.::::::. ::::::::. ...::::::... ...:::::::... .::|||::::..::::::::: .::|||||::::::::~.::::||||::::::::. ::|||||::::::::::::::'.::|||||::::::::: .::|||||::::::::::: :::||||:::::::::::::'.::||||::::::'~`:: ::|||||::::::' `~' ::::||||::::::::::: ::|||:::::' `:.`::|||||:::::::.. `::::||||::::::::: ::||::::: .::. ``::||:::|||:::. `::::|||::::::::.`:|::::: ..:~ ..:::'' .. :::|::::|||::: `::::||:::::::: :::::'.:::. ::'' ..::: .::::::::::|||:: ...:::.`:::||:::::::.`:::. ::|::.`:.::::::' ::::::::::|||::: ..::||:::::: ::||:::::::' `::.`::|:::.`:::''.:::::::::::||:::: .:::||::' ``.::||::::::'.:. `` `:||:::.~ ```:::::::::::::'' ::|||::::...::|||:::::'.||:::.. :|||:::. ````'''' `:::::::::::|||:::::'.:::|||:::::...:::|||::::. ```:::::::::''' `::::|||::::::::::::::::::. `:::||||:::::::::::::::::. ::::|||||:::::::::::|::: `::::||||||:::::::||::' `:::::||||||::|||::: `::::::||||||:::' ```:::::::'' (tm) N o t e s F r o m T h e E d g e # 122 THE Internet YES Source January 4, 1995 ______________________________________________________________________________ = nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte = ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Conversations with Alan White ______________________________________________________________________________ = nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte = ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ CONVERSATIONS WITH ALAN WHITE by Mike Tiano Conducted November 1, 1994 & December 30, 1994 ----------------------------------------------------------- The entire contents of this interview are (Copyright) (c) 1995, Mike Tiano PO Box 13 Issaquah, WA 98027-0013 for Notes From The Edge, Jeff Hunnicutt & Mike Tiano, Editors All rights reserved ----------------------------------------------------------- This interview is being posted exclusively to Notes From The Edge, (Copyright) THE Internet YES Source If you see this interview or any portion appear anywhere else, please let me know (miketi@microsoft.com). THIS INTERVIEW HAS NOT HIT THE PRINT MEDIUM. PLEASE DON'T EXPOSE YOURSELF TO LITIGATION BY POSTING IT ELSEWHERE (EITHER THROUGH ELECTRONIC OR PRINT MEANS). Thank You. ______________________________________________________________________________ = nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte = ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ MOT: The band on this last tour is the tightest I've seen in years, but despite this a lot of the venues didn't seem to sell that well from what we've heard from people on the Internet. Some online fans said they didn't know about the show until practically the last minute. Did the problem lie in promotion? AW: I think we fell into a trap this year. The band has always been a steady selling kind of act, and obviously with tours like UNION where they want to see the spectacle of everybody playing together we sold a lot more tickets. We decided this time to do it with this format, so what I believe is we fell into the trap; there's been like five bands, you know, the Eagles, Pink Floyd, those kind of concerts that have been charging enormous figures for tickets, like eighty-five, a hundred dollars, and stuff like that. So we fell into the trap of the people, the extra people, other than the cult fans that come to our concerts, to see what the band is all about that couldn't afford it, basically. I think we ran into that pretty much right through the tour. Funnily enough in South America the band did great, and in Japan the band did great too. Plus in Japan we played a couple of new areas we'd never played before which were kind of a little bit slack, but most of the gigs there were very good because the album did very well in Japan. But I think we fell into the trap of just too many people out in the market and they could only decide to go to a certain amount of concerts that year, and I think a lot of Yes fans came and enjoyed what we were doing. But it was slack, we must admit that, but apparently we were doing same or if not better business than a lot of bands that were out at the same time. But obviously we like to see the places full. MOT: What about those fans who say they didn't know about the show until close to show date? AW: That confuses me because it's not our job and we hear these things all the time, that on the business end of things people are not doing their job, and it's usually the local promoters that that is allocated to, and if they see that a concert is going to do this much business because they see what the reaction is to the tickets going on sale sometimes instead of putting more money into it they just don't put any money into it because they knew the nature and the climate of what the business was like that summer, and they all talk to each other, all of these promoters. So once you see these guys talking to each other and stuff like that, and they say, 'Well, it's a little slack on Yes, and do I spend more money here, or do I not spend any money,' kind of thing, and I think we fell into that trap too, this summer. MOT: Do you think it affected the band, seeing these venues weren't all that full? AW: No. I don't think it affected the band at all because every night the band played as tight and had a good time on stage because this band doesn't get affected by things like a lack of audience. Most nights you know you see if it's a half house or something like that, that's fine for us; it's when it's like 800 people we start getting worried, or something like that, but it's never really been like that, we always play to the full because I think everybody in the band has a reputation individually and a standard to live up to between each other and collectively together towards the public that has to be respected so I think every night we come up with a good...so, no, I don't think it affected us. I think Jon got a little, kind of dismayed about some of the lack of attendances at one time, but at the same time he was totally, every night he was there singing and he's totally into the band from this tour; I mean he's totally into everybody's playing and everything the band was doing collectively together. I think Jon thought that this tour is one of the best tours we've ever done. MOT: So Jon might be a little down before the show but once he hit the stage he gave it his all... AW: No, this has been for Jon, two or three years more than I have but it's like a big part of your life, and Yes is a big part of our lives, he just wanted to see at this point in time a little maneuvering, a little change just to make this an ongoing thing, which it is, we're now formulating other stuff. It's like kind of regrouping and say, OK, that formula didn't work here so we'll try this formula, but I think it's a collective kind of thing. MOT: What for you were the high points of the tour? AW: Basically going on stage. We've traveled so much and we've been to so many places so many times that for me actually getting up on stage every night and performing music and feeling it being played so well every night and everybody performing is kind of a high point of every day for me, and I think that culminated at the end of something like 80 shows we did, we're still performing as good as was in the first two weeks--it takes a week to warm up--but then the standard was really high, the musicianship stayed all the way till the end of the tour. MOT: We noticed the set list tended to shrink a bit as the tour went on, what was the reason for that? AW: It was, all of a sudden we'd run into a gig whereby we had to get the gear off stage by a certain time, or we had to be off stage by a certain time, and we'd just run into time problems with whether we had an intermission or not, and every gig was individually different, we asked whether we had an intermissioncthat night, or whether we had to cut the intermission, what time we had to be offstage because of union problems; so once we'd done that we had like an A, B, C, D set kind of thing, we'd choose each night which set we were doing and if it was a really important gig we'd do like the A set, and if then we can do an intermission that night--there were all kinds of combinations so every night before the show we'd say to each other, what set is it tonight, A, B, C, D, or whatever. So you may have just caught some shorter sets, or people's reaction to shorter sets or longer sets. For instance in South America we didn't go on stage till 10:00 every night, we'd play until 1:00 in the morning, and in Japan we started 6 and come off the stage at 8:30 [because] it was basically being governed by people around us, not the band themselves, because the band always likes to give everybody their money's worth, and we did for an awful lot of shows. MOT: I recall when you played here [George, WA] someone was yelling out, 'Play till sunset, play till sunset!' But what people don't understand is if you play after a particular time then you have to start paying... AW: We don't, the promoter does, and then ultimately it affects the Premier promoter, the guy that's running the whole tour. Really, it wouldn't affect us except I think contractually at the end of the day when it comes down to all the bookkeeping, they'd say at this gig we had to pay $10,000 because you went on for an extra minute, and things like that happen, so every day we had the production manager stand there and say you've got three minutes, two minutes ...in Japan, I saw him standing at the side of the stage and I told Trevor, cut the solo down, and we watched the clock; in Japan it's an absolute fortune if you stay overtime. So, I mean, that's the reason why a lot of that came down. I think inherent in that kind of question is the fact why we didn't play--there's also a lot of material that people thought we should play that we couldn't that we just didn't have the time to do. MOT: Did you play 'State of Play' anyplace in the tour? AW: Yeah, I think we played it in the first week, in about two or three gigs, which was good, it was sounding really good, but my problem...one of the most problematic kind of things about playing that on stage was because it has a hip- hop skip kind of style with a very laid-back heavy kind of style, and to play the two it could be done with a computer with a sequence going and then I can play the live drums to it, so I had to kind of sample it and it never exactly sounded exactly like it should have for the song which it probably would have gotten to the stage where it did. But it was a song that was a little weaker unfortunately on stage than some of the other material, so that's why we passed on it, but at the same time we could go right now and just play it and it'd sound great. It's just a question of what was right for the time and we had to drop something and that one wasn't quite coming up to the mark. MOT: It was reported that at YesFest Jon said the band had rehearsed some songs from DRAMA, is that true? AW: No. I've never heard Jon sing anything from DRAMA. MOT: Were there any other songs rehearsed that didn't make it onto the tour? AW: Let me see...I don't know, we went through a lot of stuff...no I don't think so, I think pretty much, that was pretty much what we rehearsed because we came through an absolute kind of list that we didn't have the time to get into anything else. MOT: The album [TALK] was, too, one of the strongest ones the band had produced in years, yet it quickly dropped off the charts. What do you attribute that to? AW: Record company, basically...I think we went with a new record company that was struggling, we got offered a deal we couldn't refuse, and I think they could have put a lot more into the album than they did. Plus it came out at the time where there was a bunch of stuff out there on the market, and I actually think it's one of the best things the band has ever done, I really got behind the album and I think everybody in the band did. It's just a combination of things; lack of promotion...every time we do this we're in the top five airplay singles in the country, and the album just gets to the wrong people, who didn't want to buy the album. I think we had the initial sales of a lot of Yes fans which helped it, but that's what happens, it just goes bang in the charts then out, you've got to have that sustenance. And, I don't know, a lack of forethought basically by the record company, it was all on their backs but they haven't really had a hit yet, and the guy who's running the record company is a big fan of the band, has known us all for many, many years, used to work for Atlantic [Phil Carson], and, I don't know, things just didn't all gel together, which they should have because the product was there, and I don't think it had enough behind it. If somebody wanted to pour another few million dollars into it it could have definitely made it and made it really big but I don't think it was them [Victory]. MOT: It's been suggested that TALK, both the album and the tour, didn't do too well because there was a backlash to the fact that Steve and Rick weren't a part of it. How do you feel about this? AW: I enjoyed TALK, and I enjoyed the band that made it...I see that that was just another step in the evolution of what we're doing. I enjoyed all of the music of TALK, and it was great to play on-stage, and now we're taking another step, and I don't think it will be a regressive kind of step, I think it'll be a step forward. What combination of the band I don't know right now. Everybody's just sitting back and looking at the whole thing and kind of saying, we're just going to move forward from here. I think all of us are just taking a big breath until the beginning of the year. I'll let you know a lot more in January as I'm going down to L.A., we're going to have some meetings and reformulate. I know one fact, that Chris has been calling me all the time, he wants to really move on fast, so I don't think there's going to be any procrastination about what's going on, so whatever's happening is going to happen pretty quick, right now. Jon's definitely involved, he has a project that he may play in China, which he's asked me to go with them, and that's in the early part of the year, maybe March or April, I'm not sure, so that will be happening. But I know there's also plans to do some kind of recording and some kind of album to come out, which will probably include some of the live stuff from the last tour but also new material, and come as a package with a view to touring to promote that. That's what people are talking about. So in what shape or format that is I couldn't really say right now. MOT: I'm a little surprised to hear that mainly because Jon seems to have so much going over the first three-quarters of this next year, there seems like there wouldn't be any time to squeeze in anything involving Yes. AW: No, we're talking to Jon and working everything out and what's happening... sometimes with Jon he's got these things in his head that the direction and everything should go but nothing's concrete. MOT: So when you met in December you didn't really talk about direction, which should happen in January... AW: Yeah, there was a couple of reflections on that but nothing substantial, that will probably come down more in January. I've got to go down to a NAMM show but I'm going about five days early to do that. MOT: Is Victory Records pretty much out of the picture altogether now? AW: Yeah, I think so. I think we're going to move on to another record company, and Atlantic Records has been mentioned again, I know Jon is talking to them; and they're interested in doing a whole thing with the band again, which would be great MOT: Is the idea of Steve [Howe] and Trevor being in the band together something that really won't come to pass? AW: No, I don't think so, I don't thing that'll happen unless we blatantly do something like a UNION thing again, and with it being so blatant is the only fact that they probably would work together, the way I see it, but you never know. MOT: I know that Trevor called Steve in L.A....there's really no animosity between them, is there? AW: Not really...it comes down to a professional kind of position where it's an attitude more than everything else; 'I think it should be this way,' 'I think it should be that way and obviously they agree sometimes, but disagree sometimes too. So different things like that. It's a style thing and it's an attitude thing, and it's really something else that's outside of whatever the band was doing, it was something between those guys and really didn't affect us that much. MOT: I was curious as to why the long version of 'The Calling' didn't appear on TALK. AW: But it did in Japan... MOT: Right, but as an additional track. AW: Right, as an additional track...because it's just politics in the business, they got 'The Calling', and it comes out, it's going to be a single, and dadada, and they want to do that, but they didn't want to confuse people by having pieces missing out of the CD and stuff like that...it's just a record company, radio kind of thing. But, yeah, I was surprised to see that in Japan, they included both versions. MOT: What about ConcertSonics, so you think that was a success? AW: You know, I thought it was a great idea and I saw a lot of interest in it and I heard a lot of great reaction to it, but I never ever saw that many people using it, at least in the first twenty rows, which may have been a fact that they had too much of the PA coming at them or something like that, but I thought it was initially a great idea. Unfortunately--you can get a lot of clarity through it but--I think basically a lot of people would start listening to the show and then they'd end up taking of them off because they had to do something and just forget to put them back on, kind of thing. I thought it was not a big success, but I think people became aware of what was happening and I thought it was a start to something that could be big in the future. MOT: Part of the problem I had with it at the Gorge was that I couldn't get the reception to come in, and you're there to see the show, and you don't want to spend a lot of time fiddling, so you're missing what's going on... AW: Messing around, yeah...yeah, just taking the time to do it... MOT: You're not paying attention to what's going on stage, you're paying attention to trying to get it on the radio... AW: Did they announce it beforehand? MOT: I heard there were some places where they didn't announce it. AW: Really...well, I don't know, that's sort of out of my jurisdiction [chuckles], I never, ever heard them announce it but apparently they did it before every show. MOT: I take it it didn't bother the band that this was an opportunity for people to actually record the show? AW: No, basically, because the quality would be of radio quality; I mean it would be a memento, but you could never do anything with it, I don't think, you can get some guy to try to sell it as a bootleg but I don't think you'd ever make it to that point. Plus we've got tapes of nearly every show, so I think eventually we may do a live album out of this tour because there's some great gigs, some fantastic gigs we did. MOT: Where does Billy Sherwood stand with the band today? AW: He's a great friend of everybody, he's basically a sixth gear we can pull in, he knows the music so well and he just enjoyed the tour so well, I'm sure he'd love being a part of the band. MOT: He filled in really nicely. AW: He did some really nice things, nice vocals. MOT: Was there a lot of leftover music from the TALK sessions? AW: Not really, no. I think there may have been a couple of extra tracks that are hanging around that didn't make it to the album but nothing to speak of. We pretty much had a goal ironed out of what we wanted to do with the album. MOT: What happened with WALLS, the CD-ROM that was originally going to be a CD single but got canned in favor of the full CD-ROM version? AW: Right, I'm not sure because once people saw the album kind of dipping and diving like this and then the tour doing mediocre as well as opposed to a really good tour, some of those things got kind of canned and some of them didn't. But I hear the CD-ROM's coming out...I saw the initial presentation of what it was, which is pretty interesting, you can click on anybody's head and we talk about different things, and then it has stuff from the album on there, different parts of the album. MOT: Are any of the leftover cuts on the CD-ROM? Because originally there were supposed to be one or two on WALLS, like the long version of 'The Calling', anything like that? AW: No. Nothing like that. MOT: Whose idea was it to make a CD-ROM? AW: We were approached by a company in LA through the management who's done something else before, I think it was Bill Idol or Tom Petty, one of those guys, that's with the same management, and they've done this similar thing before, and there's a lot of people doing it nowadays. MOT: For the record could you clear up this big rumor where Jon and Trevor were quoted as saying this is the last time Yes will record with this present lineup. Do you know how all that manifested? AW: I think that what happens is that you do so many interviews and I think it's ones frustrations kind of get compounded and you might be doing an interview and say, well, I'm kind of fed up with doing this kind of thing and this is the way I feel today and I don't think I want to ever do this with this lineup again, I think that's the kind of thing that people are misinterpreting because we all have different moods and change every day, and say things some- times that you don't believe yourself until you read them later, and that's the unfortunate part because Jon and Trevor did an awful lot of interviews for this album and it just might have been a bad day. I really don't believe that there's a full kind of conviction in most of those statements. MOT: I know you've seen the editorial 'Change Yes Must' from Yes Magazine, which we also posted. What was your reaction to it? AW: I think sometimes when people like that kind of know so much about the inner workings of the band that it sometimes gets distorted because basically a lot of those things are feelings between each member of the band and that's what it is at that time, and you can't really take that much influence from the outside like that. So I think a lot of the band would probably read that, and it's just another kind of opinion, obviously the opinion of somebody who's been in depth into what the band's done and everything about it...what's happening is that the communication between each member of the band as it is is more one of, we'll carry on regardless, and it's always been the same from day one with the band Yes. They really don't like getting pressured, don't like to be pressured even by the record companies, the industry, the reviews, or whatever around it, they'll just do whatever. MOT: Do what you think is best for you. AW: Yeah, exactly. And usually we never bend any of our own rules to make it good for somebody, it's usually what the band is doing, just goes ahead and progress. I think that's a strong characteristic in the band that's been there for a long time... MOT: ...despite the fact that everyone else is saying that-- AW: --you should be doing this thing, exactly. The band will always do that. Of course [Yes] have a certain amount of influence from what's going around them but there's opinions within the band collectively, and usually that turns out what's happening. We find a thread to link on to and that will be what's going to happen, whether it's successful or not. MOT: At this point the core band--yourself, Tony, Trevor, Chris, and Jon--are committed to staying together. AW: At this point, yes, we just want to move forward, that's what's happening right now, but who knows? It's just like we wanted to finish touring, have a certain amount of formulation for next year which we did, and then revamp it in January and get on with the future of the band. MOT: What's important to you is to carry on the momentum of TALK even though it wasn't a resounding success... AW: Whether we look at that and kind of say, well...I personally think, I think everybody in the band thinks it was a great album. But whether we look at that and go, well, it wasn't just quite right for this, or for that, and we need to restructure this and move in this direction, is something that we're formulating, is the next thing that happens, but there's definitely no signs of the band stopping what they're doing right now, they're just going to carry on. MOT: When I spoke to Steve [Howe] in Los Angeles he mentioned the fact in '95 what he wants to do is compile a lot of the video that Yes had shot during the 70's and he would pretty much be the organizer of it and get it into a form that would be released to the public, with the approval of Yes-- AW: Right, it would have to be the approval of Chris and myself, and Jon, basically, on a lot of it... MOT: How do you feel about that, though? AW: I think that it could be good, I don't see why we should hold a lot of archives from the past away from the public, I think if it's there we should spend some money on it and make some good edits and make sure it's of quality as some things that came out which we didn't have any kind of control of, came out and they were just lacking in quality; sound, everything we didn't like but we didn't own the rights to them unfortunately. But most of this stuff we do so we'll make sure it's good, if and when it comes out, but obviously you have to talk about that. MOT: You think at this point you and the others wouldn't mind him actually coordinating this effort of releasing this... AW: No, if he wants to do this as a project, and spend the time to do it I don't personally see any problem with it...I know we have some vault in England where a lot of this stuff's kept, the band's had for a long time, and I don't mind, I think it's good to get things out, moving from the past, and still move onto the future, it's only a part of the band from the past, actually MOT: It's almost like what the Beatles are doing now with their own stuff, they're assembling their official video... AW: Yeah, because there's no reason just to sit on all that stuff, wherever it happens, it may as well be available for the public. MOT: Yeah, for one thing the public wants to see, another is that if it's released from the original masters then it'll defeat the bootleggers, and the third thing is to generate income for the band members...of course we all want you all to be successful; if you're not then you're not making music. AW: [Laughs] I know, absolutely, exactly, it's a big circle, goes around... MOT: To reiterate, though this all has yet to be finalized what you're saying is that the plan hopefully for the first part of '95 is to put out something by Yes... AW: I wouldn't say the first part of '95, I think probably taking about the second quarter of '95, I think there's a lot formulating to be done in the first quarter and get sorted out. MOT: You said something about touring...are you saying Yes touring [in 1995]? AW: Yeah. In fact Chris actually wants us to tour as quick as possible, so you could see us on the road on the second quarter of '95... MOT: Before Jon does all his solo stuff... AW: That's something we're working out so it's a little premature to say that, but it's a possibility of that, subject to a lot of bouncing around of dates and stuff...that's the way people are feeling right now. MOT: I would assume any tour would not be as extensive as the TALK tour was. AW: I don't think so, it may be isolated, it may be a different kind of tour, I don't know. MOT: Maybe play places you didn't hit last time; a lot of people in Europe wanted to see you. AW: There's a possibility of that, yeah. MOT: And there are people in Australia that are dying to see Yes.. AW: I know, I know...to do the Australian thing is a big operation, to move everything and do everything like that. We're probably going out there [touring] with another new thing yet again, and promoting possibly a live album and things like that, and getting across to people again. And maybe fans who didn't like this, or didn't like that, maybe try to pull all this kind of thing into one thing so the fans are always back to the core kind of thing, who knows. MOT: Are you thinking more about merchandising? AW: It needs to come into the equation, that's for sure. MOT: Maybe even in tandem with Roger Dean and the older stuff? AW: Yeah, there's a possibility of that. Nothing is outside the realms of what we control because pretty much control all of that stuff, still, and the only members of Yes Music are myself, Chris, and Steve Howe. We pretty much control what can be done with a lot of that stuff. MOT: You, Chris, and Steve? Not Jon? AW: Jon's not a member of Yes Music, no. He left years and years ago. He formed his own kind of corporation, and Rick did, too, they're separate entities. The people who own the name are Chris, myself, Tony Kaye, and Trevor, that's who owns Yes, the actual name. Yes Music is the back catalog that's prior to Trevor Horn, basically. DRAMA wasn't involved in that, and when Trevor came into the fold it was like a separate entity. So everything prior to that is really under a company called Yes Music of which we're still directors. MOT: I was hoping you could comment on something Patrick Moraz has been saying. According to him he wrote substantial portions of 'Awaken'. What do you have to say about this? AW: [Laughs] That's funny. Well, I wrote a lot of it too. Patrick's just a strange guy to get along with...I mean I could say the same thing about TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS because I wrote a lot of chord sequences in that but never got the publishing for it because it was basically Jon and Trevor's kind of--not Jon and Trevor, Jon and Steve, Freudian slip [laughs]--it was their, kind of, thing where they had these songs set up and I did bunches and bunches of pieces of music that I never got credit for or subsequently the publishing and paid for, but it was just the way it was and I think the same thing with 'Awaken', I did some parts of 'Awaken' that you can't really grasp as a whole entity, a piece of music was just part of what was going on at that time. So you just have to live with it basically. MOT: So did Patrick contribute *anything* to 'Awaken'? AW: I'm trying to remember back, it's a long time ago, this is 1976 [laughs] and you know we may even have sat around one day and Patrick said, no, let's change this chord instead of that chord but that's not writing a song; it's when you come up with a whole series of chords that contribute to a whole piece of a song. I really couldn't tell you right now. It's a possibility but one just has to live with that fact. MOT: I'm surprised to hear you say what you did about TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS because the whole band is credited with all the music on that album. AW: No, it's Jon and Steve. MOT: The way the credits read on the actual album is lyrics by Jon and Steve, music by Yes... AW: Yeah, but the publishing doesn't work out like that [laughs]. No, that's different because there's a lot of music that I wrote on TOPOGRAPHIC and all that side three [sings piece of 'The Ancient'], parts of 'Ritual', and even parts of side 2 I wrote at that time, so no, it didn't work out that way, the whole thing. MOT: What about the Lennon [tribute album] we spoke about a while ago? AW: When Nicky Hopkins died that was put on the back burner for a while. So whether that happens or not I don't know, but I need to forward that out...that could be interesting to do that. Certainly wouldn't mind doing it. MOT: How about a solo album? AW: I've got plenty of material, I have a whole sack of thirty DAT tapes that are full of material that I have to sift through and just work out, and work on something new. MOT: You're pretty much an acoustic drum player. Have you looked towards electronic drums at all? AW: Well, you see, my whole kit is set up for acoustic or electronics, and they can use electronics any time they want for what I do and I have all the equipment beneath me on stage that they can do exactly the same as every other thing; I've got samplers that can emulate all the different sounds that anybody with electronics can, so I have the capability of doing it. It's just that I choose to, and the band chooses to have, an acoustic sound on-stage. MOT: Is there anyone you'd like to play with outside of Yes? AW: It's kind of more commercial but I like Roger's stuff, Roger Hodgson, you know, Supertramp, and actually he's working on one track that we recorded a while ago with Trevor and myself. I think I'd like to adapt some of more of my jazz instincts with a few more jazzy kind of players, do something on the side like that, incorporate that in a solo kind of thing too, something just off the wall, no names really, I just like playing with good musicians. I'm interested in doing some kind of production too, there's a couple of bands around Seattle that are apparently very good and they're looking for that kind of thing, so I might get into that as well. MOT: At this point would you say that you're waiting on what Yes decides to do before you decide what to do on your own? AW: No; I consider myself to be part of the Yes egg, as I always say, it's rolling along and whatever I do on my own is something else I'm doing, I've got another ten projects that I'm kind of doing, so I'm kind of like Jon, at the same time. I'm starting to work on a new CD ROM of samples, and I'm starting to work on a new one of those with Reek Havok, and I have lots of interesting ideas of what I want to put in this one, and I don't know whether I'll be doing it with anybody else; I might just do it by myself, with Reek. [So] that, and I'm writing, I'm finishing my studio at home so I can kind of get writing while I'm doing clinics, and I'm doing a clinic in San Jose with Carmine [Appice] and Ginger Baker, a triple clinic, the three of us together; I think it's around the third week of February. And I'm doing the NAMM show for three days and I've got a bunch of programming to do in one of the booths, and Cue Up Arts, who does all my CD ROM stuff through Reek, I'm going to do some stuff for them, Ludwig, Ziljian...all that kind of stuff, I mean last year I never sat down for three days. I've got to got to England for about ten days in February too so I've got all that stuff to do before March...taking to Chris about possibly recording in March...and April we may be on the road. So there's a lot of things building up right now. MOT: When you say with Chris, do you mean Chris as a solo, or Chris with Yes? AW: No, Chris with Yes, and he's got a solo deal in pending right now. I just talked to Chris' manager yesterday, he says that Chris might actually come up here for a couple of weeks to rehearse with me...'cause Chris really likes Seattle, they [Chris and wife Melissa] spent a couple of days here, and they came down to my house and stuff, and I think they both really like the area, so whether or not Chris moves up here is another [story]...it's interesting, he's Mr. Health at the moment, he works out all the time, and I think that's a lot of the reason he's, kind of, real straight and he just wants to get on, he's [got] a little bit of gusto in him right now and he just wants to make things move on. He's always been a strong driving force as far as that goes, as far as the actual feel of the band, as far as the one person who's played on every album. Chris has always been like that, so he's very, very together right now and he's working out three or four times a week and he just calls up and wants to do this, he wants to go; he says 'You've got to get down to L.A. or [I'm] going to be up here,' and he's setting these meetings up, so he's moving along. Jon's just like that too; forever, the mind is working on different things. ______________________________________________________________________________ = nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte nfte = ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ THOSE ALL-IMPORTANT ADDRESSES: ============================== Editors: Jeff Hunnicutt hunnicutt@vxc.ocis.uncwil.edu or nfte@sol.cms.uncwil.edu (New subscriptions, deletions, contributions, questions/comments/criticism) Mike Tiano miketi@microsoft.com (Reviews, Surveys, Tour and Release dates, etc.) Notes From The Edge PO Box 13 Issaquah, WA 98027-0013 -----+-----+-----+-----+----- Please Support... 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