Greetings:

For those of you who enjoy examining the songwriting process, such as observing the differences between the songs on David's own A FINE MESS and HERE COMES THE NEW FOLK UNDERGROUND, then you might be interested in checking out the following two compact discs, which allow the listener to do just that.

Most everyone here should already be familiar with the songs on the 1983 YES compact disc 90125 (so named after its' original ATLANTIC RECORDS catalog number) --- songs such as HOLD ON, CHANGES, IT CAN HAPPEN, and their number one hit single OWNER OF A LONELY HEART. You might be surprised to know that these songs were all written by South-African native TREVOR RABIN, who served guitar duties in YES while STEVE HOWE spent time with his side project ASIA.

90125 has been recently released as part of the RHINO EXPANDED AND REMASTERED series, where eleven of YES' early albums have all been re-released with a plethora of bonus tracks. In the case of 90125 --- there are six additional tracks:

01) LEAVE IT (Single Remix)

02) MAKE IT EASY (The guitar/keyboard intro to this song was played live as the introduction to OWNER OF A LONELY HEART)

03) IT CAN HAPPEN (Original Version)

04) IT'S OVER

05) OWNER OF A LONELY HEART (Extended Remix)

06) LEAVE IT (A Capella Version)

Of these six songs, all are interesting for various reasons. The original version of IT CAN HAPPEN varies significantly from the final version. But for my money, the most intriguing track is the vocal- only track of LEAVE IT. This is an excellent example of the YES vocal production, where voice upon voice was layered in always fascinating ways. The a capella version stands on its' own as a seperate track. There is so much melody and structure to the vocal tracks, that the song remains interesting, in spite of the absence of instrumentation. Playing both versions back-to-back will reveal to the listener just how much of LEAVE IT hinges upon the vocal tracks, which form the foundation of the song. Usually vocals are the last to be added, but in this case, it was just the opposite. Without these two pieces of musical history to listen to and compare, I never would have come to know these aspects of this music I love so much.

In addition, former YES guitarist and co-vocalist TREVOR RABIN has released a wonderful compact disc filled with the original 90125 demos, plus a few others that made it onto other YES albums, and a couple that were recorded during the 90125 sessions, but never made it onto any album.

This compact disc of the TREVOR RABIN demos is called 90124, which is highly appropriate. Not only does this disc show the true nature of RABIN's contributions to the band, but it also shows the sometimes dramatic changes that occured at various steps along the way.

Here are the songs on the 90124 demo disc:

01) HOLD ON (Demo 1981) (Final version on YES - 90125, 1983)

02) CHANGES (Demo 1981) (Final version on YES - 90125, 1983)

03) MOVING IN (Demo 1981, early version of CHANGES)

04) WOULD YOU FEEL MY LOVE (Demo 1981)

05) WHERE WILL YOU BE (Demo 1981) (Final version on YES - TALK, 1994)

06) OWNER OF A LONELY HEART (Demo 1981) (Final version on YES - 90125, 1983)

07) WALLS (Demo 1990) (Final version on YES - TALK, 1994)

08) PROMENADE (Demo 1987) (Pictures At An Exhibition - Mussorgorsky, arrangement by TREVOR RABIN)

09) LOVE WILL FIND A WAY (Demo 1987) (Final version on YES - BIG GENERATOR, 1987)

10) MIRACLE OF LIFE (Demo 1990) (Early version of song that appears on YES - UNION, 1991)

11) CINEMA (Demo 1981) (Final version on YES - 90125, 1983)

All the songs above with the DEMO 1981 notation were part of the original TREVOR RABIN demo tape that ended up at ATLANTIC RECORDS, which eventually saw him joining the band for eleven years, with YES releasing five albums during that time.

With YES having the single-most complex history of any band that remained together in one form or another since 1969, this is such an amazing thing --- that they survived so many personnel changes. Over the thirty-five years that YES has been together, a total of fourteen men have circulated through the band.

Taken together as a set, both 90124 and 90125 will show the listener the extraordinary process of writing and production that went into turning YES from PROG ROCK DINOSAUR into a band that used DIGITAL RECORDING TECHNOLOGY to their obvious advantage --- becoming pop music stars with actual hit singles.

(NOTE: OWNER OF A LONELY HEART was YES' first-ever #1 hit single in America and many parts of the world.)

It has been argued, and I agree, that without TREVOR RABIN, today there probably would not be a YES. They were that close to the edge of truly breaking up --- and if that would have happened --- the world would have been deprived of such great YESSONGS as MIND DRIVE and MAGNIFICATION, just for two examples.

Here are the YES releases in which TREVOR RABIN participated:

01) 90125 (1983)

02) 9012LIVE - THE SOLOS (1985 - Japan Import ONLY.)

This was also released as a home video, first on VHS, and later on DVD. Sadly, it was not the entire concert, instead focusing primarily on the songs from 90125.

03) BIG GENERATOR (1987)

04) UNION (1991)

This was quite an interesting album AND tour, as BOTH the HOWE and RABIN versions of YES were represented. It was a unique moment, fleeting as it may have been. In total, eight men performed on stage during this show. It was a concert that I was sure to catch multiple times on that tour alone, as I knew it was a one-off deal.

05) TALK (1994)

Why you might wish to check out 90124 is to see the songwriting process in the most successful part of YES' career. The manner in which these tracks are laid out on this disc often times features a rough acoustic guitar only version of the song, immediately followed by the rough demo of the song with guitar, keyboards, voice, and drum machine. Sometimes it is surprising how different the final version sounds, and sometimes it is surprising just how complete and complex some of these songs were even in their rough form.

KDB RATINGS:

01) YES - 90125 (1983) = A+

02) TREVOR RABIN - 90124 (2003) = B+ sound quality, A+ look into YES production work and songwriting process.

NOTE: 90125 can be found on the ELEKTRA/RHINO label, and 90124 can be found on the VOICEPRINT label. Additionally, the following YES releases have all been recently released in better sounding and expanded editions:

YES / TIME AND A WORD / THE YES ALBUM / FRAGILE / CLOSE TO THE EDGE / TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS / RELAYER / GOING FOR THE ONE / TORMATO / DRAMA / 90125 /

I have them all, and they are worth it for the better sound and the extra tracks.

http://www.yesworld.com

NOTE: Since leaving YES, TREVOR RABIN has concentrated on recording the soundtracks for twenty-six of the recent Hollywood feature films, such as ARMAGEDDON. He has also recorded and released several solo albums during this same time.

Here is the TREVOR RABIN filmography page at the INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0704909/

Thank you for listening to YES!

KDB = Buffalo, NY USA