Customer Reviews

Keys to Ascension

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It is okay.I miss the 70's albums when every song was wonderful,and I have still never really gotten over Bill leaving.Wow, that was a long time ago. If you are a completist buy it. If you're favourite is Howe ,well you know he will be marvelous regardless of anything else.

NOTE: YOU CAN NOW GET THE "COMPLETE" KEYS TO ASCENSION CONCERT IN A BOXSET. I HAVEN'T HEARD VOLUME 2. VOLUME 1 (THIS ALBUM) IS SO BAD I DID NOT WANT TO WASTE MY MONEY ON VOL 2.

This yet another Yes reunion album. It features the "classic" version of Yes: Howe, Anderson, Squire, Wakeman and White. The first disc and half of the second disc are live tracks from a show in San Luis Obisbo. The last two songs are new studio tracks. The first disc is 60 minutes long and the second is 50 minutes. The sound quality on both the studio and live material is excellent.

This has to be the worst Yes live album. This particular group hadn't played together in almost 20 years and the last "Yes" hadn't played for 3 years, and they were AWHB. The group just got together and hurriedly did this concert. There was not much time to practice or innovate. So, most of the tracks come out as flat or closely matching the studio versions.

The Revealing Science of God is just boring and tedious. It is the prime example of how Yes (along with Emerson, Lake and Palmer) killed off progressive rock with self endulgant excesses.

The version of America (which was also on Yes's second album) is a jumbled mess. It was nice for them to give it a try, but this particular version of Yes never played it before, and it shows.

Starship Trooper, Siberian Khatru and Roundabout have all been done before on a number of live albums, and have been done much better. Roundabout is especially bland.

The new track, Be The One, stinks, and is about as bad as anything Yes has done.

There are some high points on the is album. Onward has some very nice acoustic guitar work, but the vocals just keep droning on near the end. This song would have been fantastic if it would have been a few minutes shorter, concentrating on the great guitar moments. Many people think this is one of the best things Yes has ever done, and I agree that parts are.

The other new track, That, That Is, has some excellent parts. It is a little slow in the middle, but overall, it is extremely good. And this is a first for Yes: This is a long song that actually has something to say and the words make sense.

The best track is Awaken, which is the only number played with any serious energy or innovation.

Some people have written great reviews about this album. But play it alongside Yessongs and you will hear the difference in energy. Another better ablum would be ABWH's An Evening Of Yes Music Plus.

Note, there is a single CD version of this album called Extended Versions. It contains most of the live tracks, except Revealing. It is a slimely record company trick. The music is repackaged, given a new title, so that unsuspecting fans buy music that they already own. Don't buy anything from the BMG label, as this is the sole reason for their existance.

I got kind of turned off of Yes after I bought this CD. I also got kind of cynical about their music and ridiculous lyrics and sometimes over the top and drawn out music. I then started listening to some of the lesser Yes albums so I could rip the songs I liked and get rid of the rest and really started hating the band.

But, then, I started listening to Yessongs again and some of the better albums like Relayer and remembered why I love the band. I got into them all over again.

Then one day....I went into Pandora and created a Radio station based on the band Caravan, and they would play music by other groups that were similar. Siberian Khatru came on and it just sounded off. It was dead and lifeless. I wondered what was wrong...and then I looked at the computer screen and saw that it was the version from Keys to Ascension.