Yes on tour in Italy in May: interview with Billy Sherwood April 22, 2024 by Roberto De Benedetto
Without a doubt one of the most legendary and long-lived groups on the musical scene, especially that of prog rock, the English band is preparing for a new European tour, called The Classic Tales of Yes , which starts on April 30th in Lisbon and will touch Italy with three dates, May 5th in Rome, 6th in Milan and 8th in Padua. Excluding Great Britain, our country will be the most frequented by Yes on this tour, together with Germany. We had a chat with Billy Sherwood , the band's bassist, a very long-time collaborator of the group, who has covered the role of the late Chris Squire for many years. The quintet will make use of the one who can now rightly be defined as its leader, guitarist Steve Howe , together with Geoff Downes (keyboards), Jon Davison (vocals) and Jay Schellen (drums). The release of Mirror to the Sky last year, their best effort in many years, well received by critics and the public, has renewed interest in the English group, who will certainly offer a roundup of their songs historical ones, with a lineup that has some surprises in store.
Hi Billy, we are on the eve of your new Tour and in Italy you will have three dates, demonstrating the large following that you continue to have, for many years, in our country...
Yes, of course, we know it very well and we are proud of it, the Italian public has always followed us with passion and for us it is always a joy to play in Italy, warmth and knowledge of the public are important to us.
Classic Tales of Yes is the name you gave to this tour and for someone as old as me the now legendary Tales From Topographic Oceans comes to mind , can you tell us if you will play anything from that album?
Tales is my favorite Yes album! Yes, with Steve (Howe) and the group we have prepared a medley that will contain fragments of all four suites that made up the album.
I think the band's last two albums, The Quest and especially Mirror to The Sky , are among the best things you've produced in the last 30 years, the last album was very well received indeed...
Yes, we can talk about a magical combination that created these works, I am particularly proud of it. Who would have thought that in 2024 we would find ourselves talking about a band that he started in 1967! I can say that we are really proud of it, but it's the public's response that counts.
Speaking a little about you, Billy, fate wanted you to find yourself, as a young and talented musician, and also a huge Yes fan, collaborating with the band for more than 30 years and finding yourself working closely with the late Chris Squire , one of the greatest talents on the instrument that pop has had. Furthermore, you have produced some records together with Chris, so the question, which surely many have already asked you, is: how did your close friendship with him begin and how did this influence the development of your career?
I grew up listening to Yes, and back then there was no internet like today, you created your world in another way. When I was a kid I listened to Close to The Edge and looked at the photo of Chris on the back cover, really wondering who he was, I was completely captivated by his sound and his musical approach. I loved him straight away and when I first met him, well, he was my hero! It was during a dinner and we immediately became friends, laughter, discussions and a lot of fun even about stupid things, we had the same sense of humor , we started a truly incredible relationship, and something that still surprises me today when I find myself answering the question that you you just made me! It's really an incredible and emotionally very strong thing for me. In the end there were very difficult moments as you can imagine, but here I am, I play bass with Yes, I put all my enthusiasm into it and I try to honor the memory of him. You know, from the beginning of our relationship to his passing, the relationship between us has always been excellent, I notice that I no longer have him next to me on stage and I think of him very often. In short, an exhilarating journey for me that arrived at the sad transition point that we know. Now it has become a mission for me to continue in his place and move forward with the group.
Thanks Chris, for your story, really beautiful and also emotionally touching. Going back to talking about your latest album, Mirror To The Sky , which in my opinion is very good, I wanted to talk to you about a couple of songs in particular, the title track , which is written by you, Steve and Jon Davison, which is the song initial of the album and the last song, Circles of Time, written by Jon Davison alone: these two songs are very beautiful and catchy, will they be present in the set list of your concerts, as well as other songs from the album itself?
You know, when we worked on the set list we had to take into account the timing we have available for the show, yes they will probably be there, but in this tour we would like to cover a lot of our history, so, we'll see, but I'm sure that in perspective many of the songs from the album will be part of the show.
Yes, I imagine, your story is very long ….
And what's more, we'll recover some songs that we haven't performed for a long time, for example one from The Ladder (1999) which I'm really happy about, having participated in that album!
The band suffered another great loss, that of Alan White, your historic drummer, but I have to tell you that Jay Schellen is really good: you and him form a truly remarkable rhythm section...
Jay is a monster, he already has an important history in the past with Yes, he played with Tony Kaye, he was in Conspiracy with me and Chris, and you know, when Alan started having serious problems we were in need of having a drummer. At that point I told the band that I knew who could replace him and that worked. He and Alan had a relationship in the past and therefore knew each other, and so Alan was also ready and willing to have Jay be the replacement. The curious thing is that the first time I met Jay, on the occasion of a collaboration outside of Yes, I asked Jay who his favorite drummer was, he replied it was Alan White, so I replied that this would work in the future ! (laughs)
It's really peculiar how your stories run in parallel...
You know the Yes family is a tree with many ramifications, there is a long history behind it in all those who participated in it, it's strange to see how there can still be someone who believes, for example, that I started collaborating with Yes last week! (laughs)
Just a minute on the sixth member of the band, Billy: if I understand correctly, will Roger Dean (historic and legendary artist responsible for the wonderful Yes covers, and not only) participate in all the shows of the next tour?
(after making a puzzled face when I mention the sixth member) Ah, ok (smiles). Yes, I know he will participate but I don't know about his schedule, he is truly incredible and he is also a delightful person and yes, you are right, it is like he is the sixth member of the band and his art is a fixed point in the soul of the group's music. Truly an incredible talent.
Perhaps the most successful marriage between music and graphics that I remember in pop music, so it will be really interesting, I think for the fans and the public, to have the chance to see it with you...
I really hope that there will also be in Italy, but this goes a little outside of what I personally follow, which also includes projects parallel to Yes themselves.
And in fact this was the last question for you, Billy, can you tell us something about future projects?
I have a project planned with Tony Kaye for CIRCA, it's taking a while, but here it's my fault we haven't moved on because I'm busy with many other things. I'm doing sessions with other musicians and I'm always ready to collaborate with other artists if they want me in the studio for their works. Yes, I would say that my agenda is completely covered by the work with Yes and what I produce personally.
Billy, thanks for the pleasant chat and see you in Milan!
Steve Howe in Italy with Yes: «I'm not ashamed of being nostalgic, but we're not museum pieces»
«At the time of '90125' we changed our sound, I don't want it to happen again». Interview on the eve of the tour: «Our strength is our condemnation: the talent of the individuals». And then Queen, Lou Reed and... destiny
Luca Garrò April 23, 2024 Rolling Stone Italia
Do you know Er Principe, the character played by Mario Brega in Bianco, Rosso e Verdone ? That of «this hand is a little bit fero and a little bit it is feather»? Well, I've always been told that Yes guitarist Steve Howe is a fairly moody guy and that, consequently, his interviews depend a lot on the moment, the question or simply on how he woke up. For this reason I was awaiting his arrival on Zoom with a little anxiety and with the hope of sharing the happy ending with Sora Lella. Distinguished and extremely British, Howe instead spoke (actually not about everything) with great kindness and humour, presenting the arrival in Europe of the Classic Tales of Yes Tour (in Rome, Milan and Padua next 5, 6 and 8 May), speaking of the present, of the past and of the desire not to stop even now that the springs are dangerously close to 80. In short, today Steve's hand was a feather.
Let's start with current events. After last year's American tour you are now bringing this anthology show to Europe. What should we expect? We will change little for the new tranche. It will be a show divided into two parts of an hour each in which we will retrace the career of Yes , or at least part of it, trying to show the many chapters of our history. We don't feel like museum pieces, so I don't like to call it an anthology show. Compared to the American part, I think we will give a little more space to Mirror to the Sky . In the new millennium we weren't always in focus, I'm not satisfied with all the albums of the 2000s, but I think the last two are worthy of a story like ours.
The feeling is that at a certain point you understood that the future of Yes could only be found in the past. Without necessarily being nostalgic. But I'm extremely nostalgic and I'm not ashamed to say it. When I left Asia for the last time I did so precisely because I wanted to dedicate myself only to Yes and to the philosophy that had always carried forward the historical formation of the group. The public wants this, I want this, we all want this. At the time of 90125 Yes were trying to be Asia, they wanted to reach a certain audience and they didn't just change the guitarist, they completely changed their sound. I don't want this to happen again. And neither did the rest of the band. This is why I'm not talking about an anthology tour, because we won't cover every era of Yes.
In a way you resemble Deep Purple. Despite the many formations you have had, you are simply Yes, almost as if you were an idea rather than a band. In fact it is like this. Each member who was part of the group brought something, even very big, but none was bigger than the band itself. Me too. But I believe that the band cannot ignore the sound it created between '71 and '73, Yes cannot exist without the prog component. A bit like in classical music, the performers can change, but we cannot ignore the idea that the public has of Yes and the arrangements. If you think about it, it's not just a question of prog, it's really a question of DNA. If you listen to The Who, you expect certain things, just like if you listen to AC/DC or Queen. You can change, but always within a paradigm.
What was it that a band like Yes had and has that other progressive bands didn't have? I'm not in a position to say whether Yes has or had anything that others didn't have. The '70s were an unrepeatable period because dozens of bands could have the same success, often offering very different things from each other. One thing I've always recognized about Yes is the strength of individuals. We have always talked about the strength of the group, as something much greater than the sum of the parts. I, however, tell you that the strength of Yes, especially of what is considered the classic formation, lay precisely in the strength of the individuals. Which is why we didn't last long with the same line-up. In short, what perhaps we had in addition was also our condemnation.
How important was Jon Davison's arrival for the new direction? A lot and for different reasons. First of all, because it was Taylor Hawkins who introduced him to Chris Squire, with whom he had been a friend since childhood. If you think that today neither of them is any longer among us, the thing takes on connotations that go beyond music and that lead back to entities superior to us, those non-random circumstances that have to go in a certain way. Beyond the spiritual aspect, there is clearly the musical one: Jon is not only an extraordinary singer, but he is a composer of the highest level. Hiring the frontman of a Yes cover band could have been a risk, especially since many still hadn't even gotten over the farewell to Jon Anderson. I was very insistent that we work on some of his ideas for Mirror to the Sky . He could be my son, but inside he is our age ( laughs ). Without him Yes would probably no longer exist today.
Why did you say no to Keith Emerson and Jethro Tull before joining Yes? Keith was a friend. We had many things in common, in particular the love for various Italian composers, primarily Antonio Vivaldi, but at the time when he asked me to join Nice I believed that it wasn't enough. I honestly didn't know how my guitar playing could fit with them. Soon after I auditioned for Yes and he formed ELP, so I like to think I did the best thing for rock history. With Jethro Tull it was different, because Ian Anderson wasn't interested in me being a composer, he needed a guitarist and I was looking for a job, but I would never have been just a performer. I wasn't made for that.
Yet you said yes to Lou Reed for his solo debut, where you basically just performed his songs. It's true, but you have to think that at the time I had already joined Yes and we had already released The Yes Album , so I wasn't in the same situation as a few months earlier. I don't remember exactly how I ended up playing with Lou, I remember that they made me listen to the songs once and immediately after that they made me record them. We recorded in the dark, there was only a small lamp on. It was all very strange, but Lou was really nice. The album did very badly, but I was with Rick Wakeman, who soon after became a cornerstone of Yes. So as you can see everything is always written.
Twenty years later with Queen things went much better. So much so that you made Innuendo immortal with your solo flamenco . As you know, Montreux is a magical place for music. Especially for the English one. A few days before recording the piece with them, I was in Geneva and decided to rent a car to take a tour of Montreux, because I wanted to see some places that I had promised myself I would visit. While I was having lunch on the lake, Martin Groves, one of our technicians who Queen often called during their sessions, entered the restaurant. "What do you do here? Come to the studio immediately, Queen will be delighted to see you." Once in the studio, Freddie, Brian and Roger seemed to be waiting for nothing else. They made me listen to almost all of that splendid album and then added that they were looking for someone to add something to Paco De Lucia in the middle of Innuendo . They wanted me to improvise something Spanish-ish within the piece. It seemed crazy to me, also because Queen wasn't Yes, Brian May was used to filling every hole and in my opinion he is the only guitarist capable of telling you who he is with his music. Instead it was one of the most beautiful afternoons of my life.
I know you don't want questions about Jon Anderson : why? I love Jon very much as a human being. Much less for many other things. Be satisfied with this.
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The Classic Tales Of Yes 2024 European Tour
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