This Day in Music History: Yes/Going for the One (07/22)

On this day in 1977, Yes released their eighth studio album, Going for the One. Produced after each member of the group released a solo record, the album marks the return of keyboardist Rick Wakeman (RW!), who departed in 1974 over musical differences in Tales from Topographic Oceans (1973). The band returned to producing shorter songs, unlike Tales and Relayer where the tracks range from nine to almost 22 minutes.

After their extended break, the band regrouped in Switzerland in late 1976. After constructing epic tracks for the last few years, Yes felt inspired to scale things back a bit and recorded some of their most direct and concise material since Fragile. Wakeman also varied his sound by using the new polyphonic synthesizer out from Moog at the time, and using church pipe organ on "Parallels" and the extended track, "Awaken".

"Parallels" was originally intended for use on Chris Squire's solo album Fish Out of Water, but left out due to a combination of space constraints and a sense that the song didn't quite fit in.

After many successive album covers with Roger Dean, Yes (who also produced the album entirely by themselves) instead commissioned Hipgnosis (known for designing album covers for Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin) to create the artwork for Going for the One. However, Dean's Yes logo was retained. The album cover features the Century Plaza Towers in Los Angeles, also known locally as the Twin Towers. Personally, I think Yes and Roger Dean go together and this was a bad decision.

I have previously covered this album in more depth here: Side One, Side Two.

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Friday and the Random 10 (Year of Hell Edition)

So if there was any good news at all coming out of 2016 it was that three of my favorite bands made it into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Not that it matters much anyway, the place is a sham, but to be inducted this year are YES(!), Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), and Journey.

This week's countdown, and the first for 2017, will be 16 random songs from these bands and no one else. It's the only way to send out the Year of Hell*.

Let music take the pain of 2016 away!

Music Monday (Going for the One, Side 2)

The first side of Yes's Going for the One was covered here. And now onto the music and bonus tracks from side two.

The inside album cover of Going for the One

Music Monday (Going for the One, Side 1)

After 1974's Relayer, Yes took a three year break (with everyone doing solo albums and such) before releasing another album. Rick Wakeman rejoined the band (for the first time) and in 1977 they did an album called Going for the One.

For some stupid reason, they chose Hipgnosis to do the album cover instead of Roger Dean. I have no idea why. This is what it looked like:

And now, on to the music itself.