2008 was an important year for Yes. It was the year in which the band celebrated its fortieth anniversary. The band, still led by founder Chris Squire, toured America with the latest line up to bear the name of this rather special band of musicians. 2008 was also important for another reason, as towards the end of the year, whilst looking for footage for an entirely different project, a researcher unearthed the footage that is now included on this DVD.
Yes first came together under the name Mabel Greer's Toyshop, a name rather in keeping with the previous year's Summer of Love ethos. However, by 1968 the name was beginning to lose its shine. The final line-up of Mabel Greer's Toyshop included Jon Anderson, Chris Squire, Peter Banks, Tony Kaye and Bill Bruford. The name change from Mabel Greer's Toyshop to Yes came in August 1968 when, following a couple of days rehearsing at the Lucky Horseshoe cafe in Shaftsbury Avenue, the band played their first gig as Yes at the Mersea Youth Club in Essex, although the first recorded actual billing of Yes at a gig was a two-show stand at the famous Marquee club some two days later on 5th August.
The reason for the name Yes, I hear you ask? Well, according to Peter Banks it was instantly recognisable, extremely positive and more importantly, looked big on posters advertising the band's gigs.
Between August and the end of December 1968 the band played fifty-five gigs throughout the length and breadth of the country. One special gig, however, on 26th November, gave Yes a taste of what lay just around the corner, when they were added to the bill of Cream's farewell performance at London's Royal Albert Hall.
The band were bottom of the bill under Rory Gallagher's Taste, John Hiseman's Colosseum and of course, Cream. Despite being incredibly nervous, the band acquitted itself well and from here on things moved quickly. The band were invited to record a session for John Peel's Top Gear show in January 1969, the first of many recorded for the BBC, and shortly after secured a recording contract with the giant Atlantic Records label.
Over the coming months the band recorded their debut album - the epoymously titled Yes (not to be confused with The Yes Album two years later). The album featured a mix of covers and original material, which was fairly representative of the band's live set at this time, and was released in July of 1969.
The band by now had started performing gigs overseas and from the fifty-five concerts performed by Yes in 1968 the band performed a hectic 203 concerts in 1969 and also managed to fit in a number of TV appearances both in the UK and Europe, including the first appearance featured on this DVD filmed for the German television programme Beat Club in November 1969.
The tracks performed here are No Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed, Looking Around and Survival. Of the three tracks, Looking Around and Survival were from the first Yes album, and No Opportunity was a Richie Havens song the band had worked up for live performance and would feature as the opening track on the band's second album Time and A Word, which would be released in July 1970. Only No Opportunity would be featured in the actual broadcast from this mini live set and was duly broadcast on 29th November 1969. In fact, an interesting aside is that this particular edition of Beat Club was the penultimate edition to be filmed in black and white. The show would change to colour after the final show of the year on 31st December.
The set performed by Yes on this occasion would have been a cut-down version of the band's live set, and Jon Anderson introduced the numbers, although he forgets which camera he is on whilst introducing Looking Around, much to the amusement of the rest of the band. The performance is a tight, concise and well disciplined one, proving that the live work undertaken by Yes in 1969 had sharpened up their musical skills no end. More importantly, in terms of footage available from this period, very little has survived, making this small but historically important piece of film of the original line-up of Yes all the more important.
The next clip featured here is a colour clip of the band performing Time And A Word. The performance is a lip-synched performance as was the norm for many television programmes of the time and the band seem to be enjoying themselves performing the title track of their second album. Despite the good natured performance, however, there was an underlying tension, which had arisen during the recording of Time And A Word. Peter Banks is featured here in possibly one of his last TV appearances with the band he helped to form. Just over seven weeks after this performance Peter Banks was sacked from Yes following a gig in Luton on 18th April 1970. Time And A Word, the final album to feature Peter as a member of Yes, was released in July 1970 by which time Peter's successor Steve Howe was installed as the guitarist in Yes where despite a few periods where he has chosen to play with other bands such as Asia and GTR, he has remained ever since.
The next section of footage comes from another Beat Club appearance filmed on 19th April 1971. The two tracks featured on the programme, which was aired on 24th April, were I've Seen All Good People and Yours Is No Disgrace. However, researchers recently found a second take of Yours Is No Disgrace, which is slightly faster than the original take. This second take has remained in the vault until now.
Following on from these TV performances, Yes would finally break through with their third album, The Yes Album and following more changes in line-up, which saw Rick Wakeman replacing Tony Kaye, the band would go onto even greater success with albums such as Fragile, Close To The Edge & Tales From Topographic Oceans in the seventies, through the eighties with albums like 90125 and Big Generator, and then to the bands most recent studio album, Magnification, which was recorded with a full orchestra in 2001.
The band, despite short periods of inactivity and a great many changes in personnel (which has seen Chris Squire as the only constant throughout the band's history), have weathered the storms of fashion and commercial whims and released almost twenty studio albums and a number of live albums in the period 1968-2008. Yes have also remained hugely popular in the live arena and are still able to fill some of the largest arenas worldwide to audiences both young and old.
The performances featured on this DVD, however, are from the very early days of the band. You could say from a time Before and Beyond their massive success; but the spark of what made them the massively successful band they became is visible here for all to see and hear.
Licensed courtesy of Joe Sweetinburgh at impressiverecs@btinternet.com
'Nowadays, the progressive rock band Yes doesn’t need an introduction, but at the end of the sixties, when this great band made their first TV-appearances outside the UK, many people were not aware of Yes. In November 1969, Yes performed at the legendary German TV-show Beat Club. At the time nobody would have believed that their progressive rock sound should become that famous a couple of years later. The band did two more live sessions for Beat Club. The clips of Yours Is No Disgrace and I’ve Seen All Good People are the most famous ones. Some of the German footage was released on various DVD’s, but as far as I know never on one disc. In 2009, the DVD The Lost Broadcasts was released for the first time, one year later followed by the second release. This time Background Magazine got hold of a copy to review. It’s a nice opportunity to tell all of our readers what they can expect from this historical DVD. Maybe 43 minutes is a bit short for a DVD-release nowadays, but that doesn’t mean that the contents aren’t worth watching.
'The disc starts with the aforementioned Beat Club footage of November 1969 shot in black and white. Yes start with a rearranged version of the Richie Havens’ song No Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed from their second album Time And A Word which wasn’t released at the time of this performance. This song was already a live favourite and became the opening piece for that album. The song is followed by two tracks from their eponymous debut album. The footage of Looking Around and Survival were previously unseen actually. Initially, they were not included for only one Yes song could be seen on TV. The next clip was shot at February 23, 1970 and features the title track from the second album in full-colour this time because the live show accorded with the available standards at the time. It’s obvious to see that this is a playback performance. This footage shows Peter Banks on the electric guitar, but probably for the last time as he left the band just before the release of Time And A Word because of continuing tensions between Jon Anderson, Chris Squire and himself.
'The final four tracks were all filmed at April 19, 1971. It starts with the second take of Yours Is No Disgrace. This take wasn’t used for the TV-show because it was a bit faster than the version performed for the first take. In this clip Yes used the head and the chair we can also see on the cover of The Yes Album. This album was the debut for guitarist Steve Howe who plays a rather freaky solo on this long version of Yours Is No Disgrace with Jon Anderson on a keyboard. Tony Kaye, the band’s main keyboardist, is almost unrecognizable since he’s wearing a beard. The other three tracks are different versions of I’ve Seen All Good People. Three takes were needed before the band members were satisfied with the result. The first take is a mixture of two shots. First we see Bill Bruford playing the drums and then we see him clapping along with the music. The info on this DVD doesn’t tell us which take was used for the actual broadcast on April 24, 1971. However, that really doesn’t matter after watching this footage. The most important thing is that we can enjoy Yes in their early days. Most band members were still inexperienced and they hardly ever played in front of a TV-camera. It’s certainly enjoyable to see those young well-known musicians. Therefore this DVD is highly recommended to people who love the music of these progressive rock pioneers.'
*** Henri Strik (edited by Peter Willemsen)
