CLOSE TO THE EDGE

The opening and title track is incredible. Every second of the song there is something super interesting happening, no time wasted. All of the interesting ideas and moments don't just sound nice, but lead up to an amazing finale part where everything brilliantly comes together. It's incredibly satisfying, and that's the feeling which embodies the genre. And that's why this is the definitive prog song, and the album is the definitive prog album. It's a shame they didn't use the inner sleeve album art, because I think that this track feels exactly like the artwork.

And You And I tries to do almost the same thing the title did track. It's bit more folky, you can hear some Simon & Garfunkel influence. I don't think it works as well as the first track though. Most of the time it's not as interesting. It doesn't come to a climactic closing, more as a calm resting closing, which I don't like as much. Yes never did have good love lyrics. They don't hit me the same way Beach Boys lyrics would. Still a great track with a lot of cool moving parts.

Siberian Khatru works great as a closing track. It's high energy, the musicianship shows here more than any previous Yes track. It closes this album with a great sense of "wow, that was amazing".

At this point they've perfected their early sound. It definitely trumps anything that came before. The only reason this isn't five stars is simply because I'm not the biggest fan of that early Yes sound. Their later, more electric, sound is much more of what I jive with.