December 7, 1973 - Tales From Topographic Oceans

It's December 7, 1973 and this is already my third release of the month! It's also my last album of the year, as Yes released their sixth album "Tales From Topographic Oceans", a little over a year after "Close To The Edge". Bill Bruford has been gone for a bit now, and he has been replaced by new drummer Alan White. Singer Jon Anderson came up with an idea to make an album about four bodies of Hindu texts known as "shastras", and pitched the idea to guitarist Steve Howe. The two of them wrote the bulk of the material on this album, including all the lyrics, and the amount of ideas turned into a double album: four record sides, each containing one song relating to each of the Hindu texts. This is quite the undertaking. Having one side comprised of a twenty-minute epic has become a progressive rock showcase, but four of them, on the same album? Keyboardist Rick Wakeman was vocally not a fan of this grand idea, claiming there wasn't enough room for him to add his own ideas with Anderson and Howe having a designed structure for the album and he was often bored and frustrated during the recording. The album took around 5 months to practice and perfect, and tensions grew between Wakeman and the rest of the band, but they did complete their epic goal. Let's listen to some new Yes!

The album kicks off with "The Revealing Science Of God (Dance Of The Dawn)" which is the longest of the four tracks at over 22 minutes. It has a slow keyboard intro and sounds of waves crashing. Anderson sings in his usual high voice for a short bit, then we hear a nice instrumental bit with some great guitar and synths. They start a new verse with some solid bass and drums backing and Anderson, Howe and Chris Squire do their typical harmonized voices, and as usual it blends together nicely. This leads right into a new part with some good drumming by White and led by some great guitar by Howe. They slow it down to a new riff with some trippy keyboards by Wakeman. It's not a bad Yes riff, but it's a little bland. Squire turns it up on bass and Wakeman switches to piano for a cool new part with some bounce to it and Howe gives us a pretty sweet guitar solo! Around the 15:00 mark it gets very quiet and we hear an epic guitar bit by Howe. This segues into a new slow verse with soft singing and cool keyboards. Wakeman's trippy synths take off for a pretty awesome solo as he's backed by some fast guitar in this great new part. It slows down again for another new verse led by some cool guitar and it ends as it began with Anderson singing and slow keyboards. This song had some cool parts for sure, but also some lesser parts, usually the slower ones in my opinion. When they speed it up, it's great! Slowed down it's cool but not sweeping you off your feet.

Side two is called "The Remembering (High The Memory)" which opens with some light, cool keyboards and guitar. Anderson, Howe and Squire sing together over Howe's guitar before Anderson sings lead.by himself. This slow part has some decent guitar and keyboards, but is largely not very exciting. It's not bad music, but when making a progressive epic you want to have several awesome sections and then find a way to connect them all. What some of the first song, and most of this song, is doing is making long, progressive passages of music, but when it's not particularly enthralling, the added length actually takes away from the quality of the music. Wakeman takes over lead with some trippy synths, but there's just not a whole lot else happening. I like this new riff driven by acoustic guitar, sounds a lot like earlier, folk-based Yes. Squire plays some great bass backing some cool synths by Wakeman and whenever they speed it up a bit, they still play some solid stuff, including a typical Yes rock jam. The slow parts however, seem they like they go on for too long and suck the energy out. Wakeman plays some trippy keyboards, Squire does some cool bass and Howe plays some solid guitar, but overall this song did not have enough quality parts to really be over 20 minutes long. It's not that it was bad music, but it was excessive mediocrity from a band that can do way better.

Side three is titled "The Ancient (Giants Under The Sun)" which opens with cymbals and percussion from White. Wakeman and Howe add some cool keyboards and guitar to what sounds like an impromptu jam. They slow it down for a new riff with Wakeman playing some orchestra-like Mellotron and Anderson singing. This part is pretty good, with cool bass and other trippy keyboards as Anderson sings about the sun in many different languages. Howe goes off for an extended guitar solo that is pretty sweet, and he's backed by some great drumming by White. They quiet it down again for a new verse led by Howe on acoustic guitar. It sounds masterful! Really great acoustic from Howe sounds so good! Wakeman joins in on keyboards and Anderson sings a soft verse. It ends with some more great acoustic as this shortest of the 4 songs (at about 18 and a half minutes) comes to a close. I think this song was easily the best one so far, with far less extended slow parts, and lots of great guitar by Howe. Coincidence that the shortest is the best so far? I don't think so, less is more.

The final song on the album is "Ritual (Nous Sommes Du Soleil)" which opens with some nice guitar and bass. Wakeman plays some high-pitched synths as Anderson sings some wordless vocals. It gets quiet as we hear a Howe guitar solo that is alright but not amazing. Anderson sings "nous sommes du soleil" in the next part, and once again this part isn't bad, but it sounds a lot like some of the lesser parts we heard already. Rehashing the worst parts is not a great idea. The first half of this song has been way too slow, it's just not grabbing your attention, just wistfully playing in the background. Squire finally decides to spice things up a bit with a cool bass solo! A much better instrumental part segues into a drum solo for White, where he uses his kit as well as some cool other percussion. White does a great job showing off his skills, and the keyboards that back him are haunting at first, but become very trippy, cool stuff by Wakeman. A soft guitar riff starts a new part as Wakeman joins on piano. Anderson's voice is always good, but it also usually sounds the same. There's no variety, always the same high voice, which also wears on you a bit after a double album. Howe plays a pretty sweet guitar solo near the end, but the song ends rather unexciting, a pretty good summation for this final twenty-plus minute song: occasional greatness, followed by extended averageness.

That is the end of "Tales From Topographic Oceans" and while it certainly has some great music within, it is largely a prime example of unnecessary progressive excess. Steve Howe described the album incredibly well like this: "Side one was the commercial or easy-listening side of Topographic Oceans, side two was a much lighter, folky side of Yes, side three was electronic mayhem turning into acoustic simplicity, and side four was us trying to drive the whole thing home on a biggie." Aside from side three, which I thought was easily the best side, the rest of the album contained much more bland, lengthy pieces than it did exciting sections. Yes just tried to do too much with this album, or rather Anderson and Howe did as it was their brainchild. But how does it compare to their earlier albums? To be blunt, it doesn't compare well. Even their debut album "Yes", which before this I had thought was their worst album, was a much more complete record. It may not have some of the crazy synthesizers, but overall I think it's much better to have 40 minutes of mostly good music, than have 80-plus minutes of occasionally good music. This newest album will have to settle for the bottom, and hopefully Yes can simplify things and get back to basics on their next album. This is also my last release of the year, and so begins the year-end wrap-up! 13 full albums this year isn't quite as good as '70/'71, but better than last year's 9, and there was a lot of great music this year!

Favourite song of the year: If the "Karn Evil 9" suite was one whole song, I think it would probably win here, but it is broken up into 3 Impressions, and I don't think any of them individually take the cake. Instead, the choice has to be "Free Bird" by Lynyrd Skynyrd. The first five minutes are a beautiful slow guitar showcase, and the last four minutes is some of the best guitar I've ever heard. Together they make the best song of 1973 (in my opinion).

Top 5 Albums of the year

1. The Dark Side Of The Moon by Pink Floyd
2. Brain Salad Surgery by Emerson, Lake & Palmer
3. Houses Of The Holy by Led Zeppelin
4. (Pronounced Leh-nerd Skin-nerd) by Lynyrd Skynyrd
5. A Passion Play by Jethro Tull

Man that is an epic top 5! All these albums are fantastic, but the prize belongs to Dark Side as that entire album is just pure brilliance from start to finish. 1973 sure was a great year for music. I can't wait to see what '74 has to offer!