TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS

This is as good as it gets for Yes. (Besides "Relayer" and "Close to the Edge" or course). The album is near perfection. The vocals are simply wonderous, the bass guitar lines are distorted and crunchy, the guitar is so fast that its just simply hard to resist, the keyboards are so amazing, the pianos are amazing, and the drumming is suberb. This album has great musicianship from all members of the group. First things first, lets talk about the lineup that is going on here. The lineup right on this album is Jon Anderson (vocals), Steve Howe (Guitars), Chris Squire (Bass Guitar), Rick Wakeman (keyboards), and Alan White (Drums). So, Bill Bruford left the band a year earlier because of Jon Anderson's lyrics, and he didn't want to go in that direction. Alan White joined the band for this album, and he has much more chemistry with them as a whole, especially Chris, with some good bass and drum parts on this album. Rick Wakeman would leave after this album because of musical differences, and he was replaced by Patrick Moraz a year later. And that was it for the lineup, now, for the main review.

So, the first song "The Revealing Science of God" is stunning. It's the best thing on this album, perfection of course. It starts with this "choral" kind of sound, and its so good. There is some awesome and some wierd keyboard noises and guitar noises and bass noises that are slightly sloppy, but match because of its cresendo into the song. The keyboard after the chant is really amazing, and the guitar riff's are amazing. The song is just right for my ears, and I don't know why its underrated. "The Remembering" is my second farvorite of all the songs. It has some really cool keyboards and stuff, it's nice. Then it goes to a mellow guitar kind of thing, where Jon sings softly with Chris and Steve for a while, and then it goes into an acoustic kind of thing. It's a really interesting song. "The Ancient" is probably my least favorite song, but its okay. The beginning is very boring to me, but it does seem to get progressively better, but I just have to skip the first minutes because the drums and bass are really annoying, though show good musicianship. "Ritual" is the middle-man on the album. It's pretty good, not bad at all. It's alot of the same, but it works really well because I'm pretty sure this is a concept album because of the lyrics and stuff. Its a very good soloing song for Steve, of course.

This album is a "must-have" album, you need to get it or your not a real prog-rock fan.