Yes - Tormato*

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by BryanA-HTX, Jul 18, 2015.

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  1. Veni Vidi Vici

    Veni Vidi Vici Forum Resident

    Location:
    Chicago, IL
    Garry Bushell?
     
  2. Judge Judy

    Judge Judy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Brooklyn, NY, USA
    I think it's just not cohesive. It sounds like the members are all pulling in different directions. I also think it's possible that they didn't know what to do with themselves after Patrick Moraz left/was fired/whatever it was. Yes has always been a band that used the revolving door to their advantage and used incoming members' input as a real shot in the arm. Having Wakeman come back was probably a good move in terms of sales but I think at that point recapturing the Fragile/Close the the Edge vibe wasn't possible.
     
    Ostinato likes this.
  3. Tristero

    Tristero In possession of the future tense

    Location:
    MI
    But this wouldn't seem to jibe with the general consensus that the preceding Going For The One with the same line up was a very solid, focused piece of work, arguably a return to form after getting lost in the Topographic Oceans. Many fans would have been happy with GFTO II here, but they fell short of the mark.
     
  4. Adrian Adkins

    Adrian Adkins Forum Resident

    And Bill Wasn't There.
     
  5. crp207

    crp207 Forum Resident

    Ugliest Yes album ever and yet this will be a picture disc for this years record store day.
     
  6. Judge Judy

    Judge Judy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Brooklyn, NY, USA
    I didn't think GFTO was a solid album at all. I know that's not the general consensus but it's never done anything for me. I honestly believe that people who like it do so as a response to "Relayer," which I know a lot of Yes fans thought was noisy drivel. GFTO had no jazz elements to it, so I think people who preferred the more "classical" sounding stuff saw it as an improvement, but I didn't all. I honestly believe that the good reviews for GFTO are actually bad reviews of Relayer, if that makes sense.
     
  7. Tristero

    Tristero In possession of the future tense

    Location:
    MI
    GFTO was certainly a retrenchment after the more freeform experimentation of the preceding two albums. I think that the band was intentionally trying to refocus and return to the more immediate appeal of albums like Fragile. Though it's a less ambitious album, I think it was successful on its own terms in a way that Tormato was not.
     
  8. MicSmith

    MicSmith Forum Resident

    Of the 1970s Yes studio albums I'd say that Tormato is bottom 3, with Tales and Time and A Word. None are terrible but they all are weak compared with The Yes Album, Fragile, Close to the Edge, Relayer and Going For the One. In 1978 I had taken a sabbatical from this sort of music only to bother buying a copy 20 years later. It's not one I find myself bothering to play. Sorry.
     
  9. Saint Johnny

    Saint Johnny Forum Resident

    Location:
    Asbury Park
    Lord, since I have it on vinyl, that means I have not listened to it, in it's entirety in almost 20 years. FWTW.
     
  10. Judge Judy

    Judge Judy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Brooklyn, NY, USA
    Yeah, "retrenchment" is a good word. I actually think they've been guilty of that more than once in the history of the band. I don't see anything wrong with it when artists do stuff like that, and in a lot of cases it's a vast improvement over when many artists try to experiment. But Yes, for a while there at least, were really about innovating and looking forward, and maybe that's what's missing from GFTO for me.
     
  11. willy

    willy hooga hagga hooga

    I sort of love half of it, some great songs and stuff. Steve Howe is top notch throughout. But as big a fan of Rick as I am, that shrill Birotron was a mistake.
     
    Mr Class & Quality? likes this.
  12. Judge Judy

    Judge Judy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Brooklyn, NY, USA
    All the performances are great. I've never heard a Yes album in my life where there are any slouches.
     
    Rufus rag likes this.
  13. milco

    milco Forum Resident

    Something at the back of my mind says Paul du Noyer, but I could be wrong.
     
  14. milco

    milco Forum Resident

    Found it! No Tormato hatred in this Sounds review by Phil Sutcliffe from 1978:


    Source: Sounds Magazine U.K.

    Review: YES Tormato
    (Atlantic SC 19202)
    ****½

    By Phil Sutcliffe

    I understand it has remained OK to like Genesis (which I don't) but it's not OK to like Yes (which I do, though no longer with the fine unfettered rapture they drew from me about five years ago). Attitudes have been struck, battle lines drawn and the situation has a regrettably fixed and immutable look to it. So may I suggest that 'Tormato' is a very good Yes album for Yesfans, and if any of you pass 'Go' on that roll of the dice, collect the next 700 words. The rest of you can go straight to the jail of prejudice. Nine tracks. The 'Fragile' economy and self-control. All five Yespersons writing. Very much a unified band album for the first time since 'Close To The Edge'. The title and cover are further clues to its character. The band shied tomatoes at the original arty picture presented for their consideration, and here it is, complete with vegetable decoration. An actual Yesjest. What's more, these qualities of joviality and exuberance spread themselves into the music. Particularly in a track called 'Arriving UFO' they are positively jocular, with Wakeman and Squire producing grandiose effex in clownish mockery of past pomp, and Anderson processing his voice into cosmic gobbledegook which makes him sound hilariously like Miquette Giraudi.

    'Future Times/Rejoice' are bracing openers. Stirring explorations on synthesiser and drums (Alan White's sound nicely splashy) lead into an Anderson vocal which inevitably includes the word 'universe' in the first line, but, irrespective of sense, rides the dazzling sound surf of Yesinform with bravura. Squire's playing is colossal, I noticed on my first spin. By the time I'd reached the end of the album, I'd realised that was true for every track, so take it as read from here on. Great girders of profundo twanging with hints of fuzz and wah-wah giving it more 'voice'.

    Steve Howe surfaces on the next track, the single 'Don't Kill The Whale'. He saves it from potential heavy-going with some pungent guitar which harks back to George Harrison's muscly tone on 'Revolver'. No frantic virtuosity, he just plays it very hard and strong while Wakeman adds to the entertainment with some hurdy-gurdyish synthesising.

    All this is pretty flamboyant stuff, and the following two minutes of 'Madrigal' are little more than a tranquil interlude of Wakeman medievalry and Anderson romantic optimism. A fragment. The side closes with 'Release, Release', one helluva track. It's the thoughts of Jon Anderson on the subject of rock, a sermon which might set eyelids drooping but for the thundering Yesboogie with which they illustrate his views. Heads-down physical it is, mindless it isn't.

    Yes SF is the theme at the start of the second side, the band's response to the inspiring fantasy of 'Close Encounters', it would seem. 'Arriving UFO' bleeps out into 'Circus of Heaven', which is the one more or less dud track on 'Tormato'. It's the story of a celestial circus coming to a mid-western town on The Very Last Day. With no convincing tune and a half-hearted hint of reggae, the tin lid of ungainly sentimentality clangs down on it when an infant voice complains that the circus was 'OK, but there were no clowns, no lions, no tigers...'

    Swiftly, 'Onward': a Chris Squire love song, the calming balm on this side, but far more substantial than 'Madrigal'. Yes take it slowly and gracefully with Anderson down from the stratosphere for as warm and personal a vocal as he has ever recorded. Tenderness is not quite the Yesweknow, and this is no classic knee-melter, but it shows they can still extend their scope in appealing ways.

    With the swashbuckling flourish which typifies 'Tormato', they close on the most vibrant track, perhaps one at last to rival 'Roundabout'. 'On The Silent Wings Of Freedom' has Squire stretching a bassline over a Thor's Hammer of a drumbeat from White and doing it with luxuriant relish until Wakeman and Howe come buzzing in with evident excitement and Anderson begins singing ecstatically at the top of his range. A challenge to Yeshaters. Listen to this one without smiling and leaping about inside your skin.

    I think I've praised the musicians adequately in transition. Somehow they all reached a new peak in their playing as a band for this recording, supported by their own co-production. But you may have caught a few critical undertones on Jon Anderson. They refer solely to his lyrics, which are generally as opaque as ever. Despite his always friendly Lancashire accent, I can't take his didactic, finger-waving approach. He's too much the instructor to teach or share his experience verbally. The solution is simple though: don't make the effort necessary to hear the words, and the distinctive beauty of his voice makes all the meanings you need. The great leap forward in the Squire/White partnership seems to have refreshed him wonderfully.

    As I said, way back when it was 2 a.m., I've gone off this kind of music really. But Yes have transcended 'this kind of music'. In its own way, 'Tormato' is as pleasing and decorous a comeback as 'Some Girls' was for the Rolling Stones.
     
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  15. milco

    milco Forum Resident

    Rummaging around on the internet it is not difficult to find similarly effusive reviews for Tormato from the music press in 1978...

    In terms of the album's decline in general esteem, I think one factor which hampers people's perception of Tormato is that it was the last release produced by the classic line-up for over two decades. What followed was years of squabbling, acrimony, numerous changes in personnel and attempts to re-invent the band. Seen in retrospect through this prism, it is easy to see 'Tormato' as the terminal, half-baked product of a band in decline - out of sorts with itself and out of step with the musical trends of the time. Many contemporary reviews, however, contradict this narrative.

    Admittedly, it lacks the quality, musical scope and invention of previous albums. Set against this it is nonetheless straightforward and very accessible -- 'Yes-lite', if you will. I prefer to look at it in that context, forgive 'Tormato' its many sins and just enjoy it for what it is.
     
  16. Adam Pajda

    Adam Pajda Forum Resident

    Location:
    Poland
    As w whole this is my favorite YES album. The sounds than Rick make on this album are gorgeous. I love every second of it.
     
  17. Its a bloody great album. I dont get the slagging off at all. Whilst lying here crippled in my bed i think i will give it a spin to cheer me up
     
  18. Rufus rag

    Rufus rag Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    Masterpiece
     
    Fishoutofwater likes this.
  19. yesstiles

    yesstiles Senior Member

    Come on guys, Side 1 of Tormato is better than Side 1 of Going For The One at least. But both albums are only a patch on their albums from 1971-1974.
     
  20. tinnox

    tinnox Senior Member

    Location:
    Maryland
    [​IMG] Good LP to listen to in your music room with a cold cocktail
     
  21. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product

    i'm just listening to tormato now. i'm not sure i understand the negative reaction to it ... it sounds like yes. sure it's not close to the edge, but they'd done that, why do it again
     
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  22. Endymion

    Endymion Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    I listened to it again a couple of days ago. Still like it. Not a bad song on it.
    And the original japanese CD sounds very good on my headphones.
    I don't get the complaints about sound quality at all. It's one of the best sounding Yes albums.
     
  23. Alan2

    Alan2 Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK
    I've not yet heard it. Is it as good as Drama? I like Drama, in spite of the absence of Jon Anderson.
     
  24. jpmosu

    jpmosu a.k.a. Mr. Jones

    Location:
    Ohio, USA
    I’d add “Onward” to that list, as well. Making it 60% of a good album. :)
     
    ben_wood and GordonM like this.
  25. El Rich-o

    El Rich-o Forum Resident

    Location:
    Australia
    Some great songs, some dreadful songs, sound is horrible esp drums & keys
     
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