Manuel Nash - Long Live Rock’N’Roll

Wednesday, May 8, 2024 4:08 PM

[GOOGLE TRANSLATE from original Italian to English]:

By Manuel Nash
May 6, 2024

My love for Yes began one afternoon in February 1991, among the CD displays of a Ricordi store. Telling the how and why would be boring and would take us dramatically away from the reason why I find myself writing now. I can only report that it was a providential unexpected event since, previously (I admit it, your honor), I had always felt a sincere and inexplicable annoyance at Jon Anderson 's timbre but that afternoon, just a step away from turning 17, And You And I evaporated any unjustified reticence. On the other hand, as we know, great loves often begin with a flush of epidermal antipathy. As chance would have it, the events reported so far happened just before the release of the controversial Union and the related tour which would have seen the line ups of Close To The Edge and 90125 on stage for the first time together . The Roman date of 12 June shone thanks to the amused tightrope walking of a heterogeneous ensemble who did not spare themselves for a single moment, giving those present the luxury of an unrepeatable memory.

Last night, on the stage of La Nuvola in Rome , things, unfortunately, went completely differently. Apart from the company name (reduced to a vintage brand, freely associated with musicians who are now totally fungible) and the presence of Steve Howe , there are no valid reasons to speak of a "historic band". Thanks to the presence of Geoff Downes , the only other name related to the '70s and clearly struggling in the role that was Wakeman , the current lineup, at best, resembles a minor-key spin-off of Asia while, at worst, it ends by looking like a cover band of itself. Yes is certainly not an isolated case. For intellectual honesty we must admit that the phenomenon of "classic" bands committed to keeping the laws of biology at bay (for corporate reasons) is so widespread that it is now clear to everyone and a list of further examples would be too long to find. placed here. This is a side effect of the historicization of rock which, in the coming years, we will have to deal with more and more frequently.

The intent to therefore preserve the genetic heritage of a band clashes today with the insurmountable paradoxes created by a past that should be consigned to the history books instead of being forced to (re)live in the suspended animation of a pure stage representation in smells like fan service.

Returning to our specific case, it is then evident that Jon Davison 's respectable and diligent diligence will never be able to make up for the unbridgeable absence of Anderson's voice. Jey Schellen , behind the drums, also does his best to reproduce that cohesion that only Alan White was capable of. His willing zeal is professionally commendable but it is not enough to prevent the drumming from becoming the weakest link in the performance. The bass of Billy Sherwood, former leader of World Trade (recovered from their 1989 debut of the same name) and already officially in training (as a guitarist) in the late '90s, can boast a succession designation received directly from the hands of the late Squire , an unmistakable sign of a high profile professional contribution.

The role of master of ceremonies and conductor falls instead to a Howe whose indisputable coat of arms now lacks the fluidity of his best days. The sensation, it is painful to note, is that of attending a theatrical performance of "that" well-known novel by Mary Shelley. In a venue far from sold out, a ritual at Madame Tussauds takes place, made of stubborn nostalgia that borders on therapeutic fury. The questionability of a project in which none of the original members is involved, the repeated cancellations of the tour and the indefensible weakness of the latest albums (enhanced by a production not in line with the legacy of the Yes name) must have contributed to demotivating a good portion of the target audience.

A few minutes are enough from the opening, entrusted to a proactive Machine Messiah , to feel a few drops of embarrassment, certainly not for the musicians (professional, although cold and scholastic) but for an audience that is satisfied with the lovely remains of a once prestigious brand , instead of investing in solid realities of contemporary prog. The choice of the first song, taken from Drama , the '79 album with the two Buggles (Trevor Horn and Downes) instead of Anderson and Wakeman, immediately spoils the intentions of a set list that chooses to rummage through the less obvious episodes of a career now approaching its sixtieth anniversary. The aim is clearly to leverage the enticements of Easter eggs to continue to attract an audience that is historically lazy and less and less interested.

With It Will Be A Good Day (The River ) one of the most successful episodes of the decent The Ladder (1999) is even recovered. At the end of the evening this will be the song with which the musicians will have shown the greatest empathy. The sequence of Going For The One and I've Seen All Good People takes the audience for a walk on the path of a short but satisfying greatest hits and Howe, addressing an audience that reacts with understandable coldness, shows off the most predictable repertoire of compliments based on pizza, sun and mandolin.

With Time And A World , however, the only episode of the evening dedicated to the production prior to the guitarist's entry into the lineup materializes. The arrival of a short instrumental version of America , a cover of the famous Simon & Garfunkel song , leaves me with a veil of perplexity and the question mark on my face gets bigger as soon as Don't Kill The Whal starts and, a single with noble intentions environmentalists, but with a weak identity (not surprisingly released in the midst of the Punk explosion) taken from an unresolved and indispensable album like Tormato (1978).

The ethereal consistency of Turn Of The Century , one of the interpretative peaks of the catalog with Anderson, to which Davison applies himself with genuine rigor, is the ideal farewell before a short break. Upon returning, entrusted to Southside Of The Sky , a sense of fatigue begins to knock on the door of what remains of my enthusiasm.

It is now clear that I find myself living a personally painful experience, not only from an emotional but also from a historical and cultural perspective. Cut From The Stars , from the last, forgettable, Mirror To The Sky , chases a now unattainable cliché and sounds like a self-imposed obligation, in the necessity of which the musicians themselves believe very little. The real blow, however, comes with the neophilized version of Tales From Topographic Oceans which, even in this appropriately more concise guise, continues to show all the self-indulgent weaknesses that have made it, over time, an irreplaceable example of the deleterious excesses to which the Prog.

To take the place of a necessary defibrillator there are, fortunately, Roundabout and Starship Trooper . Their plastered enthusiasm, however, is not able to reset the severe judgment on the entire evening.

It's painful to see, but Howe's Yes is nothing more than a family-run touring business. There remains deep regret not only for a glorious name in rock subcontracted with unforgivable frivolity, but also for two hours of one's life thrown off a bridge and spent in the (dystopian) company of a vacuously nostalgic audience, who rushed to buy the products of a brand that has lost the prestige of the past.

Setlist
1. Machine Messiah
2. It Will Be a Good Day (The River)
3. Going for the One
4. I've Seen All Good People
5. America (Simon & Garfunkel cover)
6. Time and a Word
7. Don 't Kill the Whale
8. Turn of the Century

9. South Side of the Sky
10. Cut From the Stars
11. The Revealing Science of God (Dance of the Dawn) / The Remembering (High the Memory) / The Ancient (Giants Under the Sun) / Ritual (Nous sommes du soleil) )

12. Roundabout
13. Starship Trooper




Text by Manuel Nash
Photographs by Chiara Lucarelli