Yes - Close To The Edge (Full Music Documentary)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ต.ค. 2024
- This is the ultimate review of the mighty Close to the Edge album - an ultimate seventies classic, and the last album of the era to feature legendary drummer Bill Bruford. We get to the heart of what makes the record so special using rare archive footage and expert critical analysis.
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Thanks for watching! - The Coda Records Team
Just turned 26 and listened to "Close To The Edge" for the first time a couple of months ago. I bought the vinyl immediately after hearing the first song. By far the best decision of my life.
That bald guy acts like Close to the Edge is the only good album by yes lmao. Topograhpic and Relayer are great albums too
The dismissal of subsequent albums/line-ups is wrong. Yes!, Close to the Edge is a high water mark, but Relayer, Going for the One, Tormato (underrated I say), Going for the One, Drama all are strong efforts in my book. Also, a photographer who says this album is "not his bag" is commenting here why? Otherwise an enjoyable dive into an amazing recording.
What struck me about CCTE was that it seemed as if the band were painting with music. A dream landscape appears in the mind's eye and one feels as if "inside" the music. When i first heard it i thought it was the best piece of music i'd ever heard...and i still do.
@ 32 minutes: 'Steve How is underrated'? Er, no. Was consistently voted best guitarist for several years and the years he didn't win was when they asked him not to be considered because everyone knew he would win it. When they 'let him back in' he won it again. One of the very best. Utterly brilliant and thoughtful.
It's interesting how people are so challenged by the introduction to CTTE, for whatever reason, when I first heard the piece I totally got it...
Such a shame you couldn't use the original album's music in the album's review. What Bruford laid onto that album was never equaled live by Alan White. Thanks for this video!
Six albums in three years: The Yes Album. Fragile. Close to the edge. Larks Tongues in Aspic. Starless and Bible Black. Red. Bill Bruford-just your standard underachiever.'
Great documentary! Though I don't appreciate all the Topographic Oceans bashing ... I think that album needs to be revisited by many of its critics, it's a fantastic album.
The best Yes line up of all times, the best album and the landmark of prog rock ever. Simply a master piece. Greetings from Mexico.
Towards the end Malcolm Dome says that after CTTE Yes became so self-absorbed they forgot about the audience and produced 'pretentious' albums like "Tales...". and "Relayer". Perhaps Dome didn't notice the sold-out crowds going to see them play during those tours. I'll going along with the self-obsession of "Tales..." especially considering their idea to play the album in its entirety to crowds who had not yet heard it. But that album is a Yes classic in its own right and I only wish I had been old enough to go see them during that tour. Fortunately I was old enough to see the first Relayer tour. Yes never forgot about the audience. They always wrote and performed music for THEIR audience. If you thought Relyer was inaccessible or 'pretentious' (I hate that hackneyed criticism) , then maybe you weren't part of their audience. "Gates..." is a fucking masterpiece.
Damn near 50 years old and still sounds fresh and crisp as it did years ago. Fell in love with Yes back in 73.
Mr Malcolm Dome - Never heard you talk nonsense before. Fragile and Roundabout got them a broader audience perhaps, especially in America, But it was the incredible Yes Album that was the blueprint. - Perpetual Change? Starship Trooper? And Yours is no Disgrace on top of the bloody pops? Those were the actualisation of what was coming and there is nothing inferior or unrealised about any of it. And as the awful solo crap that littered Fragile made for a disjointed experience and the first indicator that egos might be flying high - It is definitely the lesser of the two - Even though Roundabout,Heart of the Sunrise and South Side of the sky are literally incredible to this day and are monolithic testaments to, by far The Best Prog rock this country or any other has produced Love ya mostly. Talcy Malcy
It's 1972, I'm 11 years old and used to listening to the bland pop music of the day. On a visit to my cousin's house (he's older, has a band, plays guitar and is into prog rock) he gives me a set of headphones and plays me Close To The Edge. Mind blowing and - in terms of musical taste - life changing. The thing is, I can still immerse myself in Close To The Edge almost 50 years later and enjoy it just as much. This is still my favourite Yes album and I still regard it as one of the greatest albums ever made. Classic album.
15:31 - Bill Bruford did study jazz and so that was his big orientation, while embracing an eclectic combination of styles. I did get to see Bill play Close to the Edge in 1989 during Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, and Howe's tour. Very impressive with his partly electric set that he used in King Crimson.
Truly their best work. I've since also become fond of Relayer.
I love Yes' boldness and courage to just lay it out there, no matter how off-the-wall or unusual the sound or technique! Not copying from anybody and taking amazing musical chances at every corner! Chris squire, one of the most bombastic players of all time - POW! right in the face - like or of not! And then providing the most lyrical and playful bass to accent the vocals. And Howe, and Bruford, Wakeman, and Anderson take the same all-stops-out writing and performing approach - seeming to hold nothing back! What wonderful freedom to explore such fantastic new sounds and ideas.
I'm not really a prog rock fan, but at its best it could brilliant. Yes were the best of the prog rock crew, and this was their best album. Outstanding musicianship and inventiveness. The sophisticated riot that is Siberian Khatru still blows me away all these years later. Amazing.
CttE was "The Evening Closer" for my group of friends back in high school. we would hang, listen to music, get stoned, discuss life and the world, laugh...but all good things end, so, when the evening as over, we would put on CttE and listen silently and reverently as it played, our spirits soaring and then end with tranquility via the closing forest sounds....it was, indeed, a very special time, one that i'll always cherish. to this day, when i need a spiritual boost, i play CttE and feel refreshed as it closes out.
(๑´▿｀๑)♫•*¨*•.¸¸♪✧
19:30 "...albeit in a lower register." Erh, sometimes perhaps, but actually Chris Squire generally sang the top harmony.
I remember Yes as a warm up band to Grand Funk in Yale Bowl. Jon Anderson saw everyone lighting up and asked everyone when he said go light up. First time ever done. His closing Yes piece was And You And I. Then they had to come back for three encores until Grand Funk got pissed off. So off went all the Yes equipment (Grand funk refused to let them use their amps) and on came Grand Funk as the stadium emptied out. Not all of them, but a whole lot. They were a really amazing band.
19:26 Chris Squire did a lot of 2 part vocal harmony with Jon. It wasn't always 3 part with Steve Howe. And, if you listen closely, Chris is harmonizing in a higher register than Jon through falsetto on I. The Solid Time Of Change
A lot of Yes songs were written with both Jon & Chris doing 2 part harmonies that were sung in counterpoint as opposed to one singing a diatonic 3rd to the melody. Chris would often back off the mic giving Jon more to the front sonically.
Its sad how even the people being interviewed talk bad about Tales and Relayer. I think they were Yes's two best albums personally.
Man oh man oh man oh man was this ever a mind blowing album! It was a tour de force
CTTE is a "high point of Western civilization" album for me. Everyone in the band at this point in time was not only a master of their craft, but a highly unique and individualistic player. Alan White is a phenomenally powerful and accomplished drummer, but his style is fundamentally identical to virtually any other rock drummer. You could put in him any other rock band. When they lost Bruford, they no longer had an inimitable voice on every instrument, and eventually Squire's bass style settled into the same groove---the two of them became a nimble, but typical, rock rhythm section. Some of Yes' greatest work was still ahead of them, but the lineup was never again as perfect as it was here.
"...pseudo intellectual hippy dippy airy fairy lyrics"? What wankers some critics are. Anderson used 'the sound of words' to create poetic imagery, something like fragments of dreams, and his impressionist style perfectly suited the music.
This record was ground-breaking. Even all these years later, it's incredible And even today, considering the skill sets of all five musicians... amazing.
Best album of all time. Genius.
The isolated drums and bass from CTTE can be heard on the internet if you know where to find it. Hearing Bruford (and Squire) clearly really upped my appreciation for Bill's work on the song; he was already a favorite drummer, but the nuance and dexterity of his playing on the title track is nothing short of amazing when heard in isolation. I have to agree that White didn't have quite the depth, uniqueness and musical sensibility that Bill had.
That said, though I am not a fan of 'Tales From Topographic Oceans', I do think Relayer is right up there with CTTE (perhaps a half a notch below CTTE), partly due to the fresh jazzy approach and slightly different timbre of Moraz on keyboards. Patrick not only brought new blood and energy to the group when they most needed it, but his style and sounds were perfect for Relayer (he was also on of the nicest musicians I've ever met). It's a shame the band didn't do another record with Moraz. They did start writing with him for 'Going For The One', but when Wakeman decided to rejoin (because they 'were writing songs again'), they rather unceremoniously kicked Moraz out (according to most reliable sources). There is an alternate beginning for Awaken that Moraz released, showing the possibilities of what could have been. Sadly I find 'Going For The One' to be a bit edgy, brittle and overplayed (particularly Howe, who crammed riffs from his Telecaster into every vocal pause). Perhaps the album would have been better had they not been so showy, allowing the songs to breathe a bit more. The production didn't help matters IMO; to me the record comes across as loud, scratchy and noisy - probably an odd take coming from someone who rates Relayer so highly - but Relayer somehow manages to maintain an organic quality despite the frenetic structure, wild riffing and clanging embellishments. The last great album from Yes IMHO.
I can't fault Bruford from leaving Yes for King Crimson when he did; an artist needs to grow, and I can't imagine Bruford tolerating the Tales sessions. Sure it's possible that Tales would have been better, but then the trio of killer Crim albums would never have been. A world without Lark's Tongues in Aspic, The Nightwatch, Fracture and Starless would be bleak indeed.
RIP Chris Squire and John Wetton: th-cam.com/video/JK9QUqUGmb4/w-d-xo.html
Reviewer Phil Sutcliffe is a blowhard BS'er. He twice described the beginning of "Close to the Edge" as "ugly". His comments throughout are needless observations on society's culture instead of on the novelty of the music.
He's pretentious and uninformed and simply bullshits his way through. He's a dinosaur.
"...legendary drummer Bill Bruford." You got that right, and that's on a bad day.
OK.
Who is the clown with the shaved head, who keeps giving YES backhanded compliments?
"airy fairy, pseudo intellectual lyrics", "splitting 'Close to the Edge' into 4 parts because it was pretentious".
Prog had a premature death in the mid 70's in large part because of people like this in the music press. IT wasn't that punk killed prog, as many people claim, it was the music press's response that killed prog.
What a great thing that prog had a major revival in the mid to late 90's, and has been going strong ever since. THe fact that major labels and the music press just kind of forgot about prog, and let musicians, and small labels, produce it without the need to have commercial success, was the best thing to happen to music.
Love this yet somewhat torn. Listen to 70's Yes and I picture 5 wizards hanging out at the Shire, making magic.
Close to the Edge, what can In say, that's when YES became YES, I fell in love with this album, came out of my shell.
Good documentary! A couple of corrections:
7:29 Fragile was released in November 1971, not early 1972.
34:22 This statement implies that Close to the Edge was the first time the band worked with Eddie Offord. It wasn't, he co-produced The Yes Album and Fragile, and engineered Time and a Word.
I enjoyed this video, but I think it gave a great disservice to many of the later albums. I think that Tales From Topograpic Oceans is a masterpiece, but agree that it would not be the album I would introduce a Yes newbie to. Relayer is a fantastic piece of work, and it demonstrated how the band could adapt and work with a different keyboard player. Then move on to Drama. Hear how Yes could stil create a great album without Jon Anderson as the vocalist. I could carry on, but I think you catch my drift.
I am lucky enough (and old enough) to see Yes live in Liverpool in the mid 70's (76, I think), and, as well as being bowled over by how amazing they sounded, was struck by how they created an almost dream-like, calm joyous mood.
I hear people say that what really led Yes to Close to the Edge was Fragile but I think a lot of it started one album before that. As good as Wakeman is, and I’m definitely a fan, his introduction didn’t change Yes nearly as much as Steve Howe’s did. Time and a Word is forgettable. The Yes Album is really good and also quite sophisticated. Really, they were at their best for three albums, from the time Steve Howe joined until the time that Bill Bruford left. Alan White is good but Bruford is in a league of his own, as became further evident with his work with King Crimson.
This is my favourite album ever. I love every single second of it, from the birds at the beggining to the last "Khatru"'s note . Music is great and each musician is at his best.
(Don't know what lyrics is about, but it doesn't matter to me - Bruford said he doesn't know what "total mass retain" means, ha-ha),
IMO this is Yes peack and prog rock peack also.
Alan White had to step into some difficult shoes to fill - he wasn't a jazz drummer but rather a rock/pop drummer who had had impressive accolades with Harrison and Lennon and many others, and yet he pulled it off, giving Yes a different but interesting sound live. His best work I think was on Going for the One and the San Luis Obispo phase.
It WAS a high point. And yes, by comparison, there WERE problems with many of their future releases. But I don't think it's fair to discount the magic moments that do come from Tales, Relayer, GFTO...or for that matter more maligned records such as Union and Talk. They continued to make extraordinary music. In some cases, it wasn't that what they were doing had changed...they were still making music they wanted to make. It was that the times had changed...the audiences had changed. And that's okay. Tracks like "Awaken", "Holding On" and "In The Presence Of" are superb pieces of music in their own right, and I would challenge any musician to compose pieces of such care and complexity as those. Most could not.
I am surprise there arent any comments. I love hearing people talk about YES. Actually theyre one of few bands I can talk about for hours
Great documentary. I don't think the group went down after this. "Topographic Oceans" was a great album and that was a double album that had only 4 songs on it. I also loved "Going for the one." I also wish you would have included music from the album rather than all live vresions especially since this is a documentary about the album.
One of the best parts of Yes is the fact that their music is never boring, not for a single second.
Yes did not lose their way after Close to the Edge. Relayer was their ultimate Masterpiece and then Going for the One was superb. Alright they did lose their way after that.
What a great documentary about a fantastic album, truly pivotal in prog rock history. Shame that Malcolm Dome seems to think that progressive rock doesn't mean progression however. Tales from Topographic Oceans and Relayer were also great works of musical complexity and took the bands music further. Lucky that Malcolm wasn't around to suggest that Beethoven stopped after his 4th symphony !
They're a bit too tough on Topographic Oceans here. The first track, Revealing Science of God, was really amazing too. If the track Close to the Edge was a 10/10, which is was, Revealing Science of God was a solid 9.
I disagree that they got lost after close to the edge they just went on their way and took a lot of us with them!
Malcolm Dome's of course entitled to his own view but I disagree with his comment about TFTO and Relayer where they supposedly forgot about their audience. That may well have been the case with their early live performances of TFTO but IMO not AS a studio album. And Relayer with the sublime Gates of Delirium and To Be Over? Sorry, no.
Wonderful. But, however much I love Close To The Edge, these remarks at the end saying after it they lost their way and became pretentious - such bollocks! Relayer is fantastic, Tales is my favorite.
Been following YES since1974 about 46 years now seen them live probably over 50 times in over 6 states they are the band of my life for sure
I was thinking that as well. They don't discuss Bill's writing credit on And You And I. They demonstrate the acoustic guitar passage but it's not heard in the context of the album as the Yessongs version was all electric.
There is a bit of truth to the statement made, that they became pretentious at one point. But as far as we the fans, Yes gets a pass. Because even then, they gave us good melodies and good rock and roll. And anyone who has been to a yes concert from the years 1971 to 2010 knows, they blew the roof off the joint.
Mood for a day was one of the first few songs I learned, thanks YES 🎸🇨🇦
The thought that punk killed prog is bs.
Punk fans were never gonna be prog fans.
But certainly, your not being pretentious when you cal Tales pretentious.
Simply the Best ALBUM. Ever!
My favorite rock Album the first
i heard it 46 years ago... and still is today.
Hippy dippy lyrics??
Get your teeth fixed
I was assigned to do a painting w/a fantasy theme. I painted mountains coming out of the sky in a prophetic shine from the tip of an Tolkien elf's sword flanked by statues of Rohan horses ...thank you Yes
The vocals are an instrument the same way Claptons guitar is a voice by itself
Great commentary on the greatest album. Fine insight about how Wakeman held the songs together.
*** One of the best for L S D listening *** or pot *** or not
Steve Howe is absolutely underrated as a player...so versatile and creative...
Their first real Masterpiece.Followed later by Ritual,The Gates of Delirium, and Awaken
40+ years later and it still gives me chills!
Their CTE tour was my first concert ever. Absolutely amazing.
Re drummers; Bill was a jazz drummer playing rock. Alan was a rock drummer playing Yes. Two totally different ways of bringing drums to Yes.
That record, a new world was opening before us... 🌏
Steve Howe 1st member in Guitar Player's Gallery of Greats. Best overall guitarist 5 years in a row. Only 3 total. Eric Johnson and Steve Morse are the other two.
All that and people rarely talk about him these days.
I saw theme first in 1970 if my memory is correct. I was twenty years old. And I still love them. What a great show. I saw them two more times after. Just grand!
I gotta say, that if Chris Squire had not set out to dominate the sound of this entire album--with the other guys happy to follow his lead--this album/creation would never have achieved its well deserved fame. To me, Yes was ultimately "Chris Squire's Band", populated with very talented musicians who recognized his talent and were able to see themselves wrapping their own contributions around his powerful sense of direction. A singular achievement in Progressive Rock history...
Excellent documentary! Thanks for the upload.
Close to the Edge = epic prog rock masterpiece.
The high water mark for this innovative and talented band. Though I think Going For The One has some similar qualities. I was fortunate to see them live 4 or 5 times during the 70's and 80's. I wish my kids could have experienced Yes at that time.
Not sure about that last line “never captured again” - Relayer did it...perhaps not as epically. That was the last great Yes “3 song” album lol.
I don't understand why they use the live version of Edge ... ????
The studio version is EPIC.. Big difference between Allan White & Bill Bruford.
The photo @8:52... when was that taken? I’ve heard the stories that Alan was basically hovering around during the recording and mixing of CTTE. Was he actually THERE during the mixing? That certainly looks like him sat next to Eddie (“are you ready Eddie?”) Offord. Or perhaps this was taken during TFTO
I loved prog in it's time, and I saw most of my favorites when they were fresh - King Crimson, ELP, Yes, Mahavishnu, Kansas, Pink Floyd, Genesis, Van Der Graf Generator and more. I was let down when Alan White toured the Close to the Edge tour as I loved the headphone candy of Bruford on Fragile and Close - still it was a good outdoor concert at Dillon Stadium and Alan kicked ASS - Eagles 1st tour, Edgar Winter and Yes... But I disagree with the bearded fanboy here that conveniently avoids any mention of the previous 3 Yes Lps; and pretty much ignore the convoluted mess they became later. I disagree - I don't think this music aged well at all; it was self indulgent most of the time and got by because it was "new" and kids finally had decent stereos and FM stations that could play LPs and along with weed and acid the music sounded even more progressive. 20 minute opuses of what??? I never cared for lyrics anyway - good thing because wtf is Jon been babbling about for 50 years??? No, it sucks - nobody is going around humming Close To The Edge.. But, it was of it's time a good and natural extension of rock n roll just as punk, grunge, nü wave, metal, djent and what have you are - but it just didn't age well. Rock, R-N-B, and Blues will live forever though so don't panic. 🎶🎸
One my favorite pieces of music (besides CttE and Awaken) is Amarok by Mike Oldfield. Amarok is the only "song" I know that I can look at my player and say, "crap! only 23 minutes left." It's a 59 minute song that is made of many, many parts. The Lore is that Mike Oldfield hated Richard Branson and made an album with nothing in it that could be carved out as a single. There is also supposed to be Morse code in it that spells out something like "Fuck you Richard Branson."
Personally, I put Awaken slightly ahead of CttE.
Enjoyable documentary, but then they nearly all fall into the standard "we must slag off the following albums which also did songs which took a full side of vinyl". Sure, "Topographic Oceans" has some experimentation which arguably didn't quite deliver everything they might have hoped for, but it has an awful lot of memorable tunes wrapped into those four sides. But just as "Fragile" set a template for CTTE, I think TFTO did the same for "Relayer" which is much tighter. I put "Relayer" and CTTE together as my favourites, not trying to favour one over the other, because they are quite different beasts, musically. We sure have been blessed to have shared our lifetimes with them.
I disagree with the comment "Punk drew a line under it!!!" Bands such as Genesis, Yes & ELP were selling out stadiums when most punk bands had formed and after the same punk bands had split up. Then the influence of Prog carried over into the NWOBHM , for example Phamptom of the opera, on Iron Maidens first album. I disagree with comment punk draw a line under it!!!
Yes kinda reminds me of the Beach Boys on Hallucinogenics. Obviously the vocal harmonies are the dead giveaway, but the music is so much... More!! Been a fan for longer than i care to admit. Pink Floyd "Animals" is right up there with it...
It's not just great music from a great band. The recording production is amazing. It seems like recording today is just lazy. No one wants to produce a work of art. The full album side era with early KSHE FM was golden.
1 comment so far ? Anyways, CTTE was probably their best however Relayer was killer going for the one awesome. Tormato was very good. I like Tales a lot too. But I’m a real fan. After Tornato the golden age was clearly over although they made some good music. It just wasn’t classic Yes. Just my opinion.
YES ...so much incomparably great music. But CTTE ...well, not to dismiss or deny the continued legacy of great music by YES, but ...if I had to chose just one YES album to be stuck on an island with, it would be Close to the Edge - the first YES album that stopped me in my tracks and made me just stand there in awe.
But the idea that YES forgot the audience after CTTE is moderately absurd. Their enormous audience that continued for decades and is still quite strong is proof of just how loopy that idea is.
Bill Bruford wrote an article for a drumming magazine about the Making of Close to the Edge, (years after it's release) but I can not recall which magazine it was "Drumming" or "Modern Drummer". Does anyone know which or if it is available anywhere online? Sorry to say, but it was more informative and interesting than this documentary.
the explanations of the chord structure and scales are very interesting
I don't know if CCTE was "the best that they could do" . I don't think they peaked, i think they evolved. Prog bands have to evolve or they're not progressive are they? Just give a listen to the "talk" album with Trevor Rabin!
I totally disagree. I think Yes with bruford was great. I think Yes with Alan White was great. I think the band felt better with White. I think Relayer was their best record.
And they'll think of The Dark Side of the Moon, the greatest prog album ever obviously.
The slow power piece in You and I is the best THING I've ever heard.
Nice story. But would have been nice to get Bruford on drums rather than White - who has a much rockier, muscular straightforward style....
Fragile, CTTE and smattering of everything else and that's all you need for reading scifi n fantasy novels while smoking n whatnot.
Bruford is a special musician, not many could and it wasn't fair for Alan to be compared to him. As mentioned late Yes got very pretentious after this, once Wakeman quit I stopped following them for the most part.
"Wakeman actually, literally became the glue that held together the music."
Strange to be so affirmative (YES) when it comes to the following albums. Lots of people prefer Relayer or Tales over Close to the edge. Close to the Edge is the start of 4 great albums…
But one never feels as though one is about to commit to a LONNNnnnggggg song .. this is the 'pop' 'catchiness' off the main theme .. as they say, something other proggers missed out on .. whereas some later proggers got it in one, Spock's Beard to mention just one.
I saw Topographic live...oh yeaa;;they lost their audience. Where were you?? We about died.
a lot of music theory going on here. just wondering if YES was just playing what sounded good or if they were into theory. I thought that Steve couldn't read music and if that is the case, the music theory goes out the window
Roger Dean's work is not *abstract*, it's entirely representational. You might call it 'surreal', if you want to put it in an art category.