The idea of 'Yes on Broadway' has come up. It would reflect the history of Yes.
— Chris Squire
The band will be going along, and somebody or another will say, 'I want to go off and do a solo career.'... They come back, and other people come in.
I've had to replace parts in the basses when they've gotten old or worn out, so everything isn't absolutely original.
I couldn't get session work because most musicians hated my style.
Over the years, Yes actually made 20 albums of original studio material.
I was working in a music store in London, and this particular place happened to be the importers for Rickenbacker guitars into England. So I started seeing these basses coming in.
I've always been a great believer that you have to keep producing new things in order to keep life interesting - not only for ourselves, but for the audience as well. That's really always been our principle and way of working.
'90125' was our biggest-selling album worldwide.
We did do the whole of the live suite from 'Fly From Here,' and that was very enjoyable to do. In fact, that is actually our longest piece of music, I think, that we'd ever done.
In a way, that's always been Yes' history to a large extent! Quite a few occasions when we've had a new band member or change in members, then we've done a new album with new chops and refreshed the musical approach.
A nightmare is two bassists on stage.
Touring is a tough business.
I've been called the journeyman. It's really more by default than it is by design.
Of course, Paul McCartney's sound is different from mine, but it's the way you hear things, really.
The Seventies were just an interesting time for us because we were building the brand of the name but also varying the style of the music on each of the albums we did. Very creative time of us.
People are used to us being onstage for a while.
'Drama' was put together quickly; there were a lot of intense, 16-hour days. Despite the pressure, it was a lot of fun, and the end result was an album I'm very proud of.
The way Yes works is when we have a new member come in, as in Jon Davison, it's appropriate that we see what differences we can get out of a new contributing member in order to keep Yes interesting.
All movies, when they're about the music business, tend to have a bit of a wide latitude in terms of how things really were.
'Close To The Edge,' we actually had played it from beginning to end before we recorded it in the studio. So we knew how long it was, and we knew it would fit on the album fine, so we didn't do any editing.
The other guys and myself have agreed that Billy Sherwood will do an excellent job of covering my parts, and the show as a whole will deliver the same Yes experience that our fans have come to expect over the years.
I know I always worked hard on making sure we came out with the best possible product and of course we were working with four other people, you have to balance that as well.
We've done very different Yes albums - 11 bars, 13. I think we had something that had 17/4 in it. It's just like anything - the more you do it, the more you have to do it.
I guess I've become very accustomed to playing in the 7/4, which is something we've done quite a lot.
We started Yes as a vehicle to develop everyone's individual styles.
I guess the idea of doing albums in their entirety, in sequence, appeals to people. I guess it's the memory of being able to hear the music in the way it was originally presented.
I think the first three Rickenbacker basses were imported around 1964. Pete Quaife, the bassist for The Kinks, bought one. Then John Entwistle from The Who bought one. As for the third one, I asked the manager of the store if I could get an employee discount. He said I could, and so I picked up that one.
Being called a 'music legend' is a very funny thing. It's nice to know that my work has been appreciated and that people have given me that status. On a personal level, however, I can't think about it too much. It means a lot... but then it doesn't.
With how huge Yes was, especially in the '70s and '80s, as a touring band and actually playing at the JFK Stadium in Philadelphia to 130,000 people, which is the biggest-paying show ever in rock history, you would think we'd done enough for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
It depends on various things like if the promoters want to have a break so they can sell more T-shirts and booze, then they ask if we can do an interval. I personally prefer not to do that. Once you get onstage, I like to stay there.
I think it was 'Tales of Topographic Oceans' on 8-track that was the funniest thing because it would fade out in the middle of a song and fade back in again, and when the tracks change, it was quite amusing.
Pull the good out of it and not worry about the drawbacks.
You're only as big as your last hit.
