We’re Featuring The Music of Yes on All Request Saturday Night

Yes has been a popular Progressive Rock band since their inception back in 1968. They have been so popular that in recent years there have been two different versions of the band touring, including former members of the band. Like most bands, they have gone through personnel changes over the years, with 14 different members, but the one constant all the way to now, has been lead singer Jon Anderson.

In 1981 the band went through a major split with Jon Anderson leaving and the Drama album and tour were the result of that. Then in 1982 they went through a major reformation, Squire and White hooked up with guitarist Trevor Rabin and they formed Cinema. After originally working with a new producer, more drama was going on with the band and Tony Kaye left. Squire was at a party and ran into Jon Anderson who had just completed a solo project, and asked him to rejoin the band and bring back the Yes name.

Jon agreed, and what followed was 90125 in 1983, the most commercially successful album ever for the band. Trevor Rabin's guitar work brought a fresh new sound and the album was certified platinum selling over three million copies and took a Grammy. Big Generator was their next big album coming out in 1986.

From that point on the band continued to tour, record and make more changes in the lineup. Chris Squire passed in 2015, and Billy Sherwood was asked to step in to continue the Yes tradition. As I mentioned earlier two versions of Yes were touring, back before the pandemic when that was a thing. Yes had planned to tour in 2020 with a short leg in the US then heading to Europe. Obviously the pandemic ended those plans for now. The good news is they have been in the studio working on a new album. More to come on that in the near future.

Progressive Rock and long songs are what they are known for, you will hear plenty of that along with all of your requests this weekend on All Request Saturday Night.

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Here’s some shots of the band during their 2003 tour with Rick Wakeman returning on keyboards along with some of their Roger Dean designed album covers.

(Photos came from this video produced by SouthSideOfTheSky)