BIG GENERATOR

Well ladies and gentlemen, here we are once again for another fine adventure.....My deepest question is....WHERE THE HELL WAS STEVE HOWE AND HOW COME THEY DIDN'T GET HIM TO COME BACK FOR THIS ALBUM??!?!?!?!?!

Make no mistake, I am a hardcore YES fan, but I detest, absolutely detest 80s YES. It's horrible. Well perhaps that is too harsh, but not by much. What can I say about Trevor Rabin that has not already been said? I don't despise him, but I feel that the direction in which he led the band was truly wrong. YES is a progressive rock band......which means they are different.....the goal is not to be commercial, or radio friendly, but rather to create works of art. If there were two people in the band that stood for such, it would have to be Jon Anderson and Steve Howe. But Trevor Rabin destroyed the sanctity of the progressive haven. Then I think to myself...what kind of evil foothold did Rabin have over the band that he could force them to bend to his will? But in hindsight, it was a blessing and a curse......without Rabin YES probably would not have made it through the 80s......but with Rabin they sunk to the depths of trite commerciality. I believe that in the whole grand scheme of things, Trevor Rabin served a purpose, and that was to help YES sustain itself in a time where it was of the utmost importance to do so. But when his goal was accomplished it was time for him to move on, and I'm glad he did. Now certainly I do not intend to blame Rabin entirely for the disgrace of Big Generator and 90125, or even Talk...because quite frankly the rest of the band should have put him in his place......but I think there was fear there. Lets face it the times were changing and YES felt they had to change with the times, as did alot of great bands from the 70s era. (the greatest decade for popular music period, by the way). If you want my honest opinion, Yes should have continued writting 10 more albums like Close to the Edge, 20 more albums like Tales from Topographic Oceans, and 30 more albums like Relayer. I will praise albums such as Tormato, and even Drama, but I refuse to acknowledge the Trevor Rabin period as being anything more than a stepping stone for YES to get to the 90s.