RIP: Chris Squire

Chris Squire, founding member and bassist for the band, Yes, has passed away. During my early teens, I was heavily into Progressive Rock, and Yes was my second favorite band, after ELP.

Throughout my life, I would hazard a guess that I have seen Yes approximately 6 or 7 times. I can't say that I was really much of a fan of the later incarnations of the band, and was pretty disappointed in the last Yes show, that I saw at the Moody, several years ago.

Here are some of the obituaries:

• http://pitchfork.com/news/59686-yes-bassist-chris-squire-has-died/
  
• https://twitter.com/asiageoff/status/615159221387182080
  

Yes - ACL Live at the Moody Theater

First, RIP Peter Banks

Lost in my preparation for SxSW, I noticed but forgot to blog the passing of the original guitarist from Yes, Peter Banks.

The latest incarnation

Months ago, my friends Ron and Alissa, got me this ticket. I had always been a Yes fan growing up, and had seen them multiple times prior to 1993, the year I moved to Austin. In fact, this is the first time I have seen Yes, since the Union tour.

To me, it's not really Yes without Bill Bruford, and a lineup without Jon Anderson on vocals is at the very least, suspect. I didn't mind the Drama lineup, but I was never a big fan of the 90125 era.

Band Personnel

For this tour, the Yes lineup would be:

• Jon Davison - vocals
• Chris Squire - bass
• Steve Howe - guitar
• Alan White - drums
• Geoff Downes - keyboards

Jon Davison was the only newbie in the lineup, but all reports indicated that he sounded eerily close to Jon Anderson, when he sang.

Set List

The premise of this tour was for the band to play three Yes albums in their entirety. For our show they were played in this order:

1. Close to the Edge
2. Going for the One
3. The Yes Album

Encore

• Roundabout

The performance

Honestly, there were some problems with this band, particularly with the tempo. I'm not sure if the root of the problem was that the band was under rehearsed, or that there were monitoring problems. Throughout the night, it never seemed like Howe or Downes were on the same page as the rhythm section of White and Squire.

It seems I expected more from this show than the band was able to deliver. Hopefully they'll get this worked out before the end of the tour.

The night ended mercifully with Roundabout.