{"id":11930,"date":"2016-12-15T05:30:05","date_gmt":"2016-12-15T10:30:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=11930"},"modified":"2016-12-16T08:12:51","modified_gmt":"2016-12-16T13:12:51","slug":"in-a-word-yes-rick-wakeman-on-the-arw-tour-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2016\/12\/15\/in-a-word-yes-rick-wakeman-on-the-arw-tour-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"In a Word, Yes: Rick Wakeman on the ARW Tour (Part 1)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back during the summer of this year, I enjoyed a wide-ranging and lengthy conversation with keyboard legend Rick Wakeman. The ostensible basis of our chat was the then-upcoming ARW tour, featuring three ex-members of Yes<\/strong>: Jon Anderson<\/strong>, Trevor Rabin<\/strong>, and Rick Wakeman. In this two-part feature, I present the ARW-focused part of my conversation with Wakeman. That will be followed by two other features covering other topics. \u2013 BK<\/i><\/p>\n

Bill Kopp<\/b>: Tell me about the events leading up to you getting together with John and Trevor for the ARW tour.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rick Wakeman<\/b>: I think it started in 1991, 25 years ago when we finished the Union<\/i> tour, which was eight of us. A completely mental tour, but I loved it; it was great fun. Trevor and I got on great, and we said on the last day of the tour \u2013 we just looked at each other and said, \u201cYou and I, we have got to do something together. We really have got to go out and play together, do some more.\u201d We kept in touch. In fact, some years later Trev played on an album of mine called Return to the Centre of the Earth<\/i>, on a fantastic track called \u201cNever is a Long, Long Time\u201d and we kept talking and saying we must get together.<\/p>\n

\"arw_brick\"<\/p>\n

But of course Trev moved over into doing some fantastic film scores and working in that area. And then I went back and joined Yes 2000 to 2005. Then at the end of that, Jon, as you know, was very ill. And that was it. The other guys decided they wanted to carry on working, and I said I would not go out without Jon singing. Because I did not feel \u2013 and I still feel the same way, and this is nothing detrimental to other singers \u2013 there are certain bands that you take the singer away and you haven\u2019t got the band any more, as far as I am concerned. I couldn\u2019t imagine Led Zeppelin<\/strong> without Robert Plant<\/strong>; I couldn\u2019t imagine the Who<\/strong> without Roger Daltrey<\/strong>, and I\u2019m afraid, for me, you can\u2019t have Yes or Yes music without John\u2019s voice, without John\u2019s signing. So I backed away from that.<\/p>\n

Jon and I, we did three duo tours together which were great fun. One in America and two in the UK. And all the time we kept saying, \u201cYou know, the next stage is, let\u2019s get Trev. Let\u2019s work with Trev.\u201d And Trevor, in fact about three years ago, came over to London and we had a lunch and a chat, and we just said, \u201cWe\u2019ve got to do this, we\u2019ve got to do this.\u201d One of the difficulties was, because I was so busy, Jon was busy, Trev was busy, things get put on the back burner. You know what it’s like: \u201cYeah, we must get around to doing this. Yes, must do this. Yes, we really want to.\u201d<\/p>\n

And then I think one of the things that really expedited everything was when Chris<\/strong> [Squire<\/strong>] died. When Chris died, although it was not anything that we overly talked about to each other, I think we were all suddenly very, very aware of our mortality, and music<\/i> mortality, you could say. And suddenly with so many people in the last eight, nine months who we\u2019ve lost, musicians who have gone, you know: Lemmy<\/strong>, Chris, David Bowie<\/strong>; the list is ridiculous. And you start to go, \u201cWow! Hold on a minute.\u201d And we’d go and talk to each other. And now the manager \u2013 Brian Lane<\/strong>, who’s managing the project, who was the original Yes manager as you know \u2013 Brian said, \u201cYou guys going to do this or what?\u201d He said, \u201cYou want to do it.\u201d He said, \u201cI\u2019m going to tell you now that the Yes fans will want you to do it.\u201d He said, \u201cSo what\u2019s the matter with you?\u201d And he sort of gave us a bit of a shout. We went, \u201cHe\u2019s right.\u201d And that was really it; we set the ball rolling, and it’s been a bit of a rollercoaster ever since. We\u2019re all genuinely, really excited about it.<\/p>\n

BK<\/b>: There\u2019s quite a lot of overlap in the respective catalogs of the three of you. You clearly could \u2013 and have many times \u2013 filled an evening with just the music of one of you, and barely scratch the surface of that. How do you select music for the ARW tour?<\/span><\/p>\n

RW<\/b>: That\u2019s a really good point. We want to do a real mixture. We want to do classic stuff; we want to treat the music a bit differently as well. We want to keep all the elements that the songs have got, but maybe take things to a new level and different ideas with some of the pieces so that they are still what they are.<\/p>\n

We are calling it \u201cAn Evening of Yes Music & More,\u201d and that is exactly what we want the pieces to be, \u201cand more.\u201d So people go, \u201cWow! That was a diversion! They did that [differently].\u201d That\u2019s the plan. We\u2019ve got a bit of a short list. I\u2019m going over to see Trev at the beginning of August. We\u2019re going to spend a week together looking at the different songs that we\u2019ve all decided that we think should be on the list. And then I think that at rehearsals, we will probably do more than we actually need in the actual show. And it may well be that as the show progresses, we go, \u201cYou know what? Maybe we should put this piece in and take that one out.\u201d The only way to find out is to go and play them, really. That\u2019s the plan. You\u2019re quite right; there is so much music that spreads over all of us, really. Which is great.<\/p>\n

BK<\/b>: In January, Jon posted on Facebook that you, he, and Trevor have actually been doing some writing together. Could you tell me anything about that?<\/span><\/p>\n

RW<\/b>: Yeah, we\u2019ve been flying music backwards and forwards to each other, and doing bits and pieces on it. One of the tracks, I’ll probably do some stuff on when I\u2019m over seeing Trev. What we all decided was that we\u2019re not going to be rushed into making an album. There\u2019s a few offers on the table from record companies saying, \u201cMake an album! Make an album!\u201d We’re saying, \u201cNo, hold on a minute.\u201d We don\u2019t have to rush into this. Because we want to get to play together, learn a bit more again about each other. [Learn] what\u2019s possible, what\u2019s not possible, what we can do, and fine tune a lot of things.<\/p>\n

\"rick_wakeman\"<\/p>\n

And I think there’s the rule, that \u201cOh! Here\u2019s the order you do it! You make an album, you go out and tour it.\u201d No, no, no. In this situation it\u2019s wrong, and I think that it would be perceived as being wrong by people who love Yes music and love any of us who have been involved with Yes. Because it would look like, \u201cOh. They\u2019re doing it for the wrong reason. They’re just doing it to make some music, to make some money and get out.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not what this plan is. This is a long term plan. We\u2019re looking at a minimum of three years, which might not sound very long. But when we consider we are all around the 70 years old mark, that\u2019s a reasonable starting point to look at. We want what we are doing to grow. We want it to develop. It\u2019s not just to go and churn some music out and play; we want this to develop. And if we\u2019re going to produce some music, it\u2019s got to be very special.<\/p>\n

BK<\/b>: As we\u2019ve said, you\u2019ve all worked together a lot, but you\u2019ve also worked apart a whole lot, so it would seem that spending some time together making music for a while before you set about trying to create something new could only make the music better, I would think.<\/span><\/p>\n

RW<\/b>: You\u2019re absolutely right, and that\u2019s the way that we\u2019re looking at it. So we\u2019re having fun sending music backwards and forwards and doing things, and if there\u2019s something ready for the tour, we may well give it a go. Why not? If it\u2019s something ready. But if it\u2019s not ready then we won\u2019t play it.<\/p>\n

Click here to continue<\/a> \u2026<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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