In the aftermath of my original review of
\nTodd Rundgren’s Utopia<\/i> a few months ago and the polite
\noutcry that lef me to re-review the album, one correspondent in the
\nalt.music.todd-rundgren newsgroup, Loznik, challenged me to give
\nYes’s 1974 release
\nRelayer<\/i> another listen, especially after I had admitted it
\nhad been some time since I had listened to the album.<\/p>\n
Now, some of the more hardcore progressive rock zealots (yeah,
\nyou know who you are) are saying, “Oh, God, he’s gonna rip Yes
\nagain.” No, not completely. While there were portions of
\nRelayer<\/i> I didn’t like, the album, for the most part, is
\nquite listenable.<\/p>\n
No matter what side of the fence you sit on, the one fact that
\nis indisputable is that Yes was going through a transition period,
\nespecially after the bloated monstrosity that was
\nTales From Topographic Oceans<\/i>. Gone was keyboardist Rick
\nWakeman, who apparently had enough and scooted out the door. (He
\nwould return in 1977 for two albums before departing again.) In was
\nPatrick Moraz, who seemed to be trying to figure out how to make
\nthe keyboard sound his own on
\nRelayer<\/i>. Let’s face it, he had pretty big shoes to fill —
\nthe fact he lasted all of one album isn’t a declaration against the
\njob he did on this one, however.<\/p>\n
Gone also — well, sort of — were the side-long cosmic
\njerk-offs that made
\nTales From Topographic Oceans<\/i> so unbearable (at least to
\nthis critic). Granted, “The Gates Of Delirium” takes up the whole
\nfirst side of
\nRelayer<\/i>; fact is, this is a much more listenable piece —
\nespecially because Yes decided to finally challenge the listener
\nwith touches of jazz thrown in the mix. Oh, sure, I could have
\nargued for lopping off two minutes or so of the instrumental work,
\nbut even with it on this cut, it still is a decent effort.
\nEspecially deserving of praise is guitarist Steve Howe’s work,
\nwhich is the most jazzy and fluid I think I’ve ever heard him
\nplay.<\/p>\n
Also worth noting on “The Gates Of Delirium” is the premiere of
\nJon Anderson’s vocal lines at the end — the lines that would
\nbecome “Soon” later in Yes’s career. (An example of “Soon” can be
\nfound on
\n9012Live – The Solos<\/i>.)<\/p>\n
This, however, doesn’t excuse the sonic noise that Howe twists
\nout of his guitar during “Sound Chaser.” The bulk of this track
\nsounds like it was a lot of improvisational work — and for a long
\ntime, I found myself asking, “Where the hell is this track going?”
\n“Sound Chaser” eventually does find its niche — I think you can
\nhear the beginnings of the track “Going For The One” in Howe’s
\nslide work — but it takes far too long to become a track with some
\nmeat behind it.<\/p>\n
This brings us to the third and final track on
\nRelayer<\/i> — “To Be Over,” a song that brought this version of
\nYes together the best. Moraz’s keyboard work shines the brightest
\non this song, while the whole band seems to be firing on all
\ncylinders, making this track seem far shorter than nine minutes.
\nThis is truly progressive rock without overkill — a solid,
\nbeautiful number.<\/p>\n
So why isn’t
\nRelayer<\/i> better known? Good question — maybe Loznik can
\nanswer it if he’s reading and wishes to enlighten me. Admittedly,
\nthis album came out in the shadows of
\nTales From Topographic Oceans<\/i>, and had I been actively
\nbuying records in the fall of 1974 (I was three years old, for
\nCrissakes, gimme a break), I might have been a little gun-shy about
\ntrying the disc out. Also, with Wakeman gone, some might have
\nquestioned how good of a replacement Moraz would be — never mind
\nthe fact that Wakeman wasn’t the original keyboardist for Yes.<\/p>\n
Excuses aside,
\nRelayer<\/i> has enough material to challenge, delight, and even
\nfrustrate today’s progressive rock fan, and it is a far better
\nalbum than history has made it out to be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24765,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5713],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-35969","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-yes","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35969\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35969"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=35969"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=35969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}