Yes "90125" (1983): Track by Track!

<v Speaker 1>Ao, this is Sammy J. From Chicago and you're listening
<v Speaker 1>to Shirley you Can't Be Serious podcast, And it's like
<v Speaker 1>something to think about, right, Like what if my name
<v Speaker 1>was Shirley right, and I'm like, yo, I am serious,
<v Speaker 1>and you can feel comfortable with calling me Shirley because
<v Speaker 1>that's my name and you know, always remember, right, like
<v Speaker 1>life is all about when your Internet goes down, it's
<v Speaker 1>not how many dimes it goes down, but how many
<v Speaker 1>times you get back up? Come on, you know, listen up.
<v Speaker 2>You're better than this.
<v Speaker 1>HEO.
<v Speaker 2>Hello, everybody, Welcome back to the Shirley you Can't Be
<v Speaker 2>Serious Podcast. D We are at the end of season five.
<v Speaker 2>Can you believe? I mean, we've made it five years
<v Speaker 2>and this is completed our fifth year.
<v Speaker 3>I can feel no sense of measure, no illusions as
<v Speaker 3>we take refuge in young man's pleasure, breaking down the
<v Speaker 3>dreams that we make. That's what this podcast is about,
<v Speaker 3>ladies and gentlemen, breaking down the young man's dreams when
<v Speaker 3>we were young in the eighties, young in the nineties.
<v Speaker 3>If you were young in the seventies, you may not
<v Speaker 3>be as big a fan of this episode because you
<v Speaker 3>may love a yes, that's not the yes we're talking
<v Speaker 3>about today.
<v Speaker 2>That's true.
<v Speaker 3>By the way, we are here today to talk about
<v Speaker 3>yes ninety nine oh one two five, which is interesting
<v Speaker 3>because if you listen to the intro music for Beverly
<v Speaker 3>Hills nine oh two one oh, yes, it's very similar
<v Speaker 3>to Owner of a Lonely Heart. Oh really, take a
<v Speaker 3>listen to it right here, haven't that I don't know.
<v Speaker 3>I'm just saying, you know, somebody was like nine o
<v Speaker 3>two one oh what about nine oh one two five?
<v Speaker 2>Hey, I'll tell you this before we get into what
<v Speaker 2>that actually means. I was with our good friend Doug Gray.
<v Speaker 2>We were taking some kids ice skating the other nine.
<v Speaker 2>He was sitting shotgun and we were talking and he's like,
<v Speaker 2>is that like a zip code? Like what I mean
<v Speaker 2>because it's close to nine oh two one oh? Right, yeah,
<v Speaker 2>so nine oh one two five would make a lot
<v Speaker 2>of sense.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, that may be somebody's zip code.
<v Speaker 2>So we looked it up. Uh huh, do you know
<v Speaker 2>what zip code that is? No?
<v Speaker 4>What zip code is it?
<v Speaker 2>It's non existent? Just not a zip code? Too bad? Right?
<v Speaker 4>Right?
<v Speaker 3>That had been like, yes, so we will in this episode,
<v Speaker 3>we will tell you the secret of what nine oh
<v Speaker 3>one two five means?
<v Speaker 2>And we will tell you.
<v Speaker 3>The secret of this band and how they fell apart
<v Speaker 3>and then re configured themselves into what we got in
<v Speaker 3>nineteen eighty three. This, I'll tell you, this is a
<v Speaker 3>fascinating history. And I will also tell you when you
<v Speaker 3>asked me, You're like, hey, do you know what nin
<v Speaker 3>to five means? And I said, I think it's how
<v Speaker 3>many members they've had in this band. I mean, g Andi,
<v Speaker 3>this band is still around. There are no original members left, right,
<v Speaker 3>There's some members from the seventies there and from nineteen
<v Speaker 3>eighty there, but that's it. Like, none of the guys
<v Speaker 3>that we're going to talk about today are still in
<v Speaker 3>the band.
<v Speaker 2>I will say this typically the band history, that's kind
<v Speaker 2>of your area of expertise. That's where you like to
<v Speaker 2>concentrate and follow rabbit trails and stuff like that. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>this may be the most interesting formation of Yes and
<v Speaker 2>how it's related to several other bands and the breaking
<v Speaker 2>up of Yes and the coming back together of Yes.
<v Speaker 2>I was blown away, and I dare say that really
<v Speaker 2>no other band has gone through this exact same process.
<v Speaker 3>Well, I mean, we're here today to talk about their
<v Speaker 3>eleventh studio album right eleventh. I don't know that we've
<v Speaker 3>ever talked about a band's eleventh album. I mean, we've
<v Speaker 3>talked about Aerosmith and Ozzie was Born and many bands
<v Speaker 3>that have many albums. I don't think we've ever hit
<v Speaker 3>the double digits before. And it was almost forty years
<v Speaker 3>It was forty one years ago.
<v Speaker 2>That's forty one years ago. Spandmed in nineteen sixty eight.
<v Speaker 2>My dad was a teenager when this band.
<v Speaker 3>Was formed, right, And as I said, they went through
<v Speaker 3>so many changes of members in this band. I could
<v Speaker 3>not possibly in an hour long episode give you everything.
<v Speaker 3>So what's interesting is what we've got here that we're
<v Speaker 3>going to talk about today is really yes, part three,
<v Speaker 3>but it was almost led Zeppelin Part two, right, Yeah,
<v Speaker 3>So we'll get to that story in just a bit.
<v Speaker 3>Before we get into all of that, I just want
<v Speaker 3>to say, Merry Christmas, everybody. Merry Christmas.
<v Speaker 2>Christmas was a few days ago, even though even though
<v Speaker 2>for us Christmas is in the future, for people listening
<v Speaker 2>to this, it's in the past. Happy New Year, everybody knew.
<v Speaker 4>That's what I meant to say.
<v Speaker 3>What I really mean is I'm very grateful and thank
<v Speaker 3>you for the gift that is our listenership, our fandom.
<v Speaker 3>I appreciate you, appreciate you guys so much. You've made
<v Speaker 3>it amazing five years. I hope we have ten times
<v Speaker 3>as many coming up, and we'll be talking about our
<v Speaker 3>eleventh studio album in forty wins.
<v Speaker 2>Right right, all right, well, let's dive into yes nine, one, one, two, five.
<v Speaker 3>Let's see we have this new album from this kind
<v Speaker 3>of newly reconglomerated band. Can we open up with a banger?
<v Speaker 2>Let's save the best for first, What do you say?
<v Speaker 2>I mean, really, let's start off with one of the
<v Speaker 2>biggest songs of nineteen eighty four. I think it was
<v Speaker 2>like eleventh overall for that year. We're talking about one
<v Speaker 2>of the best years for music.
<v Speaker 3>In history, right, maybe the best, arguably the best year
<v Speaker 3>in history, and this one topped the charts for several weeks.
<v Speaker 3>Here we go number one, owner of a lonely heart.
<v Speaker 3>First three seconds of the song, and we got so
<v Speaker 3>much to talk about already.
<v Speaker 2>It's incredible, right, one of the first songs to include
<v Speaker 2>a bunch of samples.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, other than some select rap groups, Yeah, nobody was
<v Speaker 3>doing this in nineteen eighty three.
<v Speaker 2>In the rock world, and really they pop in this song.
<v Speaker 2>It's almost impossible. You can't ignore them. It's like no, no, no,
<v Speaker 2>really cool. This song was released October twenty fourth, nineteen
<v Speaker 2>eighty three. This song reached all the way to number
<v Speaker 2>one in nineteen eighty four.
<v Speaker 4>Yep, do you want to hear the top five?
<v Speaker 2>I was expecting you. I hate to lead with that,
<v Speaker 2>but I know you're four right now. Okay, So this
<v Speaker 2>reached number one January twenty first, nineteen eighty four. Your
<v Speaker 2>top five not as strong as I was hoping. Four
<v Speaker 2>in January of eighty four. Number five, Break My Stride
<v Speaker 2>by Matthew Wilder. Yes, I know that, number four, Talking
<v Speaker 2>in Your Sleep the Romantics.
<v Speaker 3>Yes, we covered that one in our top five of
<v Speaker 3>nineteen eighty four. Be sure and go check out that one.
<v Speaker 3>We did talk about this song too.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, spoiler alert, Yes we did.
<v Speaker 3>Didn't know that we were going to cover this album
<v Speaker 3>for sure, and so yeah, so it made it onto
<v Speaker 3>that chart. Number three Karma Chameleon, Yeah, pretty big, unescapable.
<v Speaker 4>Yep.
<v Speaker 2>Number two, say say say, Paul McCartney, Michael Jackson.
<v Speaker 4>It's your favorite one.
<v Speaker 3>This is where Michael Jackson wins an arm wrestling. It
<v Speaker 3>was oddly flirting with his sister.
<v Speaker 4>I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>That was before his major fallout with Paul McCartney over
<v Speaker 2>the Beatles catalog issue and of course number one owner
<v Speaker 2>of a Lonely Heart.
<v Speaker 3>Can we talk about the guitar. This guitar sound that,
<v Speaker 3>I mean, it grabs a hold of your brain and
<v Speaker 3>squeezes it.
<v Speaker 2>It does.
<v Speaker 3>I mean, it's so good, it's so powerful. I don't
<v Speaker 3>know what the magic is that they did. I mean,
<v Speaker 3>this is a studio guitar that they there's no question
<v Speaker 3>that they were doing some magic in the studio here
<v Speaker 3>to make this sound as loud and crunchy as it does.
<v Speaker 3>But chef's kiss that they did their job.
<v Speaker 2>You've got the great crunchy guitar riff at the beginning.
<v Speaker 2>You've got a little arpeggio guitar, yes that's right, right,
<v Speaker 2>You've got the samples, yep, you've got the samples sound effects.
<v Speaker 2>You've got the bass that's basically mimicking the boom boom
<v Speaker 2>boom boom boom, and then just all this fun stuff
<v Speaker 2>and then the vocals are off the chart. And this
<v Speaker 2>song was composed on the toilet completely and finished on
<v Speaker 2>the toilet.
<v Speaker 4>Finished, well, not quite finished.
<v Speaker 3>There's an interesting story about pieces that were missing of
<v Speaker 3>this song, that's true, and the reunification of the band. Yes,
<v Speaker 3>that comes along with this, but we'll get into that
<v Speaker 3>story here in a little bit.
<v Speaker 4>Did you get to go watch this video?
<v Speaker 2>Yeah? I did. I think it's one of the worst
<v Speaker 2>videos of nineteen eighty four. What did I seriously think that?
<v Speaker 2>Because it started and then it stopped. So the one
<v Speaker 2>I watched, it's like the band and then John Anderson says,
<v Speaker 2>wait a minute, and the song comes to a grinding halt,
<v Speaker 2>and John Anderson's like, can we do this any other way?
<v Speaker 2>The song restarts, and then it's like people turning it
<v Speaker 2>into animals.
<v Speaker 3>I remember, like the mainstream video that you would see
<v Speaker 3>on MTV where they didn't show the full I mean
<v Speaker 3>I remember seeing the full version where they threw that
<v Speaker 3>weird stop start thing and change into birds and other
<v Speaker 3>animals and stuff like that snags and lizard right, which again,
<v Speaker 3>I mean, it kind of makes me think of the
<v Speaker 3>Pink Floyd Learning to Fly video where he's like, you know,
<v Speaker 3>takes the running jump and turn into the bird, right. Sure, Well,
<v Speaker 3>the directors of the video are Audrey Powell and Storm Thurgerson,
<v Speaker 3>who did a bunch of the Pink Floyd artwork. And
<v Speaker 3>so I'm guessing this was a director decision, not a
<v Speaker 3>band decision.
<v Speaker 2>Sure, we won't.
<v Speaker 4>Blame it on the band.
<v Speaker 2>For guys who has started in nineteen sixty eight, music
<v Speaker 2>videos was kind of uncharted territory. Sure, you got to
<v Speaker 2>do this to keep up because MTV is a huge
<v Speaker 2>new thing and these.
<v Speaker 3>Guys are like, what are we doing here? So what
<v Speaker 3>you're trying to tell me is that the video was
<v Speaker 3>killing the radio star. Oh my gosh, that's so good.
<v Speaker 3>You're going to bring it in by the way.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, we're going to get into that, yeah, okay, but
<v Speaker 2>I do want to say this before we go any further. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>this song was kicked out of number one by a
<v Speaker 2>song that we've talked about.
<v Speaker 4>Okay, really.
<v Speaker 2>Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood.
<v Speaker 4>That was one of our Patreon episode. Loved that episode.
<v Speaker 2>You remember who was the producer of that song? Don't
<v Speaker 2>remember Trevor Horn.
<v Speaker 4>Oh that's right. Oh yeah, he's the one that made
<v Speaker 4>that song so good.
<v Speaker 2>That's it?
<v Speaker 4>Oh my heed it?
<v Speaker 2>And said, guys, can I bamp this up for you.
<v Speaker 3>Yes, yeah, they were just kind of a weird. There's
<v Speaker 3>not any politically correct way for me to say what
<v Speaker 3>I'm thinking right now, but yes, they were kind of.
<v Speaker 2>An alternate club type of band, lifestyle clubs band. And
<v Speaker 2>Trevor Horn.
<v Speaker 3>Said, this actually has got a bit of a hook.
<v Speaker 3>If you do some right production on this, we can
<v Speaker 3>make this a.
<v Speaker 2>Hit, is it okay?
<v Speaker 4>Right?
<v Speaker 2>Yeah? Is it okay? If I make this a number
<v Speaker 2>one smash around the world, right, we'll sell lots of
<v Speaker 2>T shirts. So Relax and Owner of a Lonely Heart
<v Speaker 2>are sort of third cousins. Yeah, Okay, In just a minute,
<v Speaker 2>we're going to talk about another song that I think
<v Speaker 2>is very strongly related to this. Yeah, but let's kick
<v Speaker 2>that down the road. Okay, now you mentioned it. Trevor
<v Speaker 2>Rabin wrote this song on the toilet. Well, Trevor Rabin,
<v Speaker 2>who's this guy he's done in? Yes?
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, so Trevor Rabin had started off he was this
<v Speaker 3>South African guy. He was in a band in South Africa,
<v Speaker 3>got pretty famous in a band called Rabbit Ever Rampant Rabbit. Okay, No, no,
<v Speaker 3>I don't think that was well, maybe I don't know
<v Speaker 3>who knows. Maybe I don't know how Rabbit came up
<v Speaker 3>with his name, but I will tell you that this
<v Speaker 3>that the Volkswagen Rabbit was about to come out in
<v Speaker 3>the US, and they were like, Hey, we like this band.
<v Speaker 3>We want this band to come to the US and
<v Speaker 3>be like composing the music for our promotions of this
<v Speaker 3>new Rabbit car. Yes, and they were like, we're in.
<v Speaker 3>The only problem was in nineteen eighty whatever it was,
<v Speaker 3>they couldn't get a visa to the US.
<v Speaker 4>And guess why apartheid?
<v Speaker 2>You got it? Yes, that is right. That's the same
<v Speaker 2>reason why Kruegrans are illegal in the United States.
<v Speaker 3>Yes, So Trevor Rabin was frustrated. After that left the band.
<v Speaker 3>He went to the UK. I guess UK didn't have
<v Speaker 3>a problem with apartheid.
<v Speaker 4>I don't know.
<v Speaker 3>He moved to London, he started a record company up there,
<v Speaker 3>got some funding from a milling company in South Africa, Okay,
<v Speaker 3>and so he starts producing. He produces Thin Lizzy, he
<v Speaker 3>produces Manford man Tever Raven. Yes, Trevor Rabin is producing
<v Speaker 3>these records and of course playing on these albums as well,
<v Speaker 3>because he is a brilliant musician. He's not only a guitarist.
<v Speaker 3>He plays keyboards and other stuff, just you know, an
<v Speaker 3>incredible composer. And so Geffen Records comes in and they're like, hey, Trevor,
<v Speaker 3>do you have any demos?
<v Speaker 2>And he's like, yes, I do, and he.
<v Speaker 3>Plays them what would ultimately become yes, nine oh one
<v Speaker 3>two five.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. So there actually is an early version of this
<v Speaker 2>song available. It's a compilation of demos and it's called
<v Speaker 2>nine oh one two four. So I do want to
<v Speaker 2>tell you this quick story. You know, we talk about
<v Speaker 2>Trevor Rabin. They really didn't know what to do with him.
<v Speaker 2>He's kind of like Brian Adams. He's a talented singer
<v Speaker 2>songwriter right working on songs. He can sing, he can
<v Speaker 2>play guitar. Am I going to be in a band?
<v Speaker 2>Am I gonna be buy my?
<v Speaker 4>You know?
<v Speaker 2>Geffen signed him to this development deal and then they
<v Speaker 2>started kind of trying to push him around to figure
<v Speaker 2>out where he would fit. But he took these songs
<v Speaker 2>to Arista and Clive Davis, who we've talked about before
<v Speaker 2>many times, said no, I don't like these songs. They're
<v Speaker 2>too strange. That's on Noval only Heart yeah and changes
<v Speaker 2>and some yeah, some.
<v Speaker 4>Of these others talk about. Yeah, most of the songs
<v Speaker 4>on the album.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, so this is what he said. Clive Davis says
<v Speaker 2>to him, these songs are too weird. I don't like him.
<v Speaker 2>I want you to write stuff that sounds more like foreigner. Yes,
<v Speaker 2>that's right, and Trevor Ravens liked, thank you very much.
<v Speaker 4>I'm not going to do that.
<v Speaker 2>Have a nice day, see you later, kiss my butt
<v Speaker 2>Clive Davis. Right. So, ultimately, these songs caught the ear
<v Speaker 2>of an an our guy named Ron Fair yep. Ron Fair,
<v Speaker 2>who I think you've got a history on, basically said, look,
<v Speaker 2>I love this song. I want it to be a hit,
<v Speaker 2>and I will make sure this song is a hit.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>He was with RCA Records and he just basically said,
<v Speaker 3>let me play with it, let me edit it. But
<v Speaker 3>as you can easily tell by looking at the album,
<v Speaker 3>this is not an RCA record album. So something else happened.
<v Speaker 3>But you'll have to wait and see what happened there
<v Speaker 3>in just a bit.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, I don't feel like we've told people enough how
<v Speaker 2>terrible this music video is, especially in relation to how
<v Speaker 2>great the song is. Yeah, it's there's a lot of
<v Speaker 2>potential that got missed, I think on this one, but
<v Speaker 2>it was still on all the time. It was on
<v Speaker 2>all the time because it was a time and history.
<v Speaker 3>Where there were a lot more videos to play. But
<v Speaker 3>MTV was instead of just setting the standard that these
<v Speaker 3>are the songs you're going to listen to, they also
<v Speaker 3>followed the top forty and this was a song people
<v Speaker 3>were listening to and they're like, well, we got to
<v Speaker 3>play this video even if it's terrible.
<v Speaker 2>Even if it's terrible and it's full of old, ugly
<v Speaker 2>English guys, right.
<v Speaker 3>Just gank that guy out, carry him out like I'm
<v Speaker 3>mad man. I hate to move on too fast from
<v Speaker 3>this song, such a good song.
<v Speaker 2>I do want to emphasize there's one part in the
<v Speaker 2>song that just every time my hair blows my socks off,
<v Speaker 2>let me play the part in the song that really
<v Speaker 2>blows my socks off, right, So they really lean on
<v Speaker 2>that part of the heart.
<v Speaker 3>That sound That voice is John Anderson, Yes, and John
<v Speaker 3>Anderson is one of the og Yes guys and was
<v Speaker 3>not a part of this project at all until he
<v Speaker 3>was until he was and he gets credit a writing
<v Speaker 3>credit on the song, even though Tever Rayburn basically completed
<v Speaker 3>the whole thing on the toilet, on the toilet, because
<v Speaker 3>he had the chorus, and he had kind of the
<v Speaker 3>scat of the of the lyrics, but didn't really have it.
<v Speaker 3>But that very first line, that move yourself, Yeah, that
<v Speaker 3>is John Anderson's contribution. He came in and added some
<v Speaker 3>more lyrics in the verses other places, and that opening
<v Speaker 3>line and that solo, that long scream lonely heart. Yeah,
<v Speaker 3>you just pointed out it's it helps make this song
<v Speaker 3>what it is. I mean, maybe he didn't.
<v Speaker 4>Write it, but he made it something special.
<v Speaker 2>It's a banger, and when it hits that, it levels up.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>Just and there's so many breakdowns and movements, and this
<v Speaker 2>is not your standard.
<v Speaker 4>Rock and roll song.
<v Speaker 2>This is just awesomeness all over coming at you from
<v Speaker 2>all directions. Yep, all right, we're gonna move on to
<v Speaker 2>the song.
<v Speaker 4>We got to move on. We'll never get through the
<v Speaker 4>album if we don't move on.
<v Speaker 2>All right, well hold on? Oh wait, the next song
<v Speaker 2>on the album is called hold On.
<v Speaker 3>As a guy who plays music and a guy who
<v Speaker 3>plays guitar, I can tell you that many, many, many
<v Speaker 3>many guitar players start off by learning to play the blues.
<v Speaker 4>If they want to learn to play rock and roll music, right, right.
<v Speaker 3>That's just that's like stage one, right, if you want
<v Speaker 3>to be able to play the lead guitar, you're probably
<v Speaker 3>gonna learn how to play the blues first. It's not
<v Speaker 3>basic necessarily, but it is kind of stage one, good
<v Speaker 3>starting point. This is what happens when a progressive rock
<v Speaker 3>band takes a blue song and says, okay, let's.
<v Speaker 2>See what we can do with the blues. Well, all
<v Speaker 2>one up? Yeah, yeah, I think this is what happens
<v Speaker 2>when a progressive rock band takes two blues songs and
<v Speaker 2>merges them together.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, that's right.
<v Speaker 3>You've got a combination of two songs, one called hold
<v Speaker 3>On and the other one called moving.
<v Speaker 2>In, right, both written by Trevor Raven. He brought them
<v Speaker 2>to the band and Trevor Rabin had written both of
<v Speaker 2>these songs, and they're like, you know what, like this part,
<v Speaker 2>like that part, I think we should merge this into
<v Speaker 2>one song. And you can kind of hear it at
<v Speaker 2>the beginning. It's got one beat and then it hits
<v Speaker 2>that chorus and it kind of changes right there.
<v Speaker 3>It's great, Oh yeah, this is a fantastic song. And
<v Speaker 3>you say, you know he brought it to the band. Yes,
<v Speaker 3>we've got to kind of know who that is, right,
<v Speaker 3>who's the band? Okay, let's talk about this. Yeah, on
<v Speaker 3>the base, we've got Chris Squire, founding member of the band. Yes,
<v Speaker 3>we have Alan White drummer, Okay, member of the band.
<v Speaker 3>Yes on keyboards, Tony Kay had been a member of
<v Speaker 3>the band, Yes, and then he wasn't Yeah. Yes, and
<v Speaker 3>you've got Trevor Rabin. Who's the guy who's got this
<v Speaker 3>demo that they're turning into an album. I just want
<v Speaker 3>you to know, d I've got this diagram that shows
<v Speaker 3>who is in the band, Okay, what band they were in,
<v Speaker 3>what band they went to? Because I couldn't keep it straight.
<v Speaker 3>But it's so incredibly fascinating.
<v Speaker 4>It is complex stuff.
<v Speaker 3>And the thing is is that these guys, most of
<v Speaker 3>them were successful in multiple different bands.
<v Speaker 2>That's right.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>When Trevor Rabin has this kind of disappointing news from
<v Speaker 3>you know, from Clive Davis of hey, can you sound
<v Speaker 3>more like Foreigner, it's like, okay, now I'm depressed.
<v Speaker 4>Right.
<v Speaker 3>He then had this little glimmer of hope that Ron
<v Speaker 3>Fair was going to do something with owner of a
<v Speaker 3>Lonely Heart, but then that didn't materialize, so he's kind
<v Speaker 3>of had two false starts here, and then he gets
<v Speaker 3>a call from Phil Carson and Richard Steinberg of Atlantic Records.
<v Speaker 3>He gets a call from Phil Carson because Phil Carson
<v Speaker 3>had just been introduced to.
<v Speaker 4>Him by Mut Lang.
<v Speaker 2>I did not come across a Mutt Lane connection.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>So Mutt Lang had worked with Trevor Rabin. Before Trevor
<v Speaker 3>Rabin it was I mean, it's a fantastic musician. So
<v Speaker 3>he'd done a lot of studio session work and so
<v Speaker 3>Mutt Lang is like, hey, Phil Carson from Atlantic Records,
<v Speaker 3>you really should talk to Trevor Rabin. And so Phil
<v Speaker 3>Carson listens to the demos and he's like, Okay, I
<v Speaker 3>have two bands for.
<v Speaker 2>You to be in.
<v Speaker 3>And he's like, I can do one band unless you
<v Speaker 3>know some sort of magic trick that I don't know right,
<v Speaker 3>And he's like, oh, well, get you just got to
<v Speaker 3>pick right. And so band number one Cozy Powell what Yeah,
<v Speaker 3>James Buckley's Ears just worked up too, who was a
<v Speaker 3>friend of Trevor Ravens, Jack Bruce Keith Emerson from Emerson
<v Speaker 3>Lake and Palm, who's also a friend of Trevor Rabins.
<v Speaker 2>Well, we'll talk more about them here in a second.
<v Speaker 3>And then these other two guys named Chris Squire and
<v Speaker 3>Alan White is who he met first, and he immediately hit.
<v Speaker 4>It off with them.
<v Speaker 2>And it wasn't that they made fantastic music on their
<v Speaker 2>first meeting. Yeah, he just liked them.
<v Speaker 4>They just got along.
<v Speaker 2>Well, hey, that's why I hang out with you.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, exactly right, that's right. You want to work with
<v Speaker 3>somebody who you like. And I mean, I guess he
<v Speaker 3>already knew Cozy and already knew Keith, and so it
<v Speaker 3>was like, okay, yeah, I know those guys, they're fine,
<v Speaker 3>but he wanted this band that Chris Squire and Alan
<v Speaker 3>White were trying to put together. They do one rehearsal
<v Speaker 3>and then they say, you know what, we think you need.
<v Speaker 2>A co singer.
<v Speaker 3>We'd like to bring in Trevor Horn. And so Trevor
<v Speaker 3>Horn comes in and sings with them, and then Trevor
<v Speaker 3>Rabin is like, I am not going to be in
<v Speaker 3>a band with Trevor Horn is just not that good. Okay, Wow,
<v Speaker 3>it's just not gonna work. And so they said, well
<v Speaker 3>how about he produces. He says that sounds great, Trevor
<v Speaker 3>Horn can produce the album. I do not want to
<v Speaker 3>sing with him. And so the record company is like, listen,
<v Speaker 3>we like Chris's voice. I mean, Chris has got an
<v Speaker 3>integral part of the harmonies you're hearing on this sure,
<v Speaker 3>and we like Trevor's voice, but they're not like reaching
<v Speaker 3>out and grabbing us. And so as it happens, Chris
<v Speaker 3>happens to be at a party and who should be
<v Speaker 3>there but John Anderson, and John Anderson comes over and says, hey,
<v Speaker 3>I hear you making some really good music right now,
<v Speaker 3>and Chris says, you should really hear it. And so
<v Speaker 3>they go to John's house, but they don't go inside
<v Speaker 3>because Chris's wife and John's wife hate each other.
<v Speaker 2>Oh wow, that was.
<v Speaker 4>A part of their old history.
<v Speaker 3>Was not only did they eventually not get along with
<v Speaker 3>their wives, hated each other. So they're sitting outside his
<v Speaker 3>house in a car with a tape deck. He pushes
<v Speaker 3>in Trevor Raven's demo and John Anderson listens and.
<v Speaker 2>Says, I would love to help you out with this
<v Speaker 2>if you want me to.
<v Speaker 4>He's like, come on over.
<v Speaker 3>So he just came in really to kind of add vocals.
<v Speaker 3>That was it just add them right, and then he
<v Speaker 3>became the lead singer.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, can I back you up because I've got something
<v Speaker 2>interesting to add. Okay, So here's the interesting thing to me.
<v Speaker 2>Between the ninth album of Yes, called Tormado, which.
<v Speaker 3>Is I think a terrible name. Wait wait, Tormado Tormado
<v Speaker 3>like the combination of tornado and tomato.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, yes, okay, all right, and their tenth album, Drama,
<v Speaker 2>John Anderson quits. John Anderson is the lead singer. He's
<v Speaker 2>the sound of the band, he's the signature of the band.
<v Speaker 2>So he leaves. Okay. Then you add these two guys,
<v Speaker 2>Trevor Horn and Jeffrey Downs, who you and I know
<v Speaker 2>better as the Buggles.
<v Speaker 3>Yes, they lost Hans Zimmer somewhere along the way. What
<v Speaker 3>Hans zimmern Zimmer got lost?
<v Speaker 4>And they're like where Hans go?
<v Speaker 3>Oh wait, there's yes, let's see if they need people,
<v Speaker 3>And as it turned out, they did.
<v Speaker 2>So Trevor Horn and Jeffrey Downs step into Yes. Trevor
<v Speaker 2>Horn takes over lead vocals. Now stay with me on this.
<v Speaker 2>He imitates John Anderson's.
<v Speaker 4>Voice, can't.
<v Speaker 3>I mean if just think about the guy who's singing
<v Speaker 3>video killed the radio sar and the guy who's singing
<v Speaker 3>leave it right, and you're gonna go there's no way
<v Speaker 3>that guy sounds that like that other guy.
<v Speaker 4>Right.
<v Speaker 2>I'm gonna look at my diagram here. So after the
<v Speaker 2>tenth album Drama, Yes, Sa, that's it. We can't stand
<v Speaker 2>each other. We're breaking up. Okay. Imagine a piece of
<v Speaker 2>glass shattering. So Chris Squire and Alan White are looking
<v Speaker 2>for a band. Okay, well, I thought we've got to
<v Speaker 2>keep going. We're only on song number two. We got
<v Speaker 2>to move on to song number three. Here, hold that thought,
<v Speaker 2>because this is a heck of a story. Song number
<v Speaker 2>three is it can happen? Ge' down? Okay. This is
<v Speaker 2>the third single released in June of nineteen eighty four,
<v Speaker 2>reaches number five on the mainstream rock charts, number fifty
<v Speaker 2>one on the Hot one hundred. Written in nineteen eighty one,
<v Speaker 2>when Chris Squire, John Anderson, and Trevan Raven had created
<v Speaker 2>this band called Cinema.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, well before they got to Cinema Yep, Chris Squire
<v Speaker 3>and Alan White are still looking for a band.
<v Speaker 4>The Yes has broken up.
<v Speaker 3>They're looking for a band, and I love the intro
<v Speaker 3>to this because this is a sitar playing. Right, You've
<v Speaker 3>got that East Indian style of music going, and it's
<v Speaker 3>idea like this. The Beatles had.
<v Speaker 2>Brought it over, Thank you, George Harrison.
<v Speaker 3>Right, Robbie Shankar showed everybody how cool the sitar could be. Right,
<v Speaker 3>And one of the bands that had an incredibly great
<v Speaker 3>song with a sitar called Kashmir was a band that
<v Speaker 3>you know, led Zeppelin.
<v Speaker 2>That's right.
<v Speaker 3>And so while Chris Squire and Alan White were looking
<v Speaker 3>for a band, they just again, I love these party
<v Speaker 3>meetings because they seem to be scattered throughout the storyline.
<v Speaker 3>Who should they happen to meet?
<v Speaker 2>But Jimmy Page and Jimmy Page is like, oh, I
<v Speaker 2>loved Yes.
<v Speaker 3>We obviously loved led Zeppelin, right, I mean they're brothers
<v Speaker 3>like they Yes and led Zeppelin both started in sixty
<v Speaker 3>nine rolling Stone when those two albums came out, rolling
<v Speaker 3>Stone said, these two bands are the bands most likely
<v Speaker 3>to succeed.
<v Speaker 2>Oh wow, and.
<v Speaker 4>They're not too far off.
<v Speaker 3>I mean, we're kind of doing this in memento order
<v Speaker 3>here where we're righting our way back history. So we'll
<v Speaker 3>talk about the Yes of the nineteen seventies.
<v Speaker 4>In a bit.
<v Speaker 3>But obviously Zeppelin has broken up, John Bonham has died,
<v Speaker 3>and Jimmy Page is looking for a band, and Chris
<v Speaker 3>and Alan are looking for a band, and so of
<v Speaker 3>course they get together, right, And so then they've got
<v Speaker 3>to think of a name. And we've got the ex
<v Speaker 3>members of Yes and the ex member of Led Zeppelin.
<v Speaker 2>So you have X Yes Zeppelin, X y ze It's brilliant.
<v Speaker 2>It's so freaking brilliant. It's too bad that this did
<v Speaker 2>not really ever take off, right.
<v Speaker 3>Well, they I mean, they did a whole bunch of
<v Speaker 3>demo songs right, their ambition, their ideas, We're going to
<v Speaker 3>make an album.
<v Speaker 4>This is going to happen.
<v Speaker 3>And they've got every right, having just had successful careers,
<v Speaker 3>to think it's going to happen, right, And so they
<v Speaker 3>demo up several songs, and apparently there are bootleg copies
<v Speaker 3>of these demos out there, like we could go track
<v Speaker 3>them down if they surely wanted to.
<v Speaker 2>I believe one of those songs is called Run with
<v Speaker 2>the Fox. Yes it is Hey Christmas, Happy Holidays? Really? Yes?
<v Speaker 4>Okay, yep, it is a song for Christmas.
<v Speaker 3>And so they had obviously Jimmy Page plays guitar, You've
<v Speaker 3>got Chris Squire playing bass, You've got Alan White playing drums.
<v Speaker 4>What are we missing here?
<v Speaker 3>Lead singer, lead singer, Yeah, geez, I don't our lead singer.
<v Speaker 3>Kind of we had a falling out with him. Jimmy,
<v Speaker 3>do you know anybody I could call Robert Plan if
<v Speaker 3>you like? Sure, that'd be great, if I think that's
<v Speaker 3>a good idea, I mean, And so he calls Robert
<v Speaker 3>Plan up, and Robert Plant listens to the music of
<v Speaker 3>the former members of Yes and Jimmy Page, and of
<v Speaker 3>course he is absolutely one against it. Yeah, he's like
<v Speaker 3>too complex, don't like it, don't like it. And he's
<v Speaker 3>still kind of bummed out about John Bonham dying. And
<v Speaker 3>so basically that killed X y Z before it ever
<v Speaker 3>got started.
<v Speaker 2>It did give us, However, the Honey Drippers, You're gonna
<v Speaker 2>have to give me more information on that, sir. The
<v Speaker 2>Honey Drippers were a little band, had a couple of
<v Speaker 2>hit songs. Basically, it's Robert Plant and a couple of
<v Speaker 2>his buddies who just want to put out songs that
<v Speaker 2>honor his favorite music. So he came out with a hit,
<v Speaker 2>a remake of the song See of Love.
<v Speaker 4>I remember that one very well. I just thought that
<v Speaker 4>was Robert plant By himself. I didn't know that the
<v Speaker 4>group was called the Honey.
<v Speaker 2>The Honey Drivers. Yeah, that song was a hit, and
<v Speaker 2>that fell in my lap right as you were saying that.
<v Speaker 2>But there's fascinating other stories with other bands, with other
<v Speaker 2>hit songs that we got to get to. Sure, But
<v Speaker 2>before we move on, I want to hit just a
<v Speaker 2>couple of things on It can happen. During the guitar solo,
<v Speaker 2>you hear lines from the movie the importance of being
<v Speaker 2>earnest by Oscar wild Yes, is that anything to you?
<v Speaker 3>I know who Oscar wild is, and I'm familiar with
<v Speaker 3>the importance of being earnest. It's kind of a staple
<v Speaker 3>for a drama major. Yes, I thought it might. Yes, yeah,
<v Speaker 3>I have no relation to this at all, but it's
<v Speaker 3>just interesting. I'll tell you Oscar Wilde was convicted of buggery.
<v Speaker 3>Whenever he would.
<v Speaker 4>Huggery.
<v Speaker 3>I believe he might have died in jail from some
<v Speaker 3>sort of disease he got from buggery or something. But anyway,
<v Speaker 3>a well regarded and renowned playwright.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, yes, I did watch the video on this. I
<v Speaker 2>will tell you that the highlight for me was the
<v Speaker 2>guys in a circle with the camera panned up looking
<v Speaker 2>at them, and they all have cheap colored sunglasses on.
<v Speaker 2>All I can think is that these guys need help
<v Speaker 2>with the videos.
<v Speaker 3>It's interesting because we can we kind of have to
<v Speaker 3>look at what was going on with them at the time,
<v Speaker 3>because just because they had had success in the past
<v Speaker 3>doesn't mean they've got all kinds of money to spend now,
<v Speaker 3>or that the record company is ready to spend all
<v Speaker 3>kinds of monere on them.
<v Speaker 2>But I'll come to that story in a little bit too.
<v Speaker 2>Chris Squire wrote this one on the piano. Chris Quire
<v Speaker 2>says this song it was a message of hope, just
<v Speaker 2>a way through the world looking for a good route.
<v Speaker 2>Love it. Next song on the album is called Changes.
<v Speaker 4>So this one starts off and it sounds like a xylophone.
<v Speaker 2>Sounds like a xylophone to me.
<v Speaker 3>I just looked up personnel. I cannot find anybody playing
<v Speaker 3>the xylophone. So I don't know if that falls if
<v Speaker 3>it falls under percussion and Alan White was doing.
<v Speaker 4>It right, or if they did it on synthesizer. I'm
<v Speaker 4>not sure. Okay, I got nobody playing xylophone.
<v Speaker 1>On them.
<v Speaker 2>I've got something for you, and you gotta think I'm crazy.
<v Speaker 4>Okay.
<v Speaker 2>The song starts off so distinctly with that xylophone, and
<v Speaker 2>then you hit a guitar note, and then it transitions
<v Speaker 2>into a different song.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, it turns into a Tangerine Dream kind of electronic masterpiece.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I've got two songs that I think were influenced
<v Speaker 2>by this song. I'm gonna play it for you real
<v Speaker 2>quick and see what you think.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, I love it.
<v Speaker 2>Tell me if I'm crazy gaining part of this song
<v Speaker 2>I think influenced this song.
<v Speaker 4>You're not it's it is the same rhythmic. I hope
<v Speaker 4>definit Dave's listening.
<v Speaker 2>Dave, are you listening? Go back and listen to our
<v Speaker 2>Beastie Boys episode.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, heck you.
<v Speaker 2>And then it transitions into a different song that I.
<v Speaker 3>Think could be this one. That one came out before.
<v Speaker 3>So maybe that song was influenced by the Police. Sure,
<v Speaker 3>I mean very easily.
<v Speaker 4>Could have been. So this one was not one that
<v Speaker 4>he had on the demo either.
<v Speaker 3>This is one he wrote while he was depressed after
<v Speaker 3>being told by Clive Davis, you need.
<v Speaker 2>To sound more like foreign I'm not kidding.
<v Speaker 3>That's exactly how Okay, gosh, I get to write a
<v Speaker 3>song here to express my blues. It's this song that
<v Speaker 3>that we get from Trevor raven from this.
<v Speaker 2>So Trevor Ravens the guy who stepped in and wrote
<v Speaker 2>unwholdly hard and kind of got this Yes project off
<v Speaker 2>the ground. Did you know that he has written several
<v Speaker 2>movie scores, you mean, like National Treasure, Yes, Like National Treasure,
<v Speaker 2>con Air and Armageddon, Yes, and Black Trash. Well, to
<v Speaker 2>catch you with that last one, Black Trash. Black Trash,
<v Speaker 2>that was his first one. He wrote it in nineteen
<v Speaker 2>seventy six when he still lived in South Africa. And
<v Speaker 2>Black Trash.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, it might sound like a black exploitation thing, but
<v Speaker 3>it's it's not. It kind of sounds like a buddy
<v Speaker 3>cop movie. It's it's a black journalist and a white cop.
<v Speaker 3>I believe that are teaming up to try to, you know,
<v Speaker 3>solve some sort of crime that's going on. Interesting he did,
<v Speaker 3>he composed that, he and he's had dozens.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, let's just run through this list real quick, because
<v Speaker 2>you've said you've said some Armageddon bad Boys to Coach Carter,
<v Speaker 2>con Air, Deep Blue Sea, Enemy of the State, get
<v Speaker 2>Smart Gone in sixty. I am number four National Treasure,
<v Speaker 2>remember the Titans, rock Star and Snakes on a Plane.
<v Speaker 4>Snake's on a Plane.
<v Speaker 3>Spoiler alert. I don't think there are any Skippers on
<v Speaker 3>this entire album. Hm, you're gonna go ahead and disagree
<v Speaker 3>with me on that. I'm going to disagree with you.
<v Speaker 2>Well.
<v Speaker 4>I can't wait to see which one you pick.
<v Speaker 3>But Yes, So, like I said, I feel like we're
<v Speaker 3>kind of going in reverse on this history here. But
<v Speaker 3>to jump back forward, XYZ doesn't work out, right, they
<v Speaker 3>get together with Trevor Rabin, like I said, and they're
<v Speaker 3>putting this music together based on his demos, and he's
<v Speaker 3>going to be the singer. And they've decided, Hey, we're
<v Speaker 3>gonna call this band Cinema.
<v Speaker 4>Right.
<v Speaker 3>It just happens to be a coincidence that three of
<v Speaker 3>the four band members at this point are former members.
<v Speaker 2>Of Yes Okay? Now, who are those three?
<v Speaker 3>Those three are Tony Kay, Chris Squire, and Alan White. Now,
<v Speaker 3>Tony Kay came from a previous He was a Yes
<v Speaker 3>member from long ago. He was sacked back in nineteen
<v Speaker 3>seventy one. That's right, Yeah, he was still friends with
<v Speaker 3>Chris and Alan. They I don't think we're in the
<v Speaker 3>decision making process for that sacking. But you know why
<v Speaker 3>he got sacked. No, he refused to play the synthesizer.
<v Speaker 3>He's like, I will play the organ and i will
<v Speaker 3>play the piano, but I'm not going to play these
<v Speaker 3>new synthesizers.
<v Speaker 4>I don't like them.
<v Speaker 3>Well, if you're familiar with Yes's music from the seventies,
<v Speaker 3>you're going to have to need some synthesizers, my friend.
<v Speaker 2>Right before you go there eighty version of Yes. Trevor Horn,
<v Speaker 2>who had been the lead vocalist. He goes on to
<v Speaker 2>become a major record producer.
<v Speaker 4>Yes.
<v Speaker 2>I even saw something that said Trevor Horn invented the eighties.
<v Speaker 3>He definitely had a heavy hand in the sound of
<v Speaker 3>especially the new wave side of the eighties. For sure,
<v Speaker 3>the British new wave sound was heavily influenced by mister
<v Speaker 3>Trevor Horn.
<v Speaker 2>I came across an album of Trevor Horns that he's
<v Speaker 2>done recently where he reimagines a bunch of songs from
<v Speaker 2>the eighties. Okay, one of which is Owner of a
<v Speaker 2>Lonely Heart, which is a symphony version of it. Awesome, right,
<v Speaker 2>So he goes on to become a record producer. But
<v Speaker 2>two of the guys from that nineteen eighty version of Yes,
<v Speaker 2>Steve Howe and Jeffrey Downs, they go on to form
<v Speaker 2>a band with John Wetton on bass and Carle Palmer,
<v Speaker 2>and they create the supergroup Asia.
<v Speaker 4>Right huge, I mean yeah, like these guys, they don't
<v Speaker 4>seem to fail.
<v Speaker 2>It's incredible. Now, I will I told you before we
<v Speaker 2>started this. I'm like Heat of the Moment is one
<v Speaker 2>of Asia's biggest, probably their signature song. Yeah, and you
<v Speaker 2>play that big guitar sound at the beginning of Heat
<v Speaker 2>of the Moment. It sounds a lot like a lonely heart.
<v Speaker 4>It does.
<v Speaker 3>It's not that it's the same melody per se, but
<v Speaker 3>maybe that same chord is the first chord. And that
<v Speaker 3>guitar sound, that crunch that sound guitar, big crunchy guitar
<v Speaker 3>right at the beginning. It's very similar. It's also very
<v Speaker 3>similar to the sound of the guitar for the theme
<v Speaker 3>for MTV.
<v Speaker 2>Interesting.
<v Speaker 3>So at the point that Chris Squire has got John
<v Speaker 3>Anderson in the car and is playing the tape for
<v Speaker 3>him so that their wives don't know that they're hanging
<v Speaker 3>out again together, they've spent all of their money. We
<v Speaker 3>mentioned that Phil Carson from Atlantic Records was the guy
<v Speaker 3>who had kind of gotten them going. Well, Phil is
<v Speaker 3>the guy who's footing the bill for all of this,
<v Speaker 3>and he's spent three hundred thousand pounds and they're not done,
<v Speaker 3>but they're close. And they go back to a guy
<v Speaker 3>named Ahmet Urchin, who is a founder of Atlantic Records
<v Speaker 3>and who thirteen years earlier had signed the band for
<v Speaker 3>the first time called Yes. So he hears this new
<v Speaker 3>version John Anderson and Tony Kay and Chris Kuiir and
<v Speaker 3>Alan White and this new guy who's obviously very.
<v Speaker 2>Good, and he's like, this seems like the new Yes
<v Speaker 2>to me? Did you to?
<v Speaker 3>And they're like, we really want to separate ourselves from that,
<v Speaker 3>or some of them. Trevor Raven is like, I don't
<v Speaker 3>really want to be the new Yes, and he's like,
<v Speaker 3>I really think you should be. But they came out
<v Speaker 3>with a promo on MTV as Cinema, right, and all
<v Speaker 3>of a sudden their phones start ringing and they're like, hey,
<v Speaker 3>you can't call yourself Cinema because we're a band that
<v Speaker 3>is already called Cinema. And so at that point, what
<v Speaker 3>do you do the band name you wanted is gone.
<v Speaker 3>They're pushing this new band name on you, and you're thinking,
<v Speaker 3>are we going to be like.
<v Speaker 4>The new Coke?
<v Speaker 2>Yeah?
<v Speaker 3>Right, they literally they they they've got the new name
<v Speaker 3>and the album they almost called the New Yes Album. Yeah,
<v Speaker 3>I'm glad they didn't go with that, although I still
<v Speaker 3>think that Nino one two five is a terrible title.
<v Speaker 3>Now you mentioned Nino two one four earlier. The way
<v Speaker 3>that they get this number, this random number that's not
<v Speaker 3>a ZIP code, is it's apparently just the catalog number
<v Speaker 3>for their record label.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>Like like when they don't know the name of the album,
<v Speaker 3>they'll go, hey, hand me album nine oh one two four.
<v Speaker 3>And the information that I got was that was what
<v Speaker 3>this album was called. First they first called it nine
<v Speaker 3>oh one two four, but somehow there was, like I
<v Speaker 3>don't know, the different regions of the world, there was
<v Speaker 3>already a nine oh one two four, and so they
<v Speaker 3>were like, well, let's just call it nine oh one
<v Speaker 3>two five.
<v Speaker 2>Then that's interesting. So the band Cinema that never really
<v Speaker 2>formed with Chris Squire and Alan Whye and Trevor Raven,
<v Speaker 2>those guys, one of the remnants of that Project is
<v Speaker 2>an instrumental song on the album. Next song on the album,
<v Speaker 2>and it's called Cinema. This is the song on the
<v Speaker 2>album that I really don't have any use for.
<v Speaker 4>This is a song on the album that won the Grammy.
<v Speaker 2>I know, I know, it's okay. I've disagreed with the
<v Speaker 2>Grammys before.
<v Speaker 3>Oh my gosh, No, this is a great song. You
<v Speaker 3>just you want to have people singing. You don't want
<v Speaker 3>to get stuck in the middle of a singing album
<v Speaker 3>with a no singing song.
<v Speaker 2>That's right, that's right. Use this no singing song. I
<v Speaker 2>am glad it's not twenty minutes long like their old stuff.
<v Speaker 2>Oh yeah, right right. They had a double album d
<v Speaker 2>where there was one song per side both albums double.
<v Speaker 3>Album, double album, four songs. Yes, I got no No,
<v Speaker 3>keep that not interested? You were you were in stark
<v Speaker 3>disagreement from the yes of the seventies fans. Yes, so
<v Speaker 3>this actually came from one of those twenty minute long songs.
<v Speaker 3>It was just the intro to that song. I don't
<v Speaker 3>know how long this song is was our time two minutes,
<v Speaker 3>So this, this two minutes was the instrumental before. I
<v Speaker 3>guess maybe more instruments because that was the nature of
<v Speaker 3>the band, but maybe the two minutes before John Anderson
<v Speaker 3>started singing. But yes, I don't think we had room
<v Speaker 3>in nineteen eighty three for any twenty minute prog rock songs,
<v Speaker 3>but we got room for a two minute prog rock
<v Speaker 3>intro which the Grammy's loved it.
<v Speaker 2>Man A nineteen eighty five got the Grammy for the
<v Speaker 2>Best Rock Instrumental. This is one of two Grammy nominations
<v Speaker 2>that they received.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>The other was Chris Squier's version of Amazing Grace off
<v Speaker 2>of the nine oh one two Live Oh Okay, which
<v Speaker 2>was directed by Steven Soderberg.
<v Speaker 4>Oh yeah, I did see that. Yeah, mister Steven Soderberg.
<v Speaker 2>Ho about that? Very nice. When this song is played live,
<v Speaker 2>it's usually followed by a hit like Leave It or
<v Speaker 2>Owner of a Lonely Heart, Thank Goodness. Yeah. Oh.
<v Speaker 3>By the way, So I was doing last minute research
<v Speaker 3>at a bar before I came over for a year. Yes,
<v Speaker 3>and one of my buddies at the bar, Ron is
<v Speaker 3>sitting next to me and he asked me what I'm doing,
<v Speaker 3>and I'm like, I'm researching and I know one two five,
<v Speaker 3>and he's like, I don't know what that is? And
<v Speaker 3>I said Owner of Lonely Heart. He goes, oh, Frank
<v Speaker 3>Zappa covered that song, and I was like, what now, Ron,
<v Speaker 3>anytime I mentioned any band, he will bring up Frank Zappa.
<v Speaker 3>It is unavoidable. Really, it will either bring up Frank
<v Speaker 3>Zappa or he will bring up Buckethead.
<v Speaker 4>But they he loves those bands. But I had to
<v Speaker 4>hear it. I had to go.
<v Speaker 3>Okay, Frank Zappa has covered Owner of a Lonely Heart.
<v Speaker 3>Apparently it's like a mashup or something. It's bamboozled by
<v Speaker 3>love slash Owner of a Lonely Heart.
<v Speaker 4>We'll listen to that one here.
<v Speaker 2>Now.
<v Speaker 3>If you remember, we talked about Frank Zappa whenever we
<v Speaker 3>covered Toto four.
<v Speaker 2>He humiliated Steve Luca.
<v Speaker 3>He did poor seventeen year old Steve Luca thir Lik
<v Speaker 3>left Frank Zeppa's audition with his tail between his legs.
<v Speaker 2>That's it. That's it. Hit stop on your tape player,
<v Speaker 2>kick it out, flip it over for side to wait.
<v Speaker 2>This is the song I've been waiting the whole episode four.
<v Speaker 2>I don't blame you. It's freaking awesome. This song is
<v Speaker 2>called leave It.
<v Speaker 1>I can feel.
<v Speaker 2>The dreams.
<v Speaker 3>Real the year is nineteen ninety six. I am working
<v Speaker 3>as a waiter in a restaurant called the Varsity Sports Girl.
<v Speaker 3>We had a new thing, it was called a PA
<v Speaker 3>where it played music across the whole restaurant that was
<v Speaker 3>programmed from the satellite. And one day, as I'm working,
<v Speaker 3>I heard a song that I probably hadn't heard in
<v Speaker 3>at least ten years. Yeah, and this came on and
<v Speaker 3>I heard it with the speakers that were so powerful
<v Speaker 3>that the hair on the back of my neck stood up,
<v Speaker 3>and I was like, I forgot how freaking good this
<v Speaker 3>song was.
<v Speaker 2>I mean the ping ponging vocals on this and the
<v Speaker 2>melody and that kind of intro vocal thing that happens.
<v Speaker 3>Building harm it's in I you remember last episode. I
<v Speaker 3>told you I had texted my brother and I was like, hey,
<v Speaker 3>do you do like a breakfast in America? And he
<v Speaker 3>sent me question mark right, and I said Supertramp nineteen
<v Speaker 3>seventy nine. And a full day goes by and he's like, ah, yeah,
<v Speaker 3>I know a lot of these songs. I just didn't
<v Speaker 3>know that I know them, Like I don't know the
<v Speaker 3>names of the songs, but I seem to know all
<v Speaker 3>the words. So that was his supertramp response. YEA so
<v Speaker 3>week ago I texted him, I said, actually, I'll go
<v Speaker 3>a few texts up. He said, did you watch the
<v Speaker 3>yacht Rock documentary yet? I said not yet, but I
<v Speaker 3>will so good. I said, did you own yes, nine
<v Speaker 3>oh one two five, And his response was, that's the
<v Speaker 3>dumbest question I've ever heard. I would pay one hundred
<v Speaker 3>dollars for anything with the song leave it. Plus, it
<v Speaker 3>was instant street cred to me to say I was
<v Speaker 3>listening to nine oh one two five on my Pioneer
<v Speaker 3>pk R seven, a w instant give it up for's brother.
<v Speaker 3>So yeah, actually went down and saw him and we
<v Speaker 3>watched yacht Rock together.
<v Speaker 2>Oh it's great.
<v Speaker 4>Oh it's fantastic documentary.
<v Speaker 2>Love it.
<v Speaker 3>So the harmonies on this song, love it. This actually
<v Speaker 3>finally gets me to the beginning of the history of
<v Speaker 3>this band. Okay, okay, So in nineteen sixty seven, Chris Squire,
<v Speaker 3>the bass player, and a guy named Peter Banks, a guitarist,
<v Speaker 3>were in a band called the Sin s y N.
<v Speaker 3>They left that band and joined a band called Mabel
<v Speaker 3>Greer's Toy Shop that was a psychedelic rock band. A
<v Speaker 3>club owner introduces Chris Squire to his bartender named John Anderson.
<v Speaker 2>That was it.
<v Speaker 3>John was a bartender who I guess sang at the bar,
<v Speaker 3>and the club owner was like, you need to go
<v Speaker 3>meet with these guys because Mabel Greers Toy Shop was
<v Speaker 3>not making particularly great basics. They're not that great, all right,
<v Speaker 3>but these guys I can tell they've got talent.
<v Speaker 4>You need to meet with them.
<v Speaker 3>So when John Anderson and Chris Squire first started talking
<v Speaker 3>to each other, they found that they both love the
<v Speaker 3>harmonies of Simon and Garfunk call really Yes, very good.
<v Speaker 3>So then they brought in Bill Bruford on drums and
<v Speaker 3>Tony Kay on keyboards. Tony Kay is one of those
<v Speaker 3>original guys, and they decided, you know what, Mabel Greers
<v Speaker 3>Toy Shop is going to become yes.
<v Speaker 2>Better name.
<v Speaker 3>Well except that when somebody says, what you're doing over there,
<v Speaker 3>I'm looking at Yes, you're looking at what? Right?
<v Speaker 4>Yeah?
<v Speaker 3>If I said I'm looking at Van Halen, you know
<v Speaker 3>what I'm talking about. If I said I'm looking at Genesis,
<v Speaker 3>you probably are thinking I'm either reading the Bible or
<v Speaker 3>listening to Phil Collins. But yes, nobody gets it. There
<v Speaker 3>are other options were Life and World, which really I
<v Speaker 3>don't see those as better either, Like it's again it's
<v Speaker 3>too vague. Yes is not a great band name in
<v Speaker 3>my opinion.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I was thinking that the version that added Trevor Raven,
<v Speaker 2>where Trevor was like, I don't really want to be
<v Speaker 2>called Yes. Maybe they could have been called No.
<v Speaker 3>So they played cover songs, covering the Beatles, Fifth Dimention
<v Speaker 3>and Traffic, And then how many times.
<v Speaker 4>Does this happen?
<v Speaker 3>There's a big show where Sly where some band in
<v Speaker 3>this case it was Sly in the family Stone failed
<v Speaker 3>to show up. Wow, And these guys were ready waiting
<v Speaker 3>on the bench, ready to go, and they got the call.
<v Speaker 3>When they played that night, they were so good that
<v Speaker 3>the host of the show says, I want to manage
<v Speaker 3>you guys. The guy named Roy Flynn says, I'm going
<v Speaker 3>to be your manager. He gets them a gig performing
<v Speaker 3>with Cream at Cream's farewell concert. That gets them more success.
<v Speaker 3>Then they see this band called King Crimson. Now we
<v Speaker 3>talked about crog Rock in our last episode and who
<v Speaker 3>the players are, and King Crimson is one of those.
<v Speaker 3>But they saw those guys and they're like, we have
<v Speaker 3>got to up our game. We've got to become better,
<v Speaker 3>and so they improve, and that's when they get signed
<v Speaker 3>by mister Ahmet Ertjin of Atlantic Records, who would then
<v Speaker 3>help them finish this album thirteen years later, and in
<v Speaker 3>nineteen sixty nine they come out with the album Yes,
<v Speaker 3>and then Rolling Stone says they're going to be the
<v Speaker 3>most successful band of the seventies.
<v Speaker 4>They tour with Iron.
<v Speaker 3>Butterfly, that band, and I Got a Davida and I
<v Speaker 3>Got a Davida Baby. They bought Iron Butterfly's PA system
<v Speaker 3>so that they could sound better, okay, and then Tony
<v Speaker 3>Kay and Steve Howe are fighting because Tony Kay doesn't
<v Speaker 3>want to play the synthesizers, and he gets booted from
<v Speaker 3>the band. And by nineteen seventy eight seventy nine they
<v Speaker 3>are at the absolute height of their commercial success. They
<v Speaker 3>played Madison Square Garden and they have one million dollars
<v Speaker 3>in nineteen seventy nine money, one million dollars in box
<v Speaker 3>office receipts. But John Anderson, Chris Squire, and Alan White
<v Speaker 3>were disagreeing about which.
<v Speaker 4>Way the band should go.
<v Speaker 2>Their wives too, Yes, Squire and White what they wanted
<v Speaker 2>to be heavy rock.
<v Speaker 3>They want to be hard rock. And Anderson wanted to
<v Speaker 3>be light and more fantastical, more proggy. Yeah right yeah,
<v Speaker 3>And so that ultimately ends because they're doing their sessions
<v Speaker 3>and then I'm not kidding, Alan White is roller skating
<v Speaker 3>and a.
<v Speaker 4>Roller disco and breaks his foot.
<v Speaker 3>Oh the drummer needs his foot, he does, and so
<v Speaker 3>they have to take a break from the sessions. And
<v Speaker 3>so the rift and the break from the break, and
<v Speaker 3>also some financial disputes results in John Anderson saying.
<v Speaker 4>See you later. I'm out here.
<v Speaker 2>Guys, He's going to leave it. Thank you for bringing it.
<v Speaker 2>But it was nicely done. Thank you, thank you. I
<v Speaker 2>do have a couple of nuggets for you on this
<v Speaker 2>song leave it. Yeah, okay, I talked to you the
<v Speaker 2>other day. The music video looks like it was done
<v Speaker 2>on an Apple two E in nineteen eighty three.
<v Speaker 4>I got my Macintosh computer right yep?
<v Speaker 2>Okay, So all it is is just the guys in
<v Speaker 2>tuxedos and using the latest technology to like fold their
<v Speaker 2>picture and make them rotate their heads pop off and
<v Speaker 2>do circles switch bodies.
<v Speaker 4>It's weird.
<v Speaker 2>It literally is. It's somebody playing on a computer. It
<v Speaker 2>has not aged. Well, so here's the deal. I've been
<v Speaker 2>giving these guys a hard time because they're video stink,
<v Speaker 2>but the songs are great. This video was done by
<v Speaker 2>Godly and Cream. Does that name ring a bell? Yes?
<v Speaker 4>Yes, But I am trying to remember who they were
<v Speaker 4>connected to.
<v Speaker 2>These guys were in a rock band. I'll play that
<v Speaker 2>for you here in a second. But they directed music
<v Speaker 2>videos like Every Breath You Take, Girls on Film Rocket
<v Speaker 2>by Herbie Hancock. They did Everybody Have Fun To by
<v Speaker 2>Wang Chung. I mean, these guys are MTV staples. They
<v Speaker 2>came out of a rock band called ten CC in
<v Speaker 2>the seventies, so don't forget it.
<v Speaker 4>So I recognize that.
<v Speaker 3>I don't know if I remembered it from back then,
<v Speaker 3>but this is a part of the Guardians of the
<v Speaker 3>Galaxy soundtrack, so I remember it from that movie.
<v Speaker 2>So that song is called I'm Not in Love, Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>one of the great songs of the seventies. Godly and
<v Speaker 2>Cream came out of that band started directing music videos,
<v Speaker 2>including Leave It.
<v Speaker 3>Was it on the Synchronicity album that we talked about
<v Speaker 3>them talking about them directing the Every Breath You Take.
<v Speaker 2>Probably okay, probably go.
<v Speaker 4>Back and check that one out.
<v Speaker 2>That's season one, right, They also had another big hit
<v Speaker 2>in nineteen eighty five, I'm Gonna play for you real quick. Okay,
<v Speaker 2>play the game. That's a big hit called by god
<v Speaker 2>Lean Cream that I do not recognize making music videos
<v Speaker 2>and making hit songs, yeah, there.
<v Speaker 3>You go, apparently making bad music videos, although heck no,
<v Speaker 3>I mean if they did the if they did the
<v Speaker 3>every Breath You Take video, that was awesome.
<v Speaker 2>There you go. This song was the second single, and
<v Speaker 2>I love the one down, one to Go. This song
<v Speaker 2>hits number twenty four on the Hot one hundred. The
<v Speaker 2>top three that week were Hello by Lionel Richie, which
<v Speaker 2>we've covered, Footloose at number two, and Against All Odds,
<v Speaker 2>which we talked about in our Best of eighty four.
<v Speaker 2>Let's move on to the next song. Okay, So the
<v Speaker 2>next song on the album is called our Song.
<v Speaker 3>So as a little bit of ironies, as we come
<v Speaker 3>into this song, we're having a little bit of issue
<v Speaker 3>with the fan versus the heater in our studio today,
<v Speaker 3>Yeah we are. And we went from being a little
<v Speaker 3>chile too, like now I'm.
<v Speaker 2>Like starting to listen a little bit over here, as
<v Speaker 2>it turns out that relates to this song.
<v Speaker 3>That's right, Yeah, The first line of this song was
<v Speaker 3>Toledo was just another pit stop along the Good King's Highway.
<v Speaker 3>This is a reference to a Toledo show that they
<v Speaker 3>had done six years earlier, very memorable, nineteen seventy seven.
<v Speaker 3>They were inside an arena that got up to one
<v Speaker 3>hundred and twenty six degrees fahrenheit outshood. I would have
<v Speaker 3>been laying on the floor plumb, passed out from that
<v Speaker 3>heat six.
<v Speaker 2>You know where they play this song a lot? Death Valley,
<v Speaker 2>possibly Toledo, Ohio plays this song a lot. Yeah, due
<v Speaker 2>to that little nod there.
<v Speaker 3>There are several Kings Highways, none of them are near Toledo.
<v Speaker 2>There you go. This was the b side to Owner
<v Speaker 2>of a Lonely Heart ah, and it also reached number
<v Speaker 2>thirty two on the mainstream rock charts. This is a
<v Speaker 2>you know, this is a song. Yeah, it's it's not
<v Speaker 2>a skipper, but it's not one of my favorites either,
<v Speaker 2>that's true. Yeah, moving on, moving on to the next
<v Speaker 2>song on the album called City of Love, No No
<v Speaker 2>Regrets at all, Justice not as well take over.
<v Speaker 4>So this really, this song really drives in jingles.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, that's a line in the song.
<v Speaker 4>Okay, I don't know it because it's not a song
<v Speaker 4>that people really know.
<v Speaker 2>I'm not in love with this song either.
<v Speaker 3>It's this is probably the lowest of the songs on
<v Speaker 3>the album for me as well, the little bit you
<v Speaker 3>get a little bit of a sample at the beginning
<v Speaker 3>of it that I'm not sure, but it really sounds
<v Speaker 3>like something from a Beatles song to me. It's just
<v Speaker 3>where it's just saying city of Love, City of Love,
<v Speaker 3>City of Love.
<v Speaker 2>I will tell you this. Chris Squire got involved in
<v Speaker 2>rock music because he discovered the Beatles at age sixteen.
<v Speaker 2>Before that, he was involved in his church choir. All right,
<v Speaker 2>last song on the album, before we leave it is
<v Speaker 2>a song called Hearts. So we didn't really talk about
<v Speaker 2>this much before. I kind of have touched on it.
<v Speaker 3>But this is an entirely different sound for the band, yes,
<v Speaker 3>than they were during the seventies. Sure, as we mentioned
<v Speaker 3>they had ten full albums in that time, well, nine
<v Speaker 3>full albums with John Anderson and the last one Drama
<v Speaker 3>with Trevor Horn and Jeff Downs. But they were full
<v Speaker 3>prog rock back then. Their progressive rock through and through right.
<v Speaker 3>This album is much more pop. But this song is
<v Speaker 3>really a throwback to what I think the people who
<v Speaker 3>love them from the seventies would probably grab onto. There
<v Speaker 3>are a lot of people who didn't. They felt the
<v Speaker 3>same way about this that the people felt when Sammy
<v Speaker 3>Hagar joined in Haleen or when they came out in
<v Speaker 3>nineteen eighty four, and they're like, why is any playing
<v Speaker 3>the keyboards? But this one is a throwback to the
<v Speaker 3>way that they were back in the seventies. We got
<v Speaker 3>a nice, long, eight minute long song. I mean it's
<v Speaker 3>not twenty but if you're on a pop album in
<v Speaker 3>nineteen eighty four, it's a long song.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, so about eight minutes long. It's got a kind
<v Speaker 2>of an oriental feel to it. Yeah, you and I
<v Speaker 2>both agreed. We really liked the chorus of this song.
<v Speaker 2>It's got a good hooky chorus. I guess when they
<v Speaker 2>play this song live that John Anderson will speak as
<v Speaker 2>an introduction to the song speak verse two, which is
<v Speaker 2>many moons, cascade, one river, the light from side to
<v Speaker 2>side as we cross in close proximity, like rivers, our
<v Speaker 2>hearts in twine. Most like I'm listening to Scott's stap.
<v Speaker 2>Just play the song. Don't give us this poetry cramp
<v Speaker 2>oh yeah, so, but I like it. It's good. It's
<v Speaker 2>a good into this album, kind of a grand feel
<v Speaker 2>to close it out, very epic. Yes, so I guess
<v Speaker 2>that means we are time for final judgment.
<v Speaker 3>Okay, we are comparing this album, yes, nine oh one
<v Speaker 3>two five to Super Tramp Breakfast in America. If you
<v Speaker 3>haven't heard that episode, go back and listen to that
<v Speaker 3>one just before this one. Super Tramp came out nineteen
<v Speaker 3>seventy nine, exactly forty five years ago now, and this
<v Speaker 3>one came out in nineteen eighty four, exactly forty years ago.
<v Speaker 3>That's right, And I'm gonna let you go first, mister Calvin.
<v Speaker 2>So this this was really hard for me. These were
<v Speaker 2>two albums that I wasn't super familiar with. I knew
<v Speaker 2>the hits. I will tell you this, Both bands and
<v Speaker 2>both albums have kind of risen with me after breaking
<v Speaker 2>down the songs, breaking down the album, but I have
<v Speaker 2>to be honest, so when I look at the hits,
<v Speaker 2>it's kind of a push. I think that owner of
<v Speaker 2>a lonely heart and leave it changes hold on. I
<v Speaker 2>love them so much. And then you look at Super
<v Speaker 2>Tramp and you have Goodbye stranger. You have the logical song,
<v Speaker 2>you have take the Long Way Home. Those are so
<v Speaker 2>good as well. So it's the in between songs. I'm
<v Speaker 2>not a progressive rock guy. I'm more of a pop
<v Speaker 2>harmony's kind of guy, kind of softer stuff sometimes. So
<v Speaker 2>if I'm honest, the album that I grab as I'm
<v Speaker 2>leaving for a road trip, it's Breakfast at America. That's
<v Speaker 2>the one I'm grabbing. Wow, I mean I have come
<v Speaker 2>to love nine oh one, two five.
<v Speaker 4>I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>I just I like those the little synth piano keys
<v Speaker 2>a little bit more.
<v Speaker 3>Okay, So let me just ask this because when we
<v Speaker 3>started this, because I kind of suggested both of these albums,
<v Speaker 3>Yeah yeah, and you really didn't know who Super Tramp was.
<v Speaker 3>I just didn't know who they were, right, Yeah yeah,
<v Speaker 3>you like everybody else, you knew the words of the songs.
<v Speaker 3>You just didn't know what the name of the song
<v Speaker 3>was or the name of the band. So you didn't
<v Speaker 3>know those things, and now you're picking it as number one.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah I am okay, I love it.
<v Speaker 2>I love that.
<v Speaker 4>Okay, that's fantastic.
<v Speaker 2>You've moved the needle for me. I love that.
<v Speaker 4>That makes me so happy.
<v Speaker 3>So I very much like you, I'm looking at the
<v Speaker 3>hits and I'm looking at the not hits, and I'm
<v Speaker 3>trying to gauge those together. But I'll kind of flip
<v Speaker 3>the script on what you said here, because to me,
<v Speaker 3>the non hits on these albums are kind of the
<v Speaker 3>same for me, like it's just like, yeah, I can
<v Speaker 3>dig this song, this is a groove. I don't have
<v Speaker 3>really any skippers on any of the albums. There's songs
<v Speaker 3>that are less good, right, sure. And so then what
<v Speaker 3>I did was I went back and I looked at
<v Speaker 3>the hits, and I said, oh, okay, of these songs,
<v Speaker 3>these hit songs, which ones were the bigger ones for me?
<v Speaker 2>Right?
<v Speaker 3>And although I absolutely love Supertramp songs, I didn't know
<v Speaker 3>who they were. I couldn't have told you a song
<v Speaker 3>that they had done five years ago until I started
<v Speaker 3>exploring their work and I listened to their all.
<v Speaker 4>And I'm like, oh, yeah, I do know these songs.
<v Speaker 3>So they are those songs that were good enough to
<v Speaker 3>catch my ear and make me think of the words,
<v Speaker 3>but not good enough to have me go out and
<v Speaker 3>buy the album. On the other hand, in nineteen ninety six,
<v Speaker 3>when I was working as a waiter in a restaurant
<v Speaker 3>and leave It came on. It brought me right back
<v Speaker 3>to nineteen eighty four, eighty five when my brother was
<v Speaker 3>playing it in his blue Mazda as we drove to
<v Speaker 3>school in the morning, you know, And as soon as
<v Speaker 3>I could buy songs on my phone, I was like,
<v Speaker 3>I gotta buy leave It. I have to, Yeah, And
<v Speaker 3>so to me, it was of the big hits. Which
<v Speaker 3>were the bigger hits, or at least the bigger hits.
<v Speaker 4>In my heart?
<v Speaker 2>And it's got to be nine O one two five awesome, awesome. Well,
<v Speaker 2>we want to hear from you, guys. How do we do?
<v Speaker 2>Which one did you pick? Super Tramp Breakfast in America? Yes,
<v Speaker 2>nine oh one two five? Which was the better album?
<v Speaker 2>To you, guys, it has been an incredible season number five.
<v Speaker 2>We may have another episode or two, or maybe we won't.
<v Speaker 2>We will just surprise you with a little happy New
<v Speaker 2>Year celebration. Yeah, and then get ready for season six D.
<v Speaker 2>We've got some great stuff coming up.
<v Speaker 3>We're rolling into the year nineteen eighty five, the year
<v Speaker 3>of Back to the Future and teen Wolf and Phil
<v Speaker 3>Collins and Peter Gabriel. It's gonna be an incredible year,
<v Speaker 3>an anniversary year forty years ago. Plus some good movies
<v Speaker 3>come out in ninety five, some incredible movies came out
<v Speaker 3>in seventy five. There's no telling what we might cover,
<v Speaker 3>So guys, thanks so much for joining us full years now.
<v Speaker 4>We look forward to seeing you next season.
<v Speaker 2>Thanks guys,