Up to their necks in necks...

These days, when Steve Howe plays his Variax guitar on that fixed stand, it always looks kind of awkward to me...

... but I guess the double-neck guitars don't have the tonal range he's looking for? He used to play one, back in the day:

As did these guys:

And even this guy:

And then, when the bass players get into the act:

You can even get a double-team double-neck:

But why stop at just two? Chris Squire has this monstrosity:

But this just looks like a carpal tunnel case study waiting to happen:

This looks Tricky to play, and probably wasn't Cheap to build:

Let's see... 12-string, 6-string, 5-string bass, 4-string bass, 7-string, and just for good measure, another 6-string?... At least this guy rests it on the ground, to save his own neck, I'd guess?

This guy actually asked for a custom 12-string, but the guitar builder messed up... I suppose he could tune each neck to a different open chord; C, C#, D, D#, etc., and never have to learn a bunch of different positions:

Hmm. Maybe that Variax on a stand that Steve Howe uses doesn't look so awkward after all...

AWagon demo

On this "fifth acetate" from the increasingly inaccurately named "trilogy" of newly-found, unreleased "1959 Nashville Demo Recordings," Bobby & the Yup family crank out a "potential theme" for a proposed B-movie western about a 19th century trek across the American frontier in a covered wagon.

The movie execs eventually rejected this demo after they decided that Bobby's lyrics and the Yup family's "too-spacey" (for 1959) arrangement never really connected with the basic concept of the film. In particular Bobby's perplexing wordplay, in which young stars assemble and touch impenetrable youth while high vibration go(es) on, clashed rather harshly with the traditional Old West imagery of their movie.

Oddly titling the song "A Wagon in our Heart" probably didn't help matters. (Maybe some sound effects of horses would have helped?)

The Yup Album (Demos) - On A Roll, Intoned

What more can I say? They really were on, like, a roll... (& stoned?)...
 

(Yup, it's the fourth in a trilogy of "1959 Nashville Demo Recordings" from Bobby & the Yup family.)

Positively Topographic Suite (demo)

Reportedly the last in a trilogy of recently discovered "1959 Nashville demo recordings" from the unknown act "Bobby & the Yup family" finds them further pushing the envelope of their "epic length song form" way back when, this time cracking... the four minute barrier!

This time around, the Yup family keyboard player finally gets a prominent place in the mix; BUT with this take going an incredible 13 verses without a break for a chorus, a bridge, or even a solo, the poor keys player and the rest of the band are left churning away at the same chord progression, while front man Bobby seems to go off on his own, with no direction home:

A lengthy engineering note was found in the "dusty old storage cabinet" along with this acetate. The engineer (named Eddie) offered, "No one in the studio knew what the hell was going on... verse after verse after verse... What the hell kind of songwriting was this supposed to be?? By the eighth stanza, the singer's eyes rolled back in his head and he started speaking in tongues or something... Nobody, including the other folks in the band, could tell what the hell he was going on about! And then damned if the kid didn't snap out of it, just in time for the next verse! Too damn spooky for me."

The note goes on to describe a series of failed takes, with the keys player getting so bored and frustrated that he sends out for some Tennessee barbecue, which he stashes under the piano bench and munches on when Bobby isn't looking. At the end of the final take, he just slams his piano lid down, kicks over the bench, and walks out saying it's all gone too far... And the rest is obscurity...

Solid Time It Is A-Changin' (demo)

"Again, reportedly" found in "a dusty old storage cabinet" in an "abandoned recording studio" the other day, here's one more "1959 Nashville demo" from that unknown act called "Bobby & the Yup family." With five verses running over three and a half minutes, this is truly epic length... well, epic in terms of Bobby & the Yup family songs in 1959:

 

This time, the engineer managed to get the Yup family keyboard player higher in the mix... but sadly, he just played the same organ riff... over and over... no matter if it fit the arrangement. Maybe their new keyboard player was more than a bit under-rehearsed... or maybe he just didn't know his instrument well enough to play it any better?

Airfield Song (demo)

And now we meet in an abandoned studio.
We find some vinyl and it seems so long ago.
And you remember this demo used to go...

"Reportedly" found in "a dusty old storage cabinet" the other day, here's a "1959 Nashville demo" from some unknown act called "Bobby & the Yup family":

After some modern-day digital processing, it cleans up pretty nicely for a "52-year-old acetate," don't you think? Not so sure about that "Bobby" guy on vocals, though... I can't imagine he had any sort of career in music after this.

Also, the engineer needed to push the Yup family's piano player higher in the mix... or maybe the piano is intentionally buried because the guy was playing all the wrong notes?

Oh-a oh,
They weren't the first ones,
Oh-a oh,
They weren't the last ones...

A clothes-minded look at the evolution of the progvest

This sartorial tutorial begins with...

Jon Anderson (c) & Tony Kaye (r)

displaying their primordial progvests
in the late sixties.

 The buttoned-down seventies progvest; he could

Fly From Here with that collar. (& puffy shirt)

I think this is a progvest... could be a seventies jumpsuit... 

looking very proud of those prog action figures!

Colors more subtle and styling more formal,

but still... a total progvest for the eighties.

By the nineties, the casual progvest

makes a comeback, thanks to Jon.

Yes changes vocalists in 2008, but Benoit maintains

continuity with this progvest. (& puffy shirt)

Green and recycled for 2010, the buttoned-down

progvest makes a comeback, thanks to Benoit.

On the Styx/Yes tour in 2011,

Benoit loses a bet with Tommy Shaw

and has to wear this progvest onstage.

(Sadly, no prog action figures anymore.)

Two score years and several beers ago

 

As seen from the above souvenir program, today is the 40th anniversary of a concert appearance by Yes as a support act for headliner Elton John. If you can't quite make it out above, the souvenir program cost 15p; and in the print ad below, tickets for the show were £1.25 (pricey!) :

According to Chris Welch's book Close To The Edge: The Story Of Yes, Elton popped into the backstage hospitality tent before the show in search of "a naked man." Apparently no one associated with Yes at that time fit that description, so Elton moved on. He should have stuck around…about six more years:

So other than Elton going for the bum, why was this particular support appearance so notable in Yes history? The Garden Party II concert of July 31, 1971 was the very tail end of the (first) Kaye era. It wasn't long before the music papers were dishing out the poop about the (first) Wakeman era:

Although various musical reasons for dumping Tony Kaye were offered, Welch's own opinion was that Steve Howe simply didn't like sharing a room with Tony on tour! Not so much that Tony & Steve didn't get along musically… most likely it was the incessant wave of "loving" fans that Tony brought back to the room each night.

Years later, Tony would co-write a Yes song, perhaps about his earlier exploits in his & Steve's room, called "Rhythm Of Love."

Perhaps Steve has now offered his musical rebuttal in the song titled "Rumpy Bride"…? Cheeky bugger...

Going through Roger Dean's recycling bin

Here's a detail from Roger's cover art for the 2011 Yes album Fly From Here, with an overlay of a 2007 logo that he did for Nearfest.

Okay, yes, the tail is different...