This is an article I wrote for Notes From the Edge late in 1996. Each of us has his or her own 'story of Yes'; I had always wanted to write down mine, if only not to forget it years from now. It's been years already!
-- Marek Jedlinski
Today is the New Year's eve, December 31. I sat all of last night rereading this year's worth of Notes From The Edge issues, listening to Relayer and Keys to Ascension, and I yet again felt taken with wonder at the miracle of the Net. I've never seen a Yes concert - they have never played in Poland, probably never will; and I have known only one Yes fan in person. None of my friends will admit to so much as having heard Close To the Edge - while many of them are devoted fans of Genesis, King Crimson and other progressive bands. Feels strange. Anyway, here's my Yes story, with a twist.
I got my first tape recorder back in 1980 and that was when I started listening to all sorts of mostly dumb music playing on the radio stations. (Up until early 1990s there were but 4 radio stations in Poland - nothing like what you lucky American people have ;-) - last year there were 5 local stations in my city alone before I lost count, but the music is still mostly dumb.) Then, in 1981, I first heard Jon Anderson - songs from the Friends of Mr Cairo album. I've often wondered what my life would be like if I had not heard those songs back then. Are we Yes-fans hardwired for enjoying all this music? Anyway, I loved Jon's voice immediately and there was something about the music and his lyrics that got me hooked. I practically stopped listening to anything else, and I was trying to find out as much as I could about the people who were playing this heavenly stuff - which is how I learned about Yes.
Since then, I've always been naming Yes as my most favorite band - even though for the two years to come I still did not hear a single Yes song! No-one played Yes on the radio - and what I need to explain here is that, in those days in Poland, records were practically unavailable. You could bring some from abroad, if you got to travel (I didn't) or you could buy some second-hand - but there was hardly a shop where you could go and pick your copy of Close To the Edge, or any other record, really. Radio was the primary, and for most people the only source of both old and new music, and 90% of the music you had collected were taped radio programs. At some point the DJs got the fortunate notion to play records in full - with only a convenient break between the LP sides so you could switch the tape in the recorder... But no-one played Yes. I sat with my radio for hours upon hours, turning the dial, looking up the programming schedules for programs that could just possibly carry some Yes music, usually in vain. Meanwhile I did manage to collect a few gems - someone played So Long Ago, So Clear, some other DJ wiped the dust off the I Hear You Now single and - gasp - one played the Soon section from Gates of Delirium and To Be Over. I was out of my mind for this music.
I suppose today I'd say I was a "virtual" Yes fan - loving the music even before I heard much of it. There was a guy in Poland from whom you could cheaply order photocopies of lyric sheets - he had a very complete collection of rock lyrics - so soon I was poring for hours over the words to Siberian Khatru not only trying to figure out what they all meant, but also trying to imagine the music I had not yet heard. Today I teach Am-Lit and work as a translator, and even though I took English courses for many years, I do owe much of my understanding of English to Jon's lyrics, seriously. It was when I started to really get the hang of my English when I realized that most of those lyrics are not supposed to be "understood" the way you can understand (and rephrase, in your own words) the lyrics of most other rock bands.
Such was my sustenance for about two years, and then there was 1993 and 90125 was out!! Not only that, but another Jon & Vangelis album, Private Collection, as well! So suddenly Yes were all over the airwaves, except it still took some guts for a DJ to play "And You And I". But then, after the Owner of the Lonely Heart single was already hitting the charts but before 90125 was actually released, I first heard Olias of Sunhillow in full, and Tales from Topographic Oceans - didn't need any more. But when 90125 was out, all you got was Owner and Our Song... and sometimes Hearts. For two years, maybe more, I would stay home all weekends (to my parents' understandable worry) for fear I would miss some radio program and Yes music in it; my life was practically revolving around the radio stations' timetables... Well, the problem was that the, ahem, "difficult" music was rarely aired in the evening hours when most people come from work and want something nice and easy, right? So all the progressive rock (I soon learned to love Genesis, King Crimson et al - but Yes was always light years ahead) was relegated to either late night hours (not a problem) or, horror, noon hours! One of the channels was running a series of music programs every weekday at five past noon, and all the real music was there - while I was sitting in some insane class (those were my high school days). Imagine my despair when one DJ (who would always play most of the great "old" music and proclaimed himself a Yes fan) announced that the whole official Yes discography was going to be aired, in full, with one LP every Wednesday at five past noon! I did what I could. I simulated illness to skip school, but soon realized I couldn't be falling ill mysteriously every Wednesday ;-), I begged my mom to take my tape recorder to her office and tape the program for me... My favorite memory is taking the battery-powered radio+tape rec in my school bag and performing some serious acrobatics during my chemistry class to tune the radio in (this was an FM station and what do you think my teacher would have thought of a telescopic antenna sticking out a foot out of my school bag??) and hitting the Rec button, with volume all the way down of course, to record at least part of Yessongs vol 1... It was fun, but back then it felt more like a matter of life and death for me, perhaps aggravated by the fact that none of my friends would suffer beyond the opening chords of And You And I. (I did try...)
Well, today there are dozens of shops with all the latest CDs, too many to choose from, and only a few days ago I picked not only the first volume of Keys to Ascension but also Olias of Sunhillow which had been unavailable on CD for so long... I listen to lots of other music now, with Frank Zappa, Laurie Anderson and Tom Waits the favorites, but I have preserved some of those old radio programs I taped - with all the static noise, DJ's words intruding on the music sometimes, and an occasional vrrrooom interference from a car passing by my window - and they still sound like heaven. And I am often amused by the thought that, as I walk to my work at a university here and back home, I may well be the only person in the city (over a million inhabitants) who hums To Be Over to himself as he walks...
This page was last updated on October 20, 1997
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