Are We Not Yes?

Howe Squire and White
of Yes
Riverside Theater
Milwaukee, WI
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Section 1 LT, Row F, Seat 12
$75

Eight years ago, YesWorld, the official Yes website, polled its readers. They wanted to know what two songs we wanted to hear live. I voted for Tempus Fugit and Astral Traveler. I finally got to hear them on Saturday. The only catch was, I had to see Yes without Jon Anderson.

Yes has been my favorite band since I was a teenager, and they hadn't toured since 2004. I had seen several of the band members since then in other projects. If you're reading this, you probably know the story. This summer's scheduled tour was canceled due to Jon Anderson's illness. He's on doctor's orders to rest the rest of this year, and no one really knows if he'll be up to touring again. The remaining members of Yes got a new singer and organized a smaller fall tour. Roy and I cut back too, we're only going to three shows - Milwaukee, Bloomington, and here in St. Louis. The new singer is billed as an "understudy", until Jon is well enough to tour again. His name is Benoit David. They are also touring with a new keyboard player, but this is less controversial. It's Rick Wakeman's son Oliver Wakeman.

I've been excited about the shows, but with some trepidation. The setlist would include some different songs from their catalog, songs Jon didn't want to do. But what would the shows feel like? I count ABWH in my number of Yes shows. Would these feel like Yes shows or just like a bunch of band members playing Yes music? And who could replace Jon?

We had a real easy drive up to Milwaukee. It's seven hours away, but with lunch and rest stops, it ends up taking nine hours. I drove most of the way there. I knew what hotel Yes usually stayed at there, so we booked it for ourselves. It was expensive, and really nice, but we didn't see the band there. Maybe they're doing something cheaper.

We had tentative plans to meet up with our friend Kevin for dinner. Unfortately, he got there later and I was anxious to get to the theater, so we didn't have long to catch up. Kevin is such a big Jon Anderson fan, Roy was surprised he went to the show. But one of his patients won tickets to the show and gave them to him. We didn't see him afterwards, but I'd love to know what he thought of the show.

Our seats were in the left section, Steve Howe side, on the aisle across from the center section. This section started with row D, so our Row F seats were only three rows back from the stage. Our row had eight seats across, and all the other people looked young. The crowd had a good mix age-wise. We had an excellent view, even for a short person like me. I bought the tie dyed tour turtle t-shirt and decided to buy a poster after the show, so I wouldn't have to carry it around during the show. The concert started about 15 minutes late.

The setlist was:
Firebird Suite
Siberian Khatru
I've Seen All Good People
Tempus Fugit
Onward
Astral Traveler
Close To The Edge
Steve Howe solo
Clap
And You And I
Long Distance Runaround
The Fish
Machine Messiah
Aliens (Are Only Us From The Future)
Starship Trooper
Owner Of A Lonely Heart
Roundabout

The stage set was simple, but looked nice. It certainly looked better than the weird inflatables they used in the last tour in 2004. There were some white sheets draped above the drumset and the back of the stage. Different colored lights or patterns would bring different effects. Roy liked the particular shade of green they took on during Close to the Edge, just like the album cover. I paid attention to the lighting more at this show than at the others. Oliver Wakeman's keyboards were to the left of Chris, like the stage setup at SLO with only Alan in the backline, unlike other times when the keyboards would be in back behind Steve.

It took me the first few songs to get into it. I don't know if it's because I was tired from the long drive, rusty from seeing Yes, something to do with their performance, maybe apprehensive about the new singer. Roy and I had already listened to one of the shows from earlier on the tour, and Benoit can sing these songs well. But it wasn't until Tempus Fugit that the show became alive for me. That song lived up to all expectations. I was so happy to hear it. From the moment you tell me ... YES!!!!!

Steve Howe introduced Astral Traveler. He gave a slightly different introduction each night for it, but said he got to learn it when he first joined Yes, and that it was part of the setlist for The Yes Album tour. Alan had a drum solo during it. I love Alan, but the solo hurt the momentum of the song. It was nice to have him stand up from the drumset so everyone could see and applaud him at the end.

The song that really affected me was Close to the Edge. I've seen this song performed live over 20 times, and I don't usually get emotional about it. But this time, it was like reuniting with an old dear friend. The harmony vocals during I Get Up, I Get Down and the music in the end really got to me. I turned to Roy after this song and said this was really Yes. You wouldn't think deciding whether to count these shows in my "official live Yes count" would matter so much to me, but it did.

After this, Steve went into his solo. I've read reviews where the audience was rude during this part, but everyone here was paying attention and enjoying it. The next song was And You And I. I didn't like Benoit's singing on this one. It's funny because And You And I was one of those songs we played on Youtube when we first learned about Benoit, and I felt much better about a new singer after hearing it. But here, I didn't like the tone of his voice, like it was scratchy or something. I noticed the same thing during one of the long notes in the I Get Up, I Get Down portion of Close to the Edge. Roy noticed something funny during And You And I. Steve switches between guitars on this song, and one of the settings must not have been correct. He looked over to his roadie, who ran out on stage and stomped on one of the pedals, with just a second before Steve had to use that guitar. Steve wiped his hand across his forehead, as if to say "whew, just in time".

When the next song started, I got nervous. One of the songs that got me so excited about the setlist for this tour was Parallels. It should have been at the start after intermission. But now it was clear there was no intermission, and they were already into the next set. I've been thinking a lot about this in the last couple days. Because of my age, I never got to see Yes in the 70s or 80s. I'm so excited every time they bring in another song from that era. I've seen them play every song on the Going for the One album, except for this one. And they dropped it just a few days before I had seen it. If I had gone to one of the earlier shows, I probably would have seen it. I know these things happen and I usually try to see a show early in the tour just for this reason. But I didn't this time, because I didn't know what to expect with the new lineup and I wasn't excited enough about/didn't trust my favorite band enough to travel more to see an early show. So there's frustration mixed in with a bit of guilt as well. Yes did something, and I missed it.

I was strangely removed from the rest of the show. I loved hearing Machine Messiah, but the rest didn't have much impact for me. The Fish ended abruptly, and before we were sure it was over, the next song Aliens started, so we never got to applaud just for the Fish. Roy gave Aliens a standing ovation, to honor Chris in general for his spotlight pieces and to cheer them for doing a new song.

Steve introduced Starship Trooper. As the long instrumental end section was starting, Alan stood up from his drums. He led us into clapping and then used his drum sticks to motion us to stand up. Some people started doing the stage rush thing, running up the aisles to stand in front of the stage. I joined them. I love doing this, but I had to really. My whole view of the stage had been from looking across the empty aisle over to the stage. Now that it was growing full of people, it would block my view. I didn't want to leave Roy, but I secured my purse and merchandise bag and went up to the stage. I was in the second row of bodies.

This should have been so excited, but it wasn't. My view was partly blocked, but the weird thing was that I was just standing there. I usually bop around in my seat and I love to get the chance to stand up and dance at concerts, but here, I felt isolated. The performance of Owner in the encore didn't help. It felt perfunctory and I was just watching people around me being more excited. Maybe I was just tired from the long drive up to Milwaukee and it was catching up to me. Or maybe all the people around me were distracting me.

The woman in front of me right up at the stage decided to leave just before Roundabout, and she helped me move into her spot. I was now in the front row, in the aisle in front of Steve. This is where I really missed Jon. I don't know, if asked about this part of the concert, if I would consider this band Yes with the thrilling concert experience that implies. I talked to Roy about it afterwards, and he enjoyed it very much, but it didn't seem like Yes to him either, except for the Drama songs and Aliens. He had trouble getting past the fact that Benoit wasn't Jon. I think we needed this show to accept the new lineup. The next two shows we saw were so different in feel for both of us.

After the show, I bought the tour poster. We talked with a friend of Kevin's for a bit, and some annoying guy who talked like he knew everything, but didn't. I gave Roy our secret signal and we left to wait for autographs. The Riverside Theater has a back alley where the bands exit. A bunch of fans were waiting on the sidewalk, half a block away.

Alan walked right out to our group. He was by himself, no security or managers around, and signed autographs for us. He signed my poster, and I asked him if they could play Parallels in either of the next two shows. They had played it just four days earlier, so it unlikely, but not impossible for them to bring it back. I just wanted them to do it when I would be in the audience. Alan walked off by himself afterwards.

The band's van pulled into the alley. We followed it in, and I saw Benoit David and Oliver Wakeman sign a few autographs before security pushed us back to the sidewalk.

The crowd dwindled down, but we hung around longer and talked a while with another friend of Roy's, a very knowledgeable and opinionated drummer named Tony. He was a blast to talk to. He invited us to a after-show get together with some friends of his, but the place was way too smoky, so Roy and I went back to our hotel. People were telling us Yes usually stays in one of two hotels - the Pfister, where we were staying, and another one. I felt bad about spending so much on a hotel without getting the side benefit of bumping into the band there. We thought about going to the other place to see if they were there, but it was already midnight. We just had something to drink in our hotel lounge and took some time to wind down.

The next morning, we walked over to the other hotel. It was in the middle of renovations and looked like a dump. We saw a tour bus there. There wasn't really a lobby or reception area, but we went up to the top-floor revolving restaurant to take a look at the view of Milwaukee. It was getting close to check out time, so we took a cab back to our hotel and packed and got ready for the (relatively) short drive to Bloomington. It was already starting to flurry a bit.