally, "Whitefish," which is basically "The Fish" from "Fragile" featuring Squire and White with a few digressions into snippets of other songs from the Yes canon, is competent but not engrossing.

For a mini-album, two good live songs, a Squire solo with some novelty value, and decent display of Rabin's technical skills may be enough. "Here we are," it says. "This is why we're different from everybody else."

It would have been nice if the solos had also demonstrated what makes those differences so worthwhile.

This was a small live promo album that was released a couple years after 90125 to promote the 9012Live video that was released at the conclusion of the 1984 tour. Originally the video was only available in VHS or Betmax, but has since been released on DVD.

This is an okay album, but it is clearly only a promotional piece and I doubt the band had much input. This is very short (only about 33 minutes long), with two full songs, four solos, and one Chris Squire/Alan White bit at the end that's kind of a collage loosely based on "The Fish". All of the pieces are pretty good, but they fail to capture the power of the live performances from this tour. I saw the band in Oklahoma on this tour, and can confirm that each of them were definitely at the top of their game. Sure, the band was riding a popularity wave based on the "Owner of a Lonely Heart" pop hit at the time, but this represented only a small part of the concert, and isn't included on this album at all.

The two sides of the album kick off with numbers with the whole band, "Hold On" on side A and "Changes" on side B. The recording quality is pretty good, the post-production excellent, and all the band members give polished performances. These two songs were recorded in Dortmund Germany in 1984, and both are on the DVD as well.

The solo performances are pretty good too, but again I have to say that they don't capture the aura of the performances that I remember seeing live. This is particularly true of Trvor Rabin's "Solly's Beard" guitar solo. In concert he did this one about halfway through the concert while the rest of the band were taking a quick break. He was wearing an all red suit, with the stage largely darkened and a yellowish spotlight forcused on him. The crowd went nuts, as can also be heard in the background on this recording, but on vinyl the performance looses a bit of its luster. Same goes for Tony kaye's solo "Si". Kaye wasn't all that animated during his solo in concert though, and it was sandwiched in between two other songs at the time, so it wasn't really a highlight of the concert even back when it was being performed.

Jon Anderson shows why he was/is the master of progressive falsetto vocals on "Soon". His voice is all over the human hearing-range register, and does not waver or falter even for one note. Crystal clear and strong. Brilliant!

I don't remember Chris Squire doing "Amazing Grace" as a bass solo in the 1984 tour. I do remember him doing a solo, all dressed in white and dancing around like a whirling dervish though. Anyway, my clearest recollection of his solo from 1984 was that a bass player isn't supposed to play his instrument like a lead guitar, but he did then, and he does here. This is really short (only two minutes), but ranks among the best renditions of this gospel classic I have ever heard.

The mini-album closes with something called "Whitefish", an extended rhythm play with Squire and White. Here again I don't remember this solo from the concert I attended, and all the solos here were actually recorded in Edmonton Canada, so perhaps the track bill had changed by the time I saw them. Anyway, it's a nice piece with snippets of a number of Yes classics intertwined in a loose framework of "The Fish", running about nine minutes and bringing the house down with applause at the end.

This is a decent collector's item of the band, if nothing else. The two full live pieces are excellent, and "Whitefish" isn't available anywhere else as far as I know. Overall this is a good piece of music, but certainly not essential. I believe it is available on CD, but which is good because I doubt if you'll find the vinyl version anywhere anymore (and I ain't selling mine). Thee stars.

peace

This short live set has its high with "Hold On", "Si" : a short Kaye's solo. Very Wakemanesque in its texture and really good, an excerpts of "Soon" (which was already an excerpts from "The Gates Of Delirium" that will not be performed in its entirety during this live tour. On the lows now : "Solly's Beard" is a quite boring Rabin solo trying to imitate Steve (quite a daunting task, right ?) and "Amazing Grace/Whitefish" featuring the doctor Squire (as Jon will call him). This is a almost eleven minutes bass solo / jam as boring as "The Fish" in YesSongs". It also has its mediums : "Changes" with Trevor starting on lead vocals, Jon taking over the lead 'round 5'15". I wonder why they just took fractions of some numbers; they could have rendered a bit more of their live sets of the time, even if this was not their greatest period. Actually, only "Hold On" and "Changes" are played in their entirety.

FYI, the full setlist of this tour was the following (with very few variations) : Cinema, Leave It, Our Song, Yours Is No Disgrace, Hold On, Perpetual Change, It Can Happen, I've Seen All Good People, Kaye Solo ("Si"), Solly's Beard, Changes, And You And I, Soon, Make It Easy/Owner Of A Lonely Heart, Long Distance Runaround/Whitefish/Amazing Grace City Of Love, Hearts, Starship Trooper, Roundabout.

To be complete, this 9012 tour will be played 127 times in the US, eight times in Canada and only 31 times in Europe. Two stars for this live effort.

This is a pretty pointless collection of solos and songs that could only be appreciated by big fans of the 90125 tour/Rabin era. It was apparently a promotional album and I hope was not sanctioned by the band themselves. "Soon" is nice as it always is but there's really not much else here to sink your teeth into. It's also quite irritating to get pieces of songs rather than whole songs.

I would say this is poor as a live album and is by definition only for the more rabid Yes completionists. That would be a "thumbs down."

When the 90125 album was released, I was not quite happy even though I knew that some people who never heard Yes music before started to know the band.In fact, because of this album, I could connect with younger generation who knew Yes from "Owner of A Lonely Heart" album. That's fine with me. I then started to socialize them with other heavy albums of Yes like "Relayer" or "Close To The Edge" .. but still they want 90125 album. SO be it. This live album 9012 Live : The Solos was released two years after 90125. Most material were recorded live in Edmonton, Canada at Northlands Coliseum 1984 as the soundtrack of the movie "9012LIVE". One song ("Solly's Beard") was recorded in Dortmund, Germany 1984.

Why is it called "The Solos"? It's basically due to the nature of music presented in this album where each individual musician (even lead vocal!) performed their individual virtuosity in their respective instrument. The album kicks off with an Allan White thing on the intro of "Hold On" which is taken from 90125 album followed with Tony Kaye's solo on SI. Trevor Rabin performed his acoustic guitar solo in "Solly's Beard". Jon performed his vocal job in "Soon" which represents the last part of The Gates of Delirium (from "Relayer"). Even though 90125 was released during the dark years of progressive rock music where the genre was about to become a legacy as many pioneers of prog (including Yes) went pop or swept away by new wave / punk era, I liked "Changes". Through this version, the band created much more dynamic live vibes compared to original studio version. In fact, this is the best song from this live album.

As far as Yes lovers concern, I think most of them would hate this live album. But I don't think it's wise to judge the band from one angle of their career.In fact, I enjoy this album because it's quite rare - not so many people own this album.Keep on proggin' ..!

Peace on earth and mercy mild - GW

This seemed like a waste of vinyl when it was first released in 1985. Apparently it was a promotional release for the band's upcoming video of the 90125 tour. It contains nothing special, nothing memorable, and is probably the worst bunch of live material the band ever released. It contains chiefly solo material by different members that were performed during the tour. Only Hold On and Changes were true band performances. This is clearly for the "collectors/fans only" category. Two stars, maybe slightly less.

Going for the ones

As it says on the sleeve, this live album focuses on solo performances by the band members. Taken out of the context of a complete concert and bundled together in this way, such pieces can quickly lose much of the appeal they had in that environment. A lengthy bass solo can sound wonderful when placed between a couple of classic tracks ("The fish" on "Yessongs" is a fine example), but much less so when it comes after keyboards solo, a guitar solo, and a preceding bass solo! It should also be noted that this is the "90125" line up, and as such does not feature Rick Wakeman or Steve Howe. On the plus side though, the first track on each side of the LP is actually a band performance albeit from the "90125" album.

The recordings are primarily from a gig in Edmonton, Canada which was filmed for the film of the same name. Three of the pieces though, those featuring the solo slots of Anderson, Kaye and Rabin; were recorded in Dortmund, Germany.

We open with a decent rendition of "Hold on", not one of the band's best known songs by any means, but it does feature strong harmonies, and sounds pretty good in a live environment. Quickly though, we are then into three solo spots in a row. Tony Kaye keeps his brief both in title ("Si") and substance, being little more than a synthesiser fanfare. Trevor Rabin's "Solly's beard" is an acoustic guitar flourish reminiscent of the Steve Howe's solo spots. Jon Anderson's solo is the soft vocal section from "The gates of Delirium" subtitled "Soon". It is a lovely part of the track, but sounds all the better when contrasted against the bombastic chaos which usually precedes it.

Side two has just three tracks. "Changes" is the band song on this side, and the most orthodox Yes song on the album. Trevor Rabin takes on the initial lead vocals, his voice sounding rather like John Wetton's, leading to a bit of an Asia feel. Chris Squire's turn at centre stage is a short feedback laden rendition of "Amazing grace" followed by a duet with Alan White entitled "Whitefish". The title reflects Alan's surname and Squire's Fish nickname. The track itself is not really new though, being an 8 minute variant on Squire's solo spot on "Fragile", an elongated version of which previously appeared on "Yessongs".

Not an album for anyone this one is really for the Yes faithful, and even then the absence of Wakeman and Howe will cause many to question further this album's validity. Despite all its faults though, there is enough here to make this a Yes album worth having.

At a mere 33 minutes, the album hardly offers good value for money. Surely it would have been easy enough to add a Yes classic or two to the album to break up the solo spots.

I really don´t like this promo LP (or EP, for its short time). I remember hearing it in the 80´s, and although it does include a good live version of Changes and a not so good one of Hold On, I always thought it was a bad idea releasing something based on solo spots done by band members, even if by Yes members. It is interesting to have those solo moments during live shows: if you´re a fanatic you´ll hear the guys showing off their skills (in this case I recommend Trevor Rabin´s track, really great acoustic guitar bit). If you´re not, you take those moments to go to the bar to get a beer or talk to a friend about the show. But to have them on record? If only it included more group songs... and Yes certainly had plenty of excellent stuff to show them live by that time.

I hardly find any reason to anyone buy it, unless you´re into the collectors/fans/competionists categories. Other than that it´s better to look for the 9012Live video.

Rabin's beard

This short live album (or live EP?) contains live material recorded on the 90125 Tour and as such it features Jon Anderson, Chris Squire, Trevor Rabin, Alan White and Tony Kaye. The idea behind this EP is to gather together the members' respective solo spots from the tour. Si is Tony's keyboard solo spot which is short but nice. The strangely titled Solly's Beard is Rabin's acoustic solo spot and is something of an exercise in speed-guitar playing not unlike that of Yngwie J. Malmsteen. Rabin throws in a bit of Flamenco flair as well. Both Kaye's and Rabin's solo spots are very good, but not very memorable in the end. Jon gives us Soon (the final part of Gates Of Delirium from Relayer) as his solo spot. It is a lovely song, but here it sounds a little bit out of place and it is also truncated as it fades in! Chris' solo spot is a bass interpretation of the Psalm Amazing Grace. Now it is only Alan left and though it would be reasonable to expect a proper drum solo what we actually get is rather an instrumental workout featuring not just Alan by himself on the drums but Chris as well on the bass. What they give us is, of course, the famous Whitefish medley containing The Fish (Schindleria Praematurus), Tempus Fugit and Sound Chaser (the rest of the band joins in later and Jon sings 'Yes, Yes - Yes, Yes' is Tempus Fugit!). Apart from these solo performances we also get two "proper" songs, both taken from the 90125 album; Hold On and Changes. Oddly, these two were recorded in Edmonton, Canada while the sols spots were recorded Dortmund, Germany. There is also a live video (re- released on DVD in 2006) which features nine songs in total from the Edmonton show including the two ones also featured here. The solo spots and several other songs were edited out, however. This means that the present album still is the only place where you can hear these solo performances. Needless to say, a complete concert would have been strongly preferable and the solo spots would have been better presented in a running order mirroring the original set list.

As it stands, this short live album is recommended for fans and collectors only

An incoherent, useless mess. The solos work just fine within the show itself, but what a BORE when taken on their own. Tony Kaye's piece is a worthless 2-minute rendition of "Toccata And Fugue" (and some other random wanking), Trevor Rabin's piece is pleasant but rambling, and "Soon" sounds utterly stupid in this context. Only the Squire/White showcases, the first a two- minute by-the-book rendition of "Amazing Grace" and the latter a medley of "The Fish," "Sound Chaser" and "Tempus Fugit" (with Anderson singing "Yes yes" in the right places) are at all interesting, but they're not exactly the most musically substantial thing I've ever heard.

The only saving grace of the album is that it bothers to put on a pair of actual songs from the tour, both performed adequately. "Hold On" is slightly weaker here than in the Millersville 1984 gig I have as a bootleg, but "Changes" is a bit more polished, so whatever. The album is still practically useless.