02/12/2008

Astral Traveller - Now and Then

Steve Howe said, to a magazine from Argentina, in 1999:
A fan once gave me as a present a tape of us playing Astral Traveller, back in 1971... I ran to Jon and Chris and said: "Let's play this!" This song has nothing to do with me, but I started listening to Time and a Word (the album), and loved it, I admire Peter Banks a lot. He helped to design Yes' guitar style, in which I entered as it had been meant for me. It helped a lot that the guy before me wasn't a heavy metal guitarrist, but Peter, a clever man with different ideas.

After waiting 9 years, Howe finally had the chance of playing Astral Traveller again, in their new tour! He's clearly happy when he announces the song. And the new version also features a short and awesome drum solo! (good to hear Alan White playing faster again...)




Howe's approach to Astral Traveller from 1971 shouldn't be missed either. The Yes Album line-up played this song live not many times, and this is the only good record of Astral Traveller, including Bill's frantic drumming and Howe improvising very well. Link to the 71 Astral Traveller on comments!

7 comments:

Martini said...

Astral Traveller live in Gothenburg, 24/01/1971:
http://sharebee.com/b4bd82c4

Anonymous said...

When can we hope to see an In The Present tour?

Martini said...

Very soon (this video above is also from In the Present tour!)

Unknown said...

any chance of accessing the rest of 'live in Gothenburg, 24/01/1971'?

cheers

Martini said...

I also wish I had it, Mr.

Anonymous said...

You can find this show and much more here:

http://rapidshare.com/files/160725879/Yessessions.part1.rar

http://rs300.rapidshare.com/files/160709096/Yessessions.part2.rar

Martini said...

Thanks for the link to Yessessions! (although it doesn't contain the rest of the Gothenburg show...)