For most of the 1970s, the rock band Yes was known for lengthy, self-indulgent prog-rock songs (the double-album Tales From Topographic Oceans featured four tracks, three over 20 minutes long and the fourth clocking in at a relatively compact 18 minutes). On 1983’s 90125, the band was reborn (after numerous lineup changes)as a tight, guitar-driven rock band with an uncanny aural resembalance to Rush.
90125 is an interesting album. There are some great songs on there (“Owner of a Lonely Heart”, “It Can Happen”, “Leave It”). However, the rest of the album is full of tracks that are almost great yet fall squarely into undiluted cheesiness. They’re guilty pleasures; songs you know are bad (I mean—is ‘mystification’ even a word?), but can’t quite resist anyway. So check out Our Song.mp3 (link expired); give it a few listens and it’ll get irritatingly stuck in your head.
I will own up Yes fandom, deep in my dark high school years. I can dimly remember thinking Tales… was a brilliant album. And I owned not just 90125, but 9012Live, which added to the cheesiness by allowing each of the five band members a wholly self-indulgent 5+ minute solo.
What brought me back to 90125 was not a longing for the days when I was thin(ner) and had hair, but the fact that Accordian Guy (damn him) pointed me to the impossibly wonderful mashup, Owner of a Lovely Butt. I promise, this one track will fill your entire recommended daily allowance of 80’s nostalgia.