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.)