Every Little Thing - 1970 - Reuploaded

April 3, 1970. Cologne, Germany

This is one of the last shows with Peter Banks. The sound quality is better than the 1969 show in Belgium I posted here before. But not great, the voice doesn't sound very clear, but guitars and keys are quite good.
The show's repertoire is all from the first two albums. Just 5 songs, as it was a big festival with Deep Purple, Soft Machine and others.
An exciting performance, you can hear they're having lots of fun. Bill's playing is awesome. Due to time restrictions, they couldn't jam too much, and that brought down-to-earth performances of No Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed and Everydays.

Set list:
No Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed
Then
Every Little Thing
Astral Traveller
Everydays

DOWNLOAD HERE

Reuploaded: 1976 - Roosevelt Stadium (Definitive Edition)

June 17, 1976
Roosevelt Stadium
Jersey City, New Jersey

This is one of Yes most famous bootlegs, and several different versions float around, with different names: Open the Gates, The Story of Relayer Live, etc. It's a radio broadcast, so you can expect the best sound quality amongst all 75/76 shows. This version here is by far the best one. Remastered by Tooleman, a great fan of Yes, it really has a stunning sound.
Yes had their biggest venues in this tour from 1976, and Roosevelt Stadium was one of their best moments. Luckily, this concert was broadcast by a radio station.
Some songs that didn't work well with Moraz were droped from this tour's set list: And You And I and Close to the Edge most notably.
The whole show is a great listening experience, but my favourite parts are the most epic version of The Gates of Delirium; Long Distance Runaround, in its new and beautiful acoustic arrangement, that floated to the solos of Patrick, Steve and Jon.
Roundabout is another killer. The song begins with a great intro with Alan White shining. Later, Steve Howe uses a Relayer-like guitar, and Moraz organ solo is awesome, maintaining the original lines by Rick, but with Patrick's unique jazzy style.
Oh, and check out their cover for I'm Down, by The Beatles! They really rock on this one! Jon reminds me of both Robert Plant and Ian Gillan in this upbeat tune.

Tracks:
Part 1:
WNEW/WMMR DJ's
Apocalypse Intro
Siberian Khatru
Sound Chaser
I've Seen All Good People
The Gates of Delirium

Part 2:
Long Distance Runaround
Patrick Moraz Solo
Steve Howe - Clap
Jon Anderson - Olias Solo
Heart of the Sunrise
Ritual
DJ Chatter #1
Roundabout
DJ Chatter #2
I'm Down
DJ Outro

DOWNLOAD HERE - Part 1
DOWNLOAD HERE - Part 2

(1978) Wembley Stadium, Reuploaded

10/28/1978 Wembley, UK
Wembley Arena (evening show)

This is probably the most bootlegged show in Yes history. There were multiple radio broadcasts, and portions of this show were released on various compilations. So check out before downloading, you're very likely to already have this bootleg.

It was really one of the best shows the band ever did. All of the band members has his moments in this great concert, and they sound incredibly tight, a group completely united together. This can be heard in Heart of the Sunrise and especially in the big medley they created for this tour, perhaps to commemorate their 10th anniversary, which begun on their second album, Time and a Word (with a great arrangement of the title song, featuring Steve and Rick making us glad that they replaced Tony and Peter), went for Fragile, came back to Yes, passed quickly by Tales, came to The Yes Album and finished with Relayer. I really love this arrangement, The Fish sounds terrific with the whole band playing, and they change it to Perpetual Change and then to Soon in exciting ways. This was the band's fifth concert in three days, but they're not even slightly tired!

After two songs from Tormato that I prefer live than on the original, and a powerful rendition of Starship Trooper, comes my favourite part of the concert.

These versions of Awaken and I've Seen All Good People are the best live ones I've ever listened. Awaken features a stunning work by Mr. Squire, his bass is very loud and much more present than on the original version. His backing vocals are also very good, his voice sounds more natural than on Going For The One. But I really lose myself listening to his slide bass lines accompanying Anderson. The rest of the band sounds very good too, Howe with burning guitar solos, and Wakeman with his grandious middle section

I've Seen All Good People is another killer. Alan White plays with a great energy, the whole band sound so together... and what makes me love this version better than any other is the last part, where Jon presents the band and each member plays a short 4-bars solo, all of them sounding amazing and very representative of the musicians' styles.
There's still Roundabout to give a perfect end to a perfect concert.

Close Encounters Of The Third Kind
Siberian Khatru
Heart Of The Sunrise
Future Times/Rejoice (Yes played it but no tape with this survived)
Circus Of Heaven
Time And A Word/Long Distance Runaround/The Fish (Schindleria Praematurus)/Survival/The Ancient/Perpetual Change/Soon
Don't Kill The Whale
Clap
Starship Trooper
Madrigal - On The Silent Wings Of Freedom
Rick Wakeman solo (Six Wives & Journey)
Awaken
I've Seen All Good People
Roundabout

If you'll download just one Yes bootleg, this is the one to pick!

Links on comments!

Rare video on Youtube!

You probably know Youtube can surprise us now and then... So today a friend sent me this link to a video of Yes at about 1970, with Bruford on drums and Kaye on keys, playing live in what seems an instrumental part of I See You, Then, or Yours is no disgrace... or none of them!

But I'm amazed at this short video, as almost all video footage of Yes pre-Yessongs is on playback and here they're playing live and wild.

At Youtube they say Howe is on the guitar, but I have my doubts. Do you think it's Howe or Banks? Please write a comment with your reasons.

PS: Another rarity I've recently seen on Youtube is another video of young Bill Bruford, this time with King Crimson playing Starless. Red (the last album of KC in the 70s) had no tour, but Starless was played in the band's tours from 1974, with different lyrics, with fiddle and without sax. Stunning video:

1977 - Making for the one

The sessions that originated Going For The One were recorded in details, as we can see in videos from Youtube:

The audio has appeared in many bootlegs, that come from various tape of varying sound quality. This bootleg here, Making for the one (actually one of the few with this name...) seems to me the most complete.

Of course only die-hard fans will want to hear 14 tracks (mostly with less than a minute) showing how Parallels was developed. But some surprises are also here, such as Steve and Chris singing two songs by Bob Dylan, as well as Steve playing free-form music on the electric guitar.

01- History Intro

02- Parallels #01

03- Parallels #02

04- Parallels #03

05- Parallels #04

06- Parallels #06

07- Parallels #07

08- Parallels #08

09- Parallels #09

10- Parallels #10

11- Parallels #11

12- Parallels #12

13- Parallels #13 Almost Ready

14- Parallels #14 With Vocals

15- Turn Of The Century #2

16- Going For The One #2

17- Going For The One #3

18- Going For The One #5

19- Steve's Acoustic Solo #2 (Positively 4th Street, by Bob Dylan)

20- Steve's Electric Solo #2

21- Steve's Acoustic Solo #2 (Positively 4th Street (end) and Knockin' on Heaven's Door, by Bob Dylan)

22- Steve's Electric Solo #2

23- Rick's Solo #1

24- Rick's Solo #2

25- Awaken #4

26- Turn Of The Century #2

27- Turn Of The Century #3

28- Parallels #12

29- Turn Of The Century #1

30- Steve's Acoustic  Solo #2  

31- Going For The One #2

32- Jam #3

33- Steve's electric solo #2

34- Jam #4

35- Awaken #2

36- Going For The One #3

37- Awaken #4

38- Awaken #5

39- Awaken #6

40- Wonderous Stories

41- Comments On The End

42- On The Alternate Wings Of Freedom

Songs in colours are identical, but must come from different tapes, because the red ones have much worse sound quality than the purple ones. I'm sorry, but I'm not the one who created this bootleg, so don't ask me why the two jams are numbered 3 and 4, or what is "On the alternate wings of freedom" doing here!

Link on comments!

1977 - Paris (Last show from tour)

Paris, France, December 6, 1977

The last concert promoting Going for the one, this is also one of the better audience tapes of that great tour that had no soundboard record. Synthesizer patches and guitar effects are awesomely clear, while the bass makes your head tremble. Listen to And You And I, for example, Rick's moog has rarely sounded so full in  a live record.

Disc One:

01. Opening

02. Parallels

03. I've Seen Good People

04. Close to the Edge

05. Wonderous Stories

06. Colors of the Rainbow

07 Turn of the Century

08. The Tour Song

09. And You And I

10. Cosmic Mind (Jam)

Disc Two:

01. Prelude Awaken

02. Awaken

03. Roundabout

04. Nous Sommes du Soliel

05. Starship Trooper

December 5, 1977:

06. Nous Sommes du Soliel

07. Yours is no Disgrace

08. Roundabout

Links on comments!

1971 - It's Love

Gaelic Park, New York, USA

July 23, 1971

It's Love is a song by The Young Rascals, much redone by Yes (in the style of America, No Opportunity Necessary, etc). 

Yes didn't release it officially until recently, in their box The Word is Live. This version here is as good as that one, and we also have the regular short set from Yes Album tour, with a long drum solo on Perpetual Change, and Steve also taking some liberties in that one.

Now let's read Brennan Zerbe, who was there:

This show by Yes, at Gaelic Park, was a seminal moment for rock music in New York, because it brought a new style of music into the City.

Gaelic Park, which is a sand lot baseball field in the South Bronx, had been a venue for rock bands for several summers. We all sat on blankets or the grass and watched the various shows, which featured big name as well as rising talent. There was always the headline act and a warm up band, and sometimes local bands played as an early warm up. Tickets that summer were $4.
On this date, Scott Mooney of WNEW-FM came on stage and introduced Yes as the "new band from England". They had not been scheduled to play here and were stopping by at the end of their tour. In fact, they had to borrow instruments to play their songs. Scott announced that Yes had just signed a new Tour contract and that they were on their way somewhere else and could only play a few songs.

As the band began to play, we looked around at each other and commented to each other that these guys were good. Before the end of their short set, everyone was on their feet cheering. We shouted out "Yes" to show our satisfaction.

The odd thing about this show was that as we enjoyed subsequent bands, Humble Pie and Mountain, everyone shouted "YES" after their great songs. The show ended before Mountain, and the audience, was satisfied (despite other reviews), which led to some bottle throwing at the stage set.
But we all knew that we had seen something very special. I went home that night, told my brother Bob, and have been a Yes fan ever since. Seen a lot of bands since then, and I've seen Yes several times since then...but never something as electric as that late afternoon outdoor performance by Yes. Absolutely wonderful.

Probably the second best bootleg from Yes Album tour (the show from the day after this, at New Haven, is unsurpassable)

Now I was listening again to this boot, and noticed Jon seems to be confused, or maybe totally stoned... Listen to him speaking, for example describing the vachalia Steve plays as like a Portuguese monstrosity for thrashing with your bare hands. But they still sing and play as well as we're used to.

Set List:

Introduction / Yours Is No Disgrace

I've Seen All Good People

Clap / Classical Gas

Perpetual Change

It's Love

Link on comments!

Bruford - Beelzebub (1979)

Line-up:

Bill Bruford - drums

Dave Stewart - keyboards

Jeff Berlin - bass

Alan Holdsworth - guitar

The tune is a real mover, and it’s definitely Yes-like in its structure since it’s made up of a few different time signatures and a wonderfully busy progressive tempo. "Beelzebub" starts and halts suddenly, then shifts from frantic to smooth and soft to hard in an instant, illustrating Bruford’s rhythmic control and musical imagination. There’s plenty of energy spawned by Bruford’s use of the cymbals as well, and the transition from a busy state to a relaxed one works its way effortlessly through the other instruments, which do their bit at handing the track its jazzy surface.

(from allmusic.com)

Coming soon: a bootleg from a complete show of Bruford's self-titled band in 1980.

1979 - Vancouver

May 05, 1979, Vancouver, Canada

An anonymous reader brought us a present. Link and comments by him/her:

This is a soundboard recording from Yes’ Tormato tour. I don’t know why this was recorded so well (perhaps for a radio broadcast?) but the sound quality and mixing goes well beyond what any reasonable person would expect from a bootleg.
This recording was originally available on a three LP bootleg named Seventh Age Imagination. That artwork is included in the ID3 tags, just for shits and giggles.
This is the entire concert minus the “Firebird Suite” intro and the “I’ve Seen All Good People” > “Roundabout” encore. If you’re at all familiar with Yes you’ve heard those two songs about a bazillion time already, so no great loss.

What appeals most to me are the liberties Yes took with their own music. For example, long songs are short—short songs are long.
Also, most of the songs segue into the next, and not just the usual “Long Distance Runaround “> “The Fish” transition, which shouldn’t really count anyhow. Speaking of “The Fish,” Squires Bass solo morph’s in a Tales from Topographic Oceans suite at its end.

How suite is that? Very, or I wouldn’t have posted it.

This is the Classic Yes lineup at their peak, rocking their ass off right before the birth of punk rock and at the peak of disco, thumbing their noses at all of it with heaping helpings of pure, unadulterated talent.

01 Siberian Khatru
02 Heart of the Sunrise
03 Future Times Rejoice
04 Circus of Heaven
05 Time and a Word
06 Long Distance Runaround
07 The Fish (with Tale’s Medley)
08 Perpetual Change
09 Soon
10 The Clap
11 And You and I
12 Rick Wakeman Solo
13 Starship Trooper
14 Awaken

Enjoy Yes-heads! 

Links on comments!

Reuploaded: 1974 - King Biscuit Flower Hour

December 11th, 1974
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

This show was recorded for the famous radio show King Biscuit Flower Hour, and it presents Yes at the very beginning of Relayer tour. The whole album is played, and all the arrangements are quite similar to the studio ones.
Sound Chaser opens the concert like a thunderstorm, and we can't help but get amazed when they really can play all the complex sections with no difficulty!
Close to the Edge shows us that Moraz, being an awesome keyboardist in hiw own style, is one of the worse copycats they could find for Rick Wakeman. His solo near the end is almost ridiculous, and all through the song he's very low on the mix - luckily!
But on To be Over he shows us his best, rivalling Rick when it comes to the number of keyboards used. He once said his synth solo in the end of the song was improvised in the studio, but it was so complex that he had to write it down to play live. That's my favourite live performance of the song (ok, there weren't many others...)

The Gates of Delirium has an awesome stereo sound here, perhaps even better than the one in Yesshows, the mix is perfect, alll instruments are loud and Squire's powerful bass is very clear (especially his counterpoints inSoon).


Setlist:
Firebird Suite
Sound Chaser
Close To The Edge
To Be Over
The Gates Of Delirium
And You And I
Roundabout

This show has been released in many different bootlegs: Close To The Edge, The Affirmery, The Gates Of Boston Garden and others.

(according to ForgottenYesterdays Ritual was played, but there's no known version of this)

Links on comments!

On the Silent Wings of Freedom

This is a much cleaner copy, too bad they didn't include this video when they released the Greatest Video Hits back in the 90's...

(notice that this version is different from the one on Tormato, and arguably better)

1975 - NJF Festival - Reading

Reading, England, UK
August 23, 1975

This is the last show from Relayer tour, after which the band would stop playing for eight months so that every member would record his solo album.

Ritual is powerful, Sound Chaser is stunning, but two short songs steal the scene here:

Leaves of Green, the last section of The Ancient, was played separated from the original song for the first time in this show.

High Vibration is what you're thinking: a really early version of Awaken! As Pete Whipple says on Forgotten Yesterdays:

It's still just the opening to 'Awaken' but Moraz and Howe have definate parts now. It's in a different key with White giving it a rock beat! This is about as close as you'll get to the legendary Moraz 'Awaken' everybody wants to hear.

Moraz also shines in his solo, this time on the electric piano (unlike the mellotron/orchestron solos of 1976). His playing is a pleasure to hear all through the show, but on the other hand the keys' loud sound makes Steve's guitar sound low on the mix, especially on Gates of Delirium (which has a couple of minutes lacking, between the "battle scene" and "Soon". Well, that's an alternative way of listening to this epic song, surely better than the QPR DVD, when Jon's guitar was louder than Steve's!

Disc 1 
01. Opening
02. Sound Chaser
03. Close To The Edge
04. And You And I
05. High Vibration
06. The Gates Of Delirium

Disc 2 
01. I've Seen All Good People
02. Leaves of Green
03. Long Distance Runaround / Moraz Solo
04. Ritual
05. Roundabout

Links on comments!

1974 - Tales at Nassau Coliseum

1974-02-14
Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum
Uniondale
New York
Another show featuring the complete Tales, originally posted at the blog The clock that went backwards again.
Remastered by Tooleman.
Small segments of Revealing Science of God and The Ancient are missing... But overall the sound is good for audience bootleg (there was no soundboard record of this tour)

101 Firebird Suite
102 Siberian Khatru
103 And You And I
104 Close To The Edge
105 Album Introduction by Jon Anderson
106 The Revealing Science Of God (part 1) (tape flip)
107 The Revealing Science Of God (part 2)

201 Comments by Jon Anderson
202 The Remembering
203 The Ancient (part 1) (tape flip)
204 The Ancient (part 2)
205 Ritual
206 Roundabout

Links on comments!

Reuploaded: 1978 - Wembley Arena

10/28/1978 Wembley, UK
Wembley Arena (evening show)

This is probably the most bootlegged show in Yes history. There were multiple radio broadcasts, and portions of this show were released on various compilations. So check out before downloading, you're very likely to already have this bootleg.

It was really one of the best shows the band ever did. All of the band members has his moments in this great concert, and they sound incredibly tight, a group completely united together. This can be heard in Heart of the Sunrise and especially in the big medley they created for this tour, perhaps to commemorate their 10th anniversary, which begun on their second album, Time and a Word (with a great arrangement of the title song, featuring Steve and Rick making us glad that they replaced Tony and Peter), went for Fragile, came back to Yes, passed quickly by Tales, came to The Yes Album and finished with Relayer. I really love this arrangement, The Fish sounds terrific with the whole band playing, and they change it to Perpetual Change and then to Soon in exciting ways. This was the band's fifth concert in three days, but they're not even slightly tired!

After two songs from Tormato that I prefer live than on the original, and a powerful rendition of Starship Trooper, comes my favourite part of the concert.

These versions of Awaken and I've Seen All Good People are the best live ones I've ever listened. Awaken features a stunning work by Mr. Squire, his bass is very loud and much more present than on the original version. His backing vocals are also very good, his voice sounds more natural than on Going For The One. But I really lose myself listening to his slide bass lines accompanying Anderson. The rest of the band sounds very good too, Howe with burning guitar solos, and Wakeman with his grandious middle section

I've Seen All Good People is another killer. Alan White plays with a great energy, the whole band sound so together... and what makes me love this version better than any other is the last part, where Jon presents the band and each member plays a short 4-bars solo, all of them sounding amazing and very representative of the musicians' styles.
There's still Roundabout to give a perfect end to a perfect concert.

Close Encounters Of The Third Kind
Siberian Khatru
Heart Of The Sunrise
Future Times/Rejoice (Yes played it but no tape with this survived)
Circus Of Heaven
Time And A Word/Long Distance Runaround/The Fish (Schindleria Praematurus)/Survival/The Ancient/Perpetual Change/Soon
Don't Kill The Whale
Clap
Starship Trooper
Madrigal - On The Silent Wings Of Freedom
Rick Wakeman solo (Six Wives & Journey)
Awaken
I've Seen All Good People
Roundabout

If you'll download just one Yes bootleg, this is the one to pick!

Links on comments!

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!

1976 - Memphis

June 04, 1976 - Memphis, Tenessee, USA
Yes's solo album tour didn't work as expected and the set-list was ever-changing. Quoting Circus Magazine from September 13, 1976:
At a concert in Memphis' Mid-South Coliseum, when Yes was still performing various solo material, Chris Squire got his turn with "Hold Out Your Hand," the opening track from his own Fish Out Of Water album, and some ten thousand people responded to the Squire tune with a standing ovation. "We were still experimenting with the show at that stage, and we were playing different songs every night, and I think that one night we just happened to play my song," says the too-modest bassist.

Indeed the best thing about this show was Squire's great song. He sings so well, and then in the end there's an instrumental rendition of You by my side, with Howe on steel guitar. Not to be missed.
Other high points are Sweet Dreams, with all the band playing intensely and freely that early song, and Moraz's solo, this time not on mellotron but on a bluesy piano.
The tape was from audience and sound quality is not the best.

Set-list:
Apocalypse
Siberian Khatru
Sound Chaser
I've Seen All Good People
Song Of Innocence
Hold Out Your Hand/You By My Side
Leaves Of Green
Clap
Long Distance Runaround/Moraz Solo
Harp Solo
Heart Of The Sunrise
Gates Of Delirium
Roundabout
Sweet Dreams

Links on comments!

1974 - The Tooleman presents Yessongs 2

Live at Madison Square Garden, New York City, Feb 18, 1974

Some Yes fans have commented on the blog thanking for the "full Tales experience" or, in other words, the chance of hearing the full Tales from Topographic Oceans played live on stage. To those, this bootleg is the holy grail.
Tooleman, one of the greatest Yes aficionados in the world, managed to get a tape with the full Tales played live in New York, in a very good sound quality. Bad news is the tape didn't contain the rest of the show (the whole Close to the Edge album and Roundabout). He did a wonderful job remastering the tapes, and they sound fresh and lively. You can hear the moog as if it were beside you!
It might be just my imagination, but they sound so interested in this evening... The Ancient is simply dazzling: Howe plays with all his soul, and Rick has a more important role than in the studio version.
Links on comments!

REUPLOAD: 1976 - Vancouver

By 1976, Yes had Patrick Moraz, a keyboardist loved by many, and hated by perhaps even more. The band was at the peak of their success, making enormous shows, often on stadiums.
This one is from July 22, and features two epicss with astounding musicianship from the whole band: Ritual and The Gates of Delirium. Sound Chaser is another special moment. In spite of the song's complexity, it worked sso well live!
Very interesting as well are the solo sections, with a good mellotronesque solo by Moraz, Steve playing Clap and his arrangement of Vivaldi's Winter (which would be recorded much later on his solo album Natural Timbre) and Jon doing an harp solo, joined by Steve's steel guitar.
Audio quality is good (not excellent), but worse in some moments. Alas, the tape probably ran out before the end of the show, and Roundabout is cut.

Setlist:
Apocalypse
Siberian Khatru
Sound Chaser
I've Seen All Good People
The Gates Of Delirium
Long Distance Runaround
Moraz solo
Steve Howe solo
Jon solo
Heart Of The Sunrise
Ritual
Roundabout (end cut)

Recommended for:
Those who like Relayer and Patrick Moraz.

Links on comments!

REUPLOADED: 1977 - Best of Wembley

October (from 24 to 29), 1977
During their tour for Going for the One, Yes had a week-long stand in Wembley Arena, UK. Mick Dillingham and Steve Darton recorded all of the shows in their cassete tapes. Later, TheTooleMan (a great Yesfan who mastered countless bootlegs) had access to these tapes, made some noise reductions, and chose the best songs from each day, to give us the best. The result is an astonishing bootleg, with powerful performances of the band, in their homeland. Audio quality is good, and you can hear the crowd only between the songs.
Close to the Edge is slightly different: Steve Howe changed very much the introduction, giving us a rougher and rocking guitar playing. Rick also changed his awesome organ solo near the end, with results not so good. And the church organ's sound is not the best (neither it is in Parallels)
Turn of the Century is very beautiful here, the song's tender feel is recreated very well on stage.
Awaken features, again, astonishing work from Chris Squire. It looks like he gets better when playing this song in Wembley. I'll quote Simon Barrow's opinion in Forgottenyesterdays: "What really turned me inside out was ‘Awaken’. To some it’s an overblown cycle of fifths, I know. But to me, that evening, it was simply transcendent. The organ solo building to a tremendous delayed climax, then tapering off into the haunting vocal refrain and Howe’s brief, whimsical acoustic coda: it all left me drained and elated."
But the encore is the best. At this tour, the band started to play a very long version of Starship Trooper, which can be listened here at its best. The long jam of minimoog and guitar (changing frantically from one to the other) is so exciting, with Chris and Alan doing a steady accompaniment for Steve and Rick's long musical extravagance. Here, it is an extravagance of perfection.

CD1 Tracks:
Firebird Suite (10/29)
Parallels (10/29)
All Good People (10/26)
Close to the Edge (10/28)
Wonderous Stories (10/29)
Colours of the Rainbow (10/28)
Turn of the Century (10/27)
Tour Song (10/29)
And You And I (10/28)

CD2 Tracks:
Intro Comments (10/26)
Going for the One (10/26)
Flight Jam (10/27)
Awaken (10/27)
Starship Trooper (10/24)
Roundabout (10/24)

Lins on comments!

1978 - UK

Out of the Blue - Live in Riviera Theatre, Chicago, Illinois, USA
20th July, 1978
Soundboard Recording

Lineup:
Eddie Jobson: Electric Violin, Keyboards and Electronics
Allan Holdsworth: Guitar
Bill Bruford: Drums & Percussion
John Wetton: Vocals & Bass

This band started in late 1976 when Wetton called Bruford to play in a band with Rick Wakeman. They rehearsed for 6 weeks before Wakeman left the projected band and re-joined YES for the "Going for the One" album.Bruford and Wetton wanted to carry on playing together, so Wetton invited Jobson, who was playing with Frank Zappa.He didn`t join them very soon because he had some work to do with Zappa`s band. Bruford recorded his first solo album "Feels Good to Me" in mid 1977, with Holdsworth (who had played with Soft Machine, Gong and Jean Luc Ponty) on guitar. When Wetton, Jobson and Bruford finally were rehearsing together, Bruford invited Holdsworth to the new band called "U.K.". They recorded this first album between December 1977 and January 1978. They toured during 1978, until they started to have problems due to different ideas about the musical style for the band: Bruford and Holdsworth wanted a more jazz- rock style for the band, while Wetton and Jobson wanted a more Pop-Rock (in the case of Wetton) and Prog Rock (in the case of Jobson) style for the band.
I think that the most interesting thing in this band, apart of the music played by these four very good musicians, is Bruford`s drums and percussion playing, with a lot of changes in time signatures and very good technique.Holdsworth has his most interesting playing in the songs "In the Dead of Night", "Thirty Years", "Nevermore" and "Mental Medication". He is a superb virtuoso guitarrist, who doesn't have many places to shine here, but when he's on the spotlight he's excellent. For the most part, Jobson is the main musician with his keyboards. Wetton plays his bass as good as usual, singing very good too.
(Parts quoted from Guillermo Vázquez, in http://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=1360)

Setlist:
01: The Only Thing She Needs
02: Carrying No Cross
03: The Sahara Of Snow
04: Thirty Years
05: By The Light Of Day
06: Presto Vivace
07: In Dead Of Night
08: Caesar's Palace Blues

Links on comments!