Good evening boys and gals! Yesterday I experienced one of the greatest evenings in my life. Thanks to Yesband, who gave a great show.
From where I stood (2nd row, middle of the stage, right before Chris) Chris seemed to be the leader of the band, playing the loudest instrument of all.
He was simply incredible leading bass-player, most of the time grinning from ear to ear, his bass-chords and leads being a heart of this band. He surely played as many basses during the show as there were songs, joking around, playing superbly, often standing on one leg , apparently very pleased with himself (he has the reasons!), the show and the audience.And (as opposite to some earlier postings here) he was surely not drinking too much this evening.
It seems to me that Chris has some strange, mysterious aura, even while being a cheerfull guy. In fact the most intriguing personality in the band.
It was a great pleasure to hear and watch Jon too.What to say about this genius of singer and composer? Well, he played hell of a percussion (3 different tambourines!) ,little keys but no guitar, joking around with the audience between the songs.
I was so busy with watching/hearing Chris and Jon (and some of Steve, who was not always good to hear) so I can say almost nothing about Alan, period.
Steve seeming decent and shy person, one of the best gtr players ever. Apart from two solos, Billy was inaudible during the show. Was meaning him as guitarist here , he contributed backing vocals though. He seems to be a very nice person, as far as you can tell by watching someone's face during the show and after giving away his plectrums to a little girl in the first row after the show (there was in fact a complete family there, the teenage girl, wearing OYE-cap, with her parents. BTW: the little girl was also spotted and greeted by Jon during the show).
Igor was doing well as a keyboard player, not having problems with Wakemans parts, sometimes fooling around behind his keyboards. (Igor was also introduced by Jon as a "little crazy" keyboarder).
He even forced the whole band to a big grin by playing some unexpected sounds during the beginning of Good People, apparently almost threatening the whole chorus intro to collapse.
He mastered convincingly probably the most difficult part , namely the intro of Awakening, furthermore he was playing some of his own bits during No disgrace. Maybe given more space he could extend his role as a keyplayer within Yes in the future , becoming a Yes-worth contributor.
As for merchandising part of the event I was as always biased to add another T-shirt and Tour-programm to my collection, so I was little surprised by their offering of some vinyl, gatefold cover, autographed limited edition of the Ladder album for $45. As a mad collector I regret not having had enough money in my wallet that evening, cause I'd be very pleased to call such an item my own.
Hope I didn't forget anything. Thanks for your time,