999,851: Yes - Leave It

I've never been a big fan of the band "Yes," but as I understand it, the album 90125 was considered a big "sell out" by their devoted followers. Instead of side-long epics about the Topographic Oceans, the money-grubbing men of Yes decided to put in a bunch of trendy drum machines and digital synthesizers. For some reason, when bands try this today, it is always a huge disaster - nothing makes me cringe more than hearing Aerosmith and the like discovering "trip-hop" 15 years too late.

But on 90125, a modified version of Yes' original line-up went into the studio and somehow came up with a fairly kick-ass update of prog-rock for the 80's, one that I actually find infinitely more listenable than their "classic" albums. Everybody knows the song "Owner of a Lonely Heart," which introduced the "Orchestra Hit" button to Casio keyboards everywhere, but my favorite song off this album is "Leave It." "Leave it" doesn't have any real chorus or vocal melody to speak of, but it's the most hilariously awesome use of the fact that stereos have left AND right channels. It seems perfectly designed for the hot new "Walkmen" that were hitting the street around the time it was released. Go ahead and give it a play - every other note is in a different ear!

The lyrics are about, and this is just a guess, a band on the road? "I can feel no sense of measure, no illusions as we take in young man's pleasure... one down, one to go, another town and one more show / MaCarthur Park in the driving snow." (this suggests a serious unfamiliarity with the real MaCarthur Park, a hot spot for knock off t-shirts and fake ID's in the middle of Los Angeles). Who cares though? Listen to this and enjoy the glorious abuse of studio technology, as the crisp, digitally processed rockapella voices of sellout-period Yes ping-pong back and forth between your ears.