WONDEROUS - A TRIBUTE TO YES [AKA: THE REVEALING SONGS OF YES]

This 2001 tribute album was masterminded by Adam Wakeman. The model he adopts is to put a band together to play on all the tracks, with guest vocalist being added to the individual songs. The band has Adam on keyboards (of course) accompanied by Ant Glynne on guitars, Lee Pomeroy on bass (both of whom have played in Rick Wakeman's English Rock Ensemble) and Richard Brook on drums. Father Rick pops by to play on two tracks, and more importantly to add his name to the project! The tracks selected are taken from Yes's early albums up to "91025", and thus represent some of the band's finest works.

We kick off with a brave choice in "The revealing science of God" from "Topographic oceans. This 20+ minute epic is cut down here to just 8 minutes. It therefore starts in rather jarring fashion with the synth motif which followed Anderson's soliloquy introduction. The synth sound created by Adam W. is almost identical to that used by his father on the original. Steve Overland (of FM) adds vocals which are similar enough to Anderson's while avoiding imitation. The extract is taken from the first part of the song, and therefore omits its wonderful climatic conclusion. The rendition overall is symptomatic of the album as a whole in that it is so faithful to the original as to beg the question, what is the point?

"Long distance runaround" features Nikki Squire (AKA Mrs Chris Squire) of Esquire, on vocals. Once again the instrumental backing is a facsimile of the original, but Nikki's vocals add a refreshing alternative take on the song. With "America" we have a cover of a cover, this being a rendition of Yes's glorious take on Paul Simon's composition. Eddie Hardin (Spencer Davis Group) steps up to the mike for this 10 minute epic, which repeats the Yes version pretty much note for note. Hardin's bluesy vocals are as distinguished as ever though. Backing vocals are provided by Chrissie Hammond, who has appeared on a number of Rick Wakeman albums.

The wonderful Judy Tzuke ("Stay with me till dawn") is the singer for the 8½ minute take on "Roundabout". The song does not really suit her well (but see later) although she does her best to adapt it to her style. Rick plays the organ solo here. "Going for the one" features the voice of Damian Wilson (English Rock Ensemble, Threshold etc.) The karaoke nature of the album is at its height on this track, the backing track being indistinguishable from the original. Once again, the song does not appear to suit the selected singer too well, Wilson seeming to be singing in the wrong range.

Steve Overland is the first of three artists to get a second song as he returns for a run through of "Owner of a lonely heart". Next to return is Damian Wilson, who takes on the classic "And you and I". The song suits his voice much better, and inevitably sounds wonderful, mainly because there is so little variation from the original.

Judie Tzuke is at her best on the more delicate pieces, so matching her up with "Wonderous stories" make sense. She actually sounds remarkably like Jon Anderson here! The closing track is a cut down version of "Awaken" featuring Dougie White of Mostly Autumn on vocals. The track starts about midway through the piece, at Wakeman's plink-plink section, and builds to the "farewell" vocal section. As such is rather destroys the atmosphere of the piece which needs to be heard in its entirety.

Overall, this album is typical of the entire tribute market, in that it offers a collection of artists the opportunity to enjoy performing great songs in a slightly inferior way. While the invited artists do a fine job, it is difficult to recommend this collection to anyone by the most ardent Yes collector.

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