Zack: Recently, Rolling Stone asked their online readers to vote on the greatest Prog Rock band of all time. Yes finished 6th behind King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Genesis, Pink Floyd, and Rush (but in front of Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Tool, Mars Volta, and Dream Theater). People went berserk in the comments. Most of them weren’t attacking band ranks as much as they were attacking Prog credentials. People were saying that Tool just use weird time signatures and aren’t really Prog and that Pink Floyd are more psychedelic rock than anything else. Everyone seemed to be indignant about the results. And maybe they should be. After all, one week later Rolling Stone did another poll for best punk band and Green Day won, a fact even my blog colleague and noted Green Day fan sites as “bullshit.” Rolling Stone readers may not be the best sources for this kind of stuff. Now some of the credential attacking I agree with and some I don’t, but I still found the fact that not a single person dared to say anything bad about Yes telling. It’s not hard to see why. Yes are securely a Prog rock band. They carry themselves with a certain “I go to art school and I’m too cool for you to appreciate me fully vibe.” They play really long songs interspersed with a few of tolerable length. Although they are definitely more in their element with the longer tunes. For some reason, Yes’s artiness doesn’t really shine through if it’s under 8 minutes. It’s a good thing their rise to prominence didn’t happen during the age of Twitter. You would have never been able to tell how cool they are in under 140 characters. Which I guess means we have something in common, since I can’t seem to tell ya’ll if I like an album or not in under 300 words anymore. Yeah, I just used “ya’ll.” What of it? Anyway, The Yes Album was a pretty good Prog Rock album by a pretty good Prog Rock band. Some might say that Yes (and their contemporaries) marked the death of true Prog. Other might say that it just introduced commercially viable Prog to the masses. All I know is that it’s Prog Rock, and it’s pretty good.
Favorite Tracks: Starship Trooper; Perpetual Change; Yours Is No Disgrace
Emily: I know next to nothing about Yes, or really Prog Rock in general. However, I do know that Yes has earned its place in Prog Rock history as one of the defining sounds of the genre. Therefore, by the transitive property, by listening to this album I now know something – at least more than before – about the Prog Rock sound. In fact, The Yes Album is held up as a defining point in the development of Yes’ sound. They experimented for the first time with longer-form songs, versus the traditional 3 or 4 minute rock song. The longer songs work well with their wide-ranging and experimental sound, and it allowed them to develop the record-side-long rock opuses of their later work. However, the best song on the album to me was only 3 and-a-half minutes, and it’s called Clap. The typical length, however, does not make it a typical song. Clap is an instrumental, acoustic song that doesn’t really have a Prog sound. However, it is just as intricate and interesting as their other work on this album. So if you’re looking to delve into the Prog sound, or if you’re just unsure of what it actually is, The Yes Album is a very good place to start – it’s decidedly progressive, but still listener-friendly.
Favorite Tracks: Clap; I’ve Seen All Good People; Starship Trooper
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