GOING FOR THE ONE

"Going For the One" is one of pinnacles of Yes in my opinion, everything about it has a classic Yes flavour. Even after release of several albums Yes was still exploring ways to make effective and moving music and "Going For the One" features styles of music spanning a very large magnitude. All songs have a distinctive progressive flavour, particularly "Awaken" and "Turn of the Century", while others like "Parallels", "Going for the One" and "Wondrous Stories" all explore a different aspect of music.

After the creation of the wonderful 'Relayer', Yes under went another line up change this time one-off keyboardist Patrick Moraz made way for Rick Wakeman who had left the band (not for the last time) for only a year. Patrick Moraz did not depart without making a profound impact on the band's future sound as not only did he help deliver the masterpiece 'Relayer' he also collaborated with Rick Wakeman on the writing of some of "Going For the One." All the members, past and present contributions rendered yet another masterpiece from which many of the bestest (purposely misspelled) and most famous Yes songs arose. Indeed every song on "Going For the One" can be labelled among Yes's best. In particular "Wondrous Stories" reached a very high number 8 on the UK singles chart, which is one of the highest charting singles ever released by the band.

The album its self rendered the band extraordinary success all around the world, particularly in the UK and US where it reached 1 number and 8 on the albums charts respectively. Another major milestone in that "Going For the One" is one of just two Yes albums which reached number in England, the other being the controversial Tales from Topographic Oceans. Progressive bands are lucky to achieve an album in the top 20 let alone top 10 so Yes is a successful band in that respect. Needless to say that Yes deserved more success, along with many other progressive rock bands.

The musicianship in "Going For the One" is of an extraordinary quality and each member of Yes is at high points in their career at this time. "Going For the One" is usually called the last classic Yes album, I don't entirely agree with this statement but the time following this album was defiantly a time of change, for Yes and music in general. So "Going For the One" is the herald, which announces the end of classic progressive rock. but prog by no means died.

The Album opener, "Going For the One" swings into action very quickly with a pedal steel riff played by Steve Howe which is joined by the band. The Pedal Steel is used throughout the entire song for great effect. This song is basically Yes's interpretation of a surf song and it carries some resemblances which blend well with Yes's adaptive style. The song carries some abstract lyrics from Jon Anderson and towards the end of the song the synthesizers make themselves known. Next up is my favourite song from the album "Turn of the Century." The song starts off with some beautifully still and echoing classical guitar and vocals supported by a string mellotron in the background. This opening section is amazing but what follows is spectacular and there is an amazing instrumental section mid-way through the song which leads to the climax and end of the piece. It is hard for me to describe the music but it is the closest thing to perfect around.

"Parallels" features a church organ as the centrepiece of the song, and it was an actual church organ which Rick Wakeman played in Switzerland where the whole album was recorded. "Parallels" is an interesting song in which the band as a whole does a fantastic job, but the organ remains in the limelight for the entire song. Next is the all famous "Wondrous stories" which, as I said earlier is one of the most successful and best Yes singles. It takes influence from 'Jon Anderson's 'Olias of Sunhillow' from which the sound no doubt originated from. The sound has a Jon Anderson feel in the way it sounds, the lyrics and just the general feel of it. There is a wonderful section when Jon Anderson and Chris Squire sing in unison in which their voices blend well. The instrumental portion of the song is the standard Jon Anderson arrangement, acoustic (sometimes electric) guitar rhythm with synths twinkling in the background and some percussion here and there. Last of all is an epic masterpiece "Awaken" which is slightly different to other Yes epics. It sounds different, it has more of an art rock structure and it doesn't have as a great deal of synthesizers, but rather is more focused around Rick Wakeman's organ and piano while Steve Howe plays a pivotal role on guitar. There are still quite a lot of synthesizers, just not as much as other Yes epics (am I contradicting or what?). The percussion in the mid crescendo section is very important as it gives the organ a kind of accent and adds to mystical, driving feel. The whole song is a wonder to listen to and the little tune Steve Howe plays to end of the song and album is so meaningful despite the fact it only lasts for about six seconds.

1.Going For the One (4/5) 2.Turn of the Century (5/5) 3.Parallels (4/5) 4.Wondrous Stories (5/5) 5.Awaken (5/5) Total = 23 divided by 5 = 4.6 = 5 stars

Essential: A Masterpiece of Progressive Music

As far as timeless albums go "Going For the One" is around the top for me, it sounds as fresh now as it ever has. It has a minimalist and at the same time lush beauty which will never fade, even if it goes unseen. As for me, it is one of my favourite albums, it has to be to get five stars. Essential is the first word to come to mind when think of "Going For the One", such an accurate word. I'd recommend "Going For the One" to all progressive fans, as many experienced reviewers have written for many different albums."GET IT."