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Topic ClosedIs 90125 the most underrated Yes album?
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rogerthat View Drop Down
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Points: 9869 		Direct Link To This Post Topic: Is 90125 the most underrated Yes album?
    Posted: May 15 2011 at 10:10
As I listen to it, I wonder how this album actually gets so much flak.  Right now, I would call it their best since, um, Relayer or at least since GFTO.  On 90125, the band sounds rejuvenated and there are hooks galore (and I mean really good hooks that grab you by the collar).  It's their freshest effort since CTTE but I shall give consideration to Relayer and GFTO being considerably studied and ambitious efforts. I grant that 80s production values don't make it the easiest to endure initially but is that really reason enough to ignore Changes, Hold On or Leave It?  

Also, it doesn't sound so different from 80s Rush anyway, so I wonder if only second generation prog rock bands are 'allowed' to incorporate AOR or New Wave elements in their music. LOL  The only thing that doesn't go down so well with me is that it feels as if it was quite consciously made with an eye on commercial accessibility but, again, that's not to me such a huge consideration as to put this one down and applaud Drama in the same breath.  Thoughts?   
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Points: 13233 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 10:13
Well, it's certainly not underrated here. I love it, and think it is a true highlight of the band's career.

However, there are people who think that anything that remotely smells like a commercial song, let alone sounds like one, is automatically a bad thing. It isn't, but it's probably best to ignore the snipers and carry on enjoying. 
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Points: 9869 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 10:17
Even the first time I heard it, I never found it as bad as it was made out to be in some quarters but today it clicked for me like it never did before.  Yes, I love it too and I am glad I gave it a shot today.
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Points: 1302 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 10:32
King Crimson's Discipline incorporated new wave at the time(1981) but not AOR IMO as did Yes for 90125. I like the album but I think Trevor Rabin's AOR/pop/rock influence lasted through the 90's with the band except for both Keys albums. IMO, the compilation Keystudio, the studio tracks from Keys To Acseension Vol. I and II is the most underated album from Yes.
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Points: 901 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 10:53
90125 was immensely popular and I certainly wouldn't call it underrated. Personally, I don't like it at all, along with 80s Rush. Going For The One is the Yes album that doesn't get the love it deserves
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Points: 23 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 12:28
Yes progressed rather than remaining with the traditional prog sound and that is never popular with fans initially. Look at Marillion and even Genesis. But always in retrospect I enjoy these albums. 90215 is a class album, yes it has AOR influences but why not? That is the art of moving on. That is true progressive music.
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Points: 6740 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 12:41
On Rick Wakeman's website, he wrote the following under his "Grumpy Old Rick" blog:

http://www.rwcc.com/

"Jon is in pretty constant contact with Trevor Rabin and music has already started flying back and forth. Jon has sent through some great ideas and I will shortly be sending some stuff back across the Atlantic to both Trev and Jon. Trev, I know, is also working on music for the project and we are all really up for it and excited as to what it’s going to produce. 

As many people know, it’s a combination of YES personnel that’s never been used on recordings, and certainly, if the chemistry that happened on the UNION tour between the three of us can reignite itself, then we are in for a treat making the music and hopefully it’ll be a treat for others to listen to it......and then, with a bit of luck...live performances...and special ones, not hundreds of gigs one after the other which dissipates all meaning of the music."

Since it appears that Trevor will reappear soon in a Yes formula, I've been giving his Yes catalog a good listen recently.   I agree, 90125 has some excellent material (my favorite being "It Can Happen,") although I don't care for followup material such as "Big Generator" as much.

Trev has chops & good compositional sense, so I'm curious how he'll sound 30 years after 90125!  He has some serious growth under his belt from his film scoring & other work.  I'm more excited about the Anderson/Wakeman/Rabin project's potential than I am about the latest Yes lineup, although time will tell.  
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Points: 17493 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 13:09
No, I think it's actually overrated.
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Points: 26064 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 13:09
I prefer Talk where the band sounded a bit more 'relaxed'. 90125 was just too forced for my liking much like Genesis post Duke output. That happens when commercial considerations overtake artistic ones (imo).
The eighties is almost a total write off for most seventies prog bands with only Rush and King Crimson seeming to have an actual artistic vision.Rush's music about impending oblivion was hardly the stuff for radio airplay.
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Points: 12581 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 13:27
I'm still waiting for more news from that project, really looking forwards to it. I find 90125 a really enjoyable album, though few songs are really highligts for me. However, it's a really good pop album. Still, for a Rabin era song, my favouirte is "Endless Dream" by far.
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Points: 1305 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 13:56
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 13:59
Originally posted by The T The T wrote:

No, I think it's actually overrated.
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Points: 19942 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 14:17
Originally posted by The T The T wrote:

No, I think it's actually overrated.


Me too.
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Points: 29625 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 15:32
Hey, I liked it at the time but I have better things to listen to these days.  
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Points: 1048 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 19:58
I like it.

It's not at the level of "Fragile", "The Yes Album" or "Close To The Edge", but it's a good album.
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Points: 9869 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 19:58
Originally posted by Slaughternalia Slaughternalia wrote:

90125 was immensely popular and I certainly wouldn't call it underrated.


Welcome to popular and underrated. In other words, if it is popular and especially a popular album in the 80s from a prog rock band, it cannot be very good, is the usual presumption and it thereby gets more than its fair share of flak. 
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Points: 12654 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 20:07
Originally posted by rogerthat rogerthat wrote:

Originally posted by Slaughternalia Slaughternalia wrote:

90125 was immensely popular and I certainly wouldn't call it underrated.


Welcome to popular and underrated. In other words, if it is popular and especially a popular album in the 80s from a prog rock band, it cannot be very good, is the usual presumption and it thereby gets more than its fair share of flak. 
 
Perhaps he just didn't like the album. I could never hear it again and would never miss it. It does nothing for me. Personally, I think Going for the One is underrated and Yes sounds rejuvenated and lyrical on that release after falling into the ELP Works I and II trap with the bloated and pretentious  Relayer and Topographic Oceans albums.
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rogerthat View Drop Down
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Points: 9869 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 20:18
Originally posted by The Dark Elf The Dark Elf wrote:

 
Perhaps he just didn't like the album. 


Fair enough and I was really addressing the general assumption that something that is popular cannot be underrated.
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The Dark Elf View Drop Down
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Points: 12654 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 15 2011 at 20:25
Originally posted by rogerthat rogerthat wrote:

Fair enough and I was really addressing the general assumption that something that is popular cannot be underrated.
Well, there have been plenty of albums that have been critically panned, even savaged, that still proved to be wildly successful with the public. So, I suppose an album can be underrated in that sense. We were just talking about Tull's A Passion Play in another thread. There's an album that the critics attacked almost  universally, but it still went to #1 in the U.S.
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Points: 26064 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: May 16 2011 at 01:12
Originally posted by The Dark Elf The Dark Elf wrote:

Originally posted by rogerthat rogerthat wrote:

Originally posted by Slaughternalia Slaughternalia wrote:

90125 was immensely popular and I certainly wouldn't call it underrated.


Welcome to popular and underrated. In other words, if it is popular and especially a popular album in the 80s from a prog rock band, it cannot be very good, is the usual presumption and it thereby gets more than its fair share of flak. 
 
Perhaps he just didn't like the album. I could never hear it again and would never miss it. It does nothing for me. Personally, I think Going for the One is underrated and Yes sounds rejuvenated and lyrical on that release after falling into the ELP Works I and II trap with the bloated and pretentious  Relayer and Topographic Oceans albums.
 
Interesting. For me the holy trinity of Yes albums is The Yes Album,Fragile and Close To The Edge. That may have had something to do with the line ups. Moraz never really fitted into Yes and should have remained in Refugee imo. I still like Gates though. Going For The One has some very strong material but it feels a little bit too forced for me.
 
ELP's Works Volume album is a decent effort and much more interesting musically than many albums of the time. I wish it was more respected. The average rating it currently gets of around 2.5 is criminal imo.
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