Kevin Garrity

Wednesday, December 13, 2023 5:39 PM

(email text posted by FY with Kevin's permission)
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My employer had the contract to do sound for the entire Summer Series at Yale Bowl, I was ready to go, then every act came with it’s own touring PA and I was stuck with a full season backstage pass ;)

I had a small 5” Sony TC-800 Reel to Reel so I sat down in front of the board and found an unused mix buss out, jacked in and left the deck under my seat. I was expecting to record Grand Funk, Yes wasn’t on the tickets or in any of the advertising.

I turned down a thousand dollar offer for that tape in 1972, I explained to the gentleman that musicians are my friends, they have a hard enough time paying their bills.

Short story, I loaned the tape to a great friend, in his excitement he lost track of it and the next thing I knew it was on Napster and Limewire…….
Now you know the story

Kevin G

Joe Ambrose

Tuesday, February 2, 2021 12:53 PM

Hey! Allen Peck... look me up on facebook

Allen Peck

Wednesday, August 26, 2020 12:59 PM

Hello Joe Ambrose,
Remember me from Waterbury UPS 1975 ?
I was at the GFR/Yes concert also !
I hope you are well.
Is there a way to contact you ?

Mike Williams

Wednesday, September 14, 2016 5:42 AM

Remember this concert like it were yesterday. Wierd stage set up. Went with girl friend at the time, also my brother and his college room mate. Big fan of Grand Funk then & now, and my brother's college mate turned us onto YES and the rest is history. Miss those years. Cheers and best regards.

Joe Ambrose

Friday, July 29, 2016 8:54 AM

My first rock concert ever! My sister's friend couldn't go and she took me as a last minute fill in in her brand new orange VW Beetle. OMG! Did that ever change my world! Excited to see Grand Funk Railroad I found myself chanting YES! YES! YES! MORE! MORE! What a blast! The rest they say is history! Zepplin...The Who...The Stones..Clapton...etc. etc. The ticket stubs kept piling up and STILL DO! What a great time in life to be a teenager!

ray parlato

Tuesday, January 21, 2014 1:58 PM

i was fortunate enough to work with the new haven jaycees in those years as a volunteer usher. i saw more 60's 70's groups than i could name. it was the ultimate ticket to that music era. too bad it ended in such sad way.kids after us were left with overpriced tickets & shows that could not compare to those at the "bowl". also saw joplin & hendrix at woolsey hall. yale should have been in the music business!

billy bober

I was there!!!! after years of telling people and my kids about seeing yes, now I know it was true. I remembered it was a saturday night at the Yale bowl. My girlfriend and I had nothing to do, so we said lets go see GFR..I really did not like them..Then an amazing thing happened..Yes came out and blew us all away, changed my life as a guitarist, until this day..connectticut was a great place for music back then..I saw led zep at the oakdale theater. a tent covered bowl with a revolving stage, saw Cream at the old new haven arena,david bowie ,diamond dogs tour in new haven, also Van Morrison.. He was miffed because the crowd wasn't responding to his music.He said " this isn't intellectural music" ...I yelled out we were freezing, as the new haven arena had a hockey team back then and the just put mats over the ice..saw Zappa a few times in waterbury...wildweeds..ain't no good to cry...ah, I feel young again

Paul G.

Let it go Mike! I'm a long time Yes Freak and Dead Head!

Mike

I too was there, and my jaw dropped too. The music was so complicated! I don't remember any bands other than Yes and GFR on that bill.

The following Saturday night (July 31, 1971), the Grateful Dead played the Yale Bowl. Some fans without tickets wanted to crash it, and there was tear gas, cancelling the remaining Pops Concerts, including the following week's scheduled Who concert, for which I had 10th row seats. I will never forgive Dead fans.

Don McGlynn

I was a student at No Branford High School then. Went to this concert with my classmate Maureen. Yes really did steal the show. The group of guys behind us rolled a joint twice the diameter of a cigar and the crowd reeked of pot. Many years later I took my teenage sons to see Yes, Pink Floyd, Bob Dylan and Crosby, Stills & Nash (N. Young gone solo by then)

I also went to the Led Zep show at the Yale Bowl. Was fortunate to have a front row seat. Had been in New Haven the same nite the Bee Gees played but instead I went to the Blue Angel Cafe to see The Drifters.

Those were the days...

Don McGlynn

Nick Savoyski

On this evening I walked into Yale Bowl with an RCA 1/4" 3and 3/4 ips. battery operated open reel recorder with an external "ball mike" as they were called in those days. I recorded "Perpetual Change" to get a level and figuring I better get something from this band on tape. It's the only cut I have from that night as I wanted to save the tape for Grand Funk as I only had a total of 60 minutes of tape. Glad I did it! Yes forever changed my life as budding young musician. I recall saying to my friend Dave, " Who are these guys??" Steve Howe's guitar was clear, fast and precise. Bruford's drumming had a mathematical feel. What great vocals! And how was Squires getting this cool bass sound? Little did I know how much this band was going to influence my musical life for many years to come. I just happen to come across this tape a couple of weeks ago which I put into a file cabinet for safe keeping. I have no idea how well the tape has survived time but, I bet Steve Norde still has the copy of the cassette I duped for him.

Steve Norde'

This was the very first rock concert I ever attended.
My brother and I were big GRAND FUNK fans and couldn't wait for them to hit the stage.
It was a beautiful summer day in New Haven and we fans were all huddled to the seats in one end zone so as to create an amphitheatre.
I honestly have no recollection of DECIBEL DEATH playing a note!
When YES played, everyone listened!
The band played with a lot of energy. Howe was brilliant! Kaye's B3 tone was exceptional. Vocally, they were flawless.
Bruford and Squire were as tight a rhythm section as there ever was.
There's a great bootleg of this set and, when you listen to it today, it confirms just how tight they were.
GRAND FUNK came out to a standing ovation and blew the doors down for about 90 minutes. They were really LOUD but everyone seemed to enjoy it. Their 3-piece version of "Closer to Home" was quite impressive.
I saw Bruford at the NAMM show recently and he remembered this night and all of the hoopla surrounding GRAND FUNK.
However, many of us who attended this show became immediate YES fans and have remained loyal to this day.
One final thought: Of all the times I saw Howe, this was the best I'd ever heard him.

Sharon Brown

My memories of this show are very similar to the others. My community college got us discounted tickets to see Grand Funk Railroad. I was totally unaware of any other bands on the bill.
But like everyone else, I was totally blown away by YES. I wanted them to play all night. GFRR was nothing compared to them. My only real comment was that I thought the other band on the bill was Melissa Manchester. Whatever I have no real recollection of it.
Glad I went...
Been a fan ever since. Sharon

Mike Bimonte

I remember this show like it was yesterday. Not being a fan of Grand Funk, I went along anyway with some friends. I remember the announcer coming out and saying "Will you welcome, direct from England-Yes." About 10 people clapped for this band that neither I nor most people in the U.S. had ever heard of up to this time. By the time they left the stage, My jaw was hanging from what I had just seen and heard,and I have seen Yes more than 55 times since. My memory of this show was how clear and professional the sound was. Grand Funk, on the other hand, was all show and little musical substance. In fact, they were extremely loud and distorted, and I remember a good portion of the crowd walking out before they set was over.I immediately bought "The Yes Album" shortly after and played it constantly.

Kev

The story of the recording goes like this: a young man walked into the Yale Bowl with an open reel deck under his arm, walked up to the soundboard, plugged in and taped Yes. As far as I know, the four songs on the tape were the only ones played at that show.

The original recording was on a small reel and was done in mono, there was no FM broadcast at the time, although it could very well have been played over the air by a really cool radio station at a later date. I am the person who actually had the master reel and transferred it to cassette, and I still have that 1st generation copy in my collection. It took me almost a year to get the tape into my hands and we worked pretty quickly to get it transferred and returned. As far as I know, the original has stayed in the possession of my friend since the transfer was done.

In regards to the show, Yes were third on the bill to Grand Funk, with a band I have never heard of called Decibel Death sandwiched in between. There were quite a few shows put on at the Yale Bowl in the early 70's including two Led Zeps, Grateful Dead and other top acts of the day. The entire stadium was not used for the shows, only one end of it was set up with a stage. The best estimate I can come up with is attendance would have been around 10-15,000 for each of these shows.

The New Haven register had this to say on Monday July 26, 1971: They said they came from England which automatically made them special; they said this was the last performance on their current tour. Their name was "Yes" and if they had been missed by the not-really-into-it fan, then he was into them when they left. "Yes" was just fine; a robust, creative group whose Atlantic (ATCO) albums, while never big sellers, always contained lots of good licks to get off on. Last Saturday's Yale Bowl Pops got off, too. Their special and last number "Perpetual Change" is 8 minutes of sheer joy, rock at its finest with a hard top yet with plenty of lilting vocals by John Anderson who also plays a strong set of drums. Chris Squire on bass, Steve Howe on acoustic (and he really lives to play this beautiful instrument as demonstrated by a fine solo), Tony Kaye on piano-organ and Bill bruford, the regular drummer - "Yes" is worthy of watching next time around.

I wish I could find the person who wrote that article and see what they thought of future Yesshows!! I have been fortunate enough to talk with several folks who were in attendance, almost all of them mention Chris' fur-topped boots and my favourite quote is from my good friend Nick who said "We didn't know what planet they were from"... they were all blown away.

Matt Lupoli

My dad went to see Yes at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut on July 24, 1971. The venue was mainly used for sporting events, but in this case they put some seats on the end zone and put the stage in the middle of the field. He bought tickets to see Grand Funk Railroad who were extremely big at the time. He remembers when an English rock band (who no one had ever heard of) opened for Grand Funk. They were Yes. At first people didn't want to see them. They were too anxious to see Grand Funk. By the end of the performance the entire crowd was blown away. They called Yes back for 3 encores. By the time Grand Funk Railroad actually did come on stage, the people were still thinking of Yes. It's weird. First Grand Funk blew Zeppelin off the stage and now Yes blows Grand Funk off the stage. This was Yes's first and last tour as an opening band. If I were alive in 1971, I would have slept on the sidewalk for this show.

Kev

I have a photocopy of the newspaper review of the show....the show took place on a Saturday, and the review was in Monday's paper 7/26/71.....the gig was at a place called the Yale Bowl, an outdoor stadium that is used primarily for the Yale football games. Although the place does hold 80,000 people, the popular concerts that were held there in the early '70's appear to have been staged at one end of the field to a crowd of 15,000 people or so....I have not been able to find any written documentation of that, this is based on eyewitness accounts...they played third on the bill with Grand Funk (the headliners) with a band called Decibel Death in the middle....by all accounts the performance was tremendous, I have a few friends who were at the show (lucky them).....the newspaper gave Yes a great review.

Paul Hebert

I went to see GRAND FUNK RAILROAD. I had never heard of YES. They opened the show and blew me (and everyone else) away. When they finished their set, they were called back for three encores. When GRAND FUNK hit the stage, it was a bit of a let down, not because they were bad (they actually were pretty good) but because YES was so outrageous. They left a lasting impression with me and I've been crazy about their music ever since.

Gordon Skene - Past Daily

Sunday, July 24, 2022 4:27 PM

Yes – Live At New Haven - 1971 – Past Daily Weekend Soundbooth

By Gordon Skene
July 23, 2022

"Yes, in concert at New Haven, Conn. – July 24, 1971 – Gordon Skene Sound Collection.

I thought I would run into the vault and drag something out I hadn’t heard in a while (and probably neither of have you). Yes, in an early U.S. concert, opening for Grand Funk Railroad in the summer of 1971 at New Haven Connecticut.

This is Yes just before they became huge – before they were headliners and just before they turned into one of the most influential bands of the early 1970s. They were already getting a lot of support via the FM underground, and hot on the heels of the release of their 3rd album, The Yes Album which this tour was busily promoting, their fortunes were just at the start of breaking in the U.S.

There are a lot of live recordings of Yes floating around, most of them sound terrible and give bootlegging its name and reputation. Recordings made by the sound crew from the mixing board at these early performances are rare, especially during the days prior to high-quality cassette recordings, or high-quality portable reel to reel recorders. It’s always been my intention and policy to present an artist or act in the best possible light – if we’re going to present an artist in a historic context, then present them in the way they were intended to sound and in the way that brings a better understanding of an artist or band during a formative period of their careers – not having to guess who is singing and what is playing behind a thick cloud of coughs and distorted distance.

Luckily, this concert is clear and sounds remarkably good for its age. And even though there’s a few tape splices here and there, the overall sound is excellent and a particularly good glimpse of a band just at the cusp of becoming household names.

If you’re just getting around to discovering Yes, this is a crucial period of time for the band – and it’s actually phase 2 in their musical journey – the really early recordings from the late 1960s (via the BBC and German and French Radio) feature the band with founding member Tony Kaye on keyboards. After his departure he was replaced by Rick Wakeman, and this is the pivotal period for the band and their sound.

If you’ve been a fan for a while, you know how important the Rick Wakeman period was for the band – and how much of their sound was shaped by his contribution. This concert is a good example of that.

In any case, play loud and forget it happened 51 years ago."