Artist Rundown: Yes (Part 1)

Artist Rundown is a periodic feature in which I briefly share my thoughts, memories and opinions of an artist or group's entire recorded work in chronological order. First up is one of the bands which helped developed my love of and taste in music: progressive rock legends Yes.

Yes - Yes (1969)

When I first read about this album, it was described as light, jazzy 60's pop. While those influences are definitely apparent, it's clear by the end of the the first track that, even this early, these guys had a rough blueprint of the basic Yes sound. Chris Squire's trebly, distorted Rickenbacker bass sound is already fully developed and pleasingly loud in the mix, and he and drummer Bill Bruford lock horns throughout the record to incredible effect. Meanwhile, the woefully underrated Peter Banks (R.I.P.) lays down all manner of jazzy, major-key lead lines that prove he pioneered the Yes guitar sound two years before his replacement by Steve Howe.

The group's propensity toward clever arrangements is already evident in the jammed-out, quasi-symphonic treatment of The Beatles' "Every Little Thing" and the closing micro-epic "Survival." Also of note is singer Jon Anderson's songwriting, which is surprisingly warm and tender given the abstract approach he would take to lyric writing for the better part of the '70s. "Yesterday and Today" and "Sweetness" are both gorgeous, gentle love ballads without a trace of the sentimentality that would plague Anderson's later attempts in this area.

Postscript: The 2003 expanded edition includes several essential bonus tracks, including a rare single version of "Everydays" and an epic, seven-minute B-side called "Something's Coming" that just about blew me away when I first heard it (yes, that's "Something's Coming," as in West Side Story -- just give it a listen).