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Introduction:


A series of essays wherein I explore the numerous musical identities of my favorite musician: from child prodigy to teen idol to guitar hero to singer/songwriter to award-winning in-demand film composer.
Featuring news/updates and commentary/analysis of Trevor's career and associated projects.
Comments are disabled but please feel free to contact me at rabinesque.blog@gmail.com.



Saturday, July 30, 2016

Media Watch: new interview with Lou

With thanks to Yesfans forum member YESOLA for the heads-up.

The new edition of Yes Music Podcast features an interview with Trevor's drummer - now and forever - Buddy Love, aka Lou Molino III, who discusses the new undertaking of ARW as well as the history of his wonderfully hilarious and creatively-fulfilling partnership with Trevor.

http://mulryne.com/yesmusicpodcast/an-interview-with-arw-drummer-lou-molino-236/

Friday, July 29, 2016

Media Watch: Prog Report interview

An ongoing series wherein I comment on Trevor's recent publicity.

Today The Prog Report posted a recent interview with Trevor (see below).  Interestingly, Trevor reveals that he was courted several times to rejoin Yes over the years rather than the couple instances which have been chronicled in the past - and he comes down fully on the side of the "No Jon, No Yes" faction.  But as I had previously supposed in fandom discussion, the initial idea behind ARW would have involved an eventual album release only; as well as Lou Molino having been the one who recommended Gary Cambra for the touring band.  And in terms of setlist additions, Trevor verifies they will be playing "Shoot High, Aim Low" which is good news to the many fans who are clamoring to hear that YesWest classic.  Trevor notes he's spent "a long time getting a whole new system together" which likely explains the Instagram post from Line 6 which I shared with readers back in June.  In closing comments Trevor notes that his vocal rock album is still on the way "sooner rather than later" and he is taking a break from scoring "for the foreseeable future."

Friday, July 22, 2016

East & West

Spotted on social media: guitarist Toshi Yanagi experienced a fandom moment at his day job this week (GROUPLOVE taped an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live), and our Maestro's looking ready to rock, I'd say!

Thursday, July 21, 2016

Media Watch: ARW updates

Two recent articles provide an interesting perspective on what's going on with ARW from a recording standpoint - as we know, the boys will be gathering in August to spend two months rehearsing and refining their live presentation, then unleashing it upon excited audiences beginning October 4th.  Although - as we've read in recent press - the schedule for the album has been pushed back till after initial touring at the earliest, a few comments about its' probable contents are certainly enough to pique our interest as fans.

First is Jon's interview (with its' colorful cover proclaiming him Prog God for 2016) in the August issue of PROG (on sale as of yesterday) - which is primarily devoted to a retrospective of his career as well as recent events (i.e. Anderson/Stolt and ARW).  Page 49 features an article on the topic of our favorite trio...
A new album is in the works, still being tweaked as we speak.  How's it coming together?
"It's really really good!" says Anderson delightedly.
What can Anderson reveal about the new music?
"I heard it...Trevor's done some power-rock tracks for some of the record; it's really bananas.  They work, you know.  Then I put some ideas on them...so it became furious, cinematic.  There's long-form material too.  Oh it goes from one extreme to another!" 
On the live show:
"It'll be a mix of Yes music and our new material.  I can hear everything in my head...it's a question of pooling your energies together to make it work the very best we can.  And in a way I don't want it to be too like Yes: we want to use a more 21st-century sound, which, given new technology, is how we record." 
Rick's interview with Mike Ragogna of The Huffington Post (who also interviewed Trevor in 2012) was posted yesterday as well, and he offers some interesting tidbits.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/yes-its-arw-and-more-conversations-with-rick-wakeman_us_5783bb2ae4b0f06648f56378

On the subject of the album:
As soon as it leaked out what we were doing, it was nuts. We had lots of offers from various record labels. “Oh, come and make an album.” It’s very tempting to say, “Yeah, great, let’s make an album,” but we sat down and said, “This is doing it for the wrong reasons.” Yes, we’ve all got music, we’ve been throwing music back and forth towards each other with ideas of things we want to do and there is some great stuff. But we decided what’s best is to go out and play together and really get to know each other again. We’ll continue the writing during the tour, and after the tour, we can do some more recording, put some more tracks together. We may do it as a CD EP, we may do it as a single track, we may do it as an album, but we’ll be doing it for the right reasons when the music is ready.
I’m coming over to see Trev in the beginning of August to put some keys down on a couple of tracks that we’ve been working on. If they’re ready in time, we may well do one in time, we may release it as a single piece, I don’t know. But what we’re not doing is we’re not going down the old road of, “Oh, you’ve got to make an album before you tour.” No, we don’t have to do that at all. We can go out, play music, maybe include some new stuff, certainly throw in some new surprises and certainly some new arrangements of some of the classic Yes material. The great thing about rules―and there always have been rules in the rock world, “first you make an album, then you tour”―is that they’re there to be broken. The most important thing that we’ve all agreed on is that whatever we do, it has to be done for the right reason. It wouldn’t be the right reason just to run into a studio and knock out an album. At the end of the day, after a tour, we all go, “You know what? We could’ve done that so much better.”
Rick states that the North American tour has been extended into December and interestingly enough the official site has been taken offline again, presumably to make those updates to the schedule. He also noted: "We’re looking at this as a relatively long-term plan, at least three if not four or five years." which certainly makes for interesting future speculation in terms of what ARW is looking to accomplish on the touring/recording fronts, as well as how all of it will impact Trevor's workload in other areas.

Monday, July 18, 2016

A Guide to Field Recordings: 1989 tour

A series featuring commentary on live recordings from my collection.


As I was working on my essay regarding the YesWest legacy as it pertains to audio/video of live performance, I dug deep into my collection of bootlegs and thus an idea for a new series was born, but one which directly relates to my Collector's Corner series, so consider it an offshoot if you care about that sort of thing.  My focus for the inaugural entry is Trevor's 1989 club tour.


"We must be in (insert name of city here)!"
-Trevor Rabin, at every gig he played in 1989.

Back when the remastered edition of Live In L.A. was released, my review of the album contained historical commentary on the tour as a whole.  However, at the time I had compared the official recording with my copy of the Boston show, rather than all the recordings I have, so I missed a few details which I thought would be interesting to mention now.  My main point in this entry is: for those fans interested in live recordings, you're not getting the entire experience from Live In L.A.  It is certainly the best-quality recording in all aspects and the one which Trevor is satisfied with in terms of presentation, but I would recommend for those who want to hear - and (for those lucky enough to originally attend) relive - the complete set they should seek out a copy of the Boston show; as a radio broadcast it is the best available of those in circulation.  And hearing the entire show gives fans a chance to truly experience Trevor as the focus of a performance, which many of us have never known in our long relationship with Trevor's career.  It is wall-to-wall guitar goodness - which we at least possess a tangible document of in the form of Live In L.A. - at the arguable peak of his Rock God powers.

In Toronto, Trevor asked the audience if he looked okay in his polka-dot suit.

  • Before the entrance music which the band played (the introduction to "Lift Me Up"), a section of "The Cape" was played over the PA.  The way in which the Boston show is edited you can't hear it, but I have audience recordings from other dates which include this portion.  I'm assuming it was played as the lights went down.
  • I find it interesting that the portion of "Birdland" in "Sorrow (Your Heart)" is not noted in the credits of Live In L.A.; one would think that these days, due to the ubiquitous use of sampling/interpolation, that the copyright acknowledgement wouldn't have been overlooked.
  • I stated Trevor had the audience sing along with "Owner" at every date, and that's not correct.  I tend to think it depended on the audience.  It appears he was battling a cold during the entire tour (so we can assume, as noted by Mark Mancina, that Trevor's infamous demand for "More brandy!" was strictly a medicinal request), and makes mention of it several times in the recordings I have, but if the energy level of the audience seemed to be lacking he didn't necessarily encourage them to sing along.  Thus I have a couple versions of the song with Trevor singing a step down for his register, which isn't bad, but it seems to me the band as a whole should have tried to get every audience involved.  But knowing the Los Angeles show was being recorded I think it was important to Trevor not only to capture the energy of the audience in the recording, but also to avoid straining his voice or doing less than his best - which he acknowledges in the liner notes interview.
  • There are backing vocal tapes used - which is something YesWest did for every tour as well - which doesn't detract from his own songs in which they're used: "Cover Up," "Sorrow (Your Heart)," "Eyes Of Love," and "Something To Hold On To" but I can't help but wonder if the budget could have allowed for an extra vocalist.  According to at least one interview conducted prior to the club tour, originally Trevor planned to include former bandmate Duncan Faure in his band, who would have provided great harmonies for the songs chosen.  I also believe that either a backing vocal tape or an augmented mix was used in "Love Will Find A Way."  This practice does not strike me as disingenuous so much as emphasizes how committed Trevor was to presenting the particular sound of the songs even given the vagaries of live performance.
  • I would imagine that compared to every other date - even Los Angeles - the Boston audience was insane, chanting Trevor's name at several points, for example.  They also performed every audience participatory thing they could.  That is another reason why I would recommend this recording, although it's known that Boston audiences are rowdy in general.  Their energy level really bolsters the band's mood in my estimation, resulting in a kick-ass gig overall.
  • As Trevor notes in the liner notes interview for the reissue of Live In L.A., the version of "Solly's Beard" is not from the performance at The Roxy, and that's a shame because the renditions of his acoustic solo piece were interesting and evolving with each gig.  Placed at the mid-point of the setlist, he lengthened it and incorporated various new elements.  For example, in San Diego he teased the intro to "Love Will Find A Way."  And as I've mentioned previously, his introduction was hilarious.
  • Which brings me to my next point: by not including a lot of the stage patter, you really miss out on appreciating Trevor's sense of humor.  It tends to be evident in most interviews he gives, but he never really had the chance to show it onstage with YesWest, so it's fun to hear him make quips between songs. 
  • Speaking of talking, an interesting thing about audience recordings is you usually get to hear random bits of conversation in the crowd, and on the Toronto recording, one of the attendees correctly identified "You Know Something I Don't Know" as a song which had been considered for 90125 but then dropped from the running order.  And this was in 1989, proving that the original demos have been in circulation for a very long time.
  • I imagine any number of fans have noticed this one...in an interesting act of self-censorship, Trevor altered a line in "Heard You Cry Wolf" (going from "hope to God that no one'll find you" to "hope to goodness") and one wonders if he might have believed invoking the G-word would have been potentially offensive, but given the demographic of attendees I tend to think no one would have minded.  The choice of this song - my favorite from Wolf - remains one of the high points of these shows for me, it's so wonderfully performed, illustrating what a great song it is overall in Trevor's solo catalog.
  • "On the drums - Buddy Love, the Scheiße Haus, Mr. Lou Molino!"               Everyone has their favorite track on Live In L.A, and for me it's "Sludge." As I noted in my essay "Fusion Furor" it's an absolutely audacious performance, and from the versions I have in my collection, the boys managed to bring it every single night.  But given the format in which the recording was eventually released, I don't get why Lou's epic three minutes-and-change drum solo was edited down to 30 seconds.  I don't believe it would have necessarily impacted the flow of the recording overall, and hey - isn't that what live shows are for?!

In keeping with my ongoing argument/advocacy for further curating and preservation of Trevor's legacy overall, I daresay that - even with a warts-and-all release - allowing fans to have a complete record of this tour is important, and would be a gracious gesture to the fanbase who continue to love this era of Trevor's career and provided positive support as it occurred.

Saturday, July 9, 2016

This date in Yesstory: Surprise!

On this day in 2010, Trevor made a surprise appearance during Yes' performance at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles to perform on his signature song "Owner of a Lonely Heart."


It's rather bittersweet now to watch the interplay between Chris and Trevor (as it was the last time they would ever appear onstage together), but I remember when I first watched this video I chuckled to see Chris seeming to follow Trevor into the wings as if it were old times.  I will always regret not being able to make it to this show - because I was made aware beforehand that Trevor was going to be there - but of course life in our modern wired world means that whatever happens, you're likely to see video of it on YouTube at some point.

Friday, July 8, 2016

Notes from the Maestro

In the wake of the touring band lineup announcement, Trevor finally caught up with us on social media last night (and apologized for his "long hiatus")...

Trevor points out - as I did in my entry on Big Mess - that he and Ryan will be out on the road at the same time, an event unprecedented in their shared lives as father and son, including updates on what his multi-talented progeny has been up to in his musical career.   He also comments "We're still working hard on the new material." which at least keeps the hope of new music alive, even in light of recent statements about the status of an ARW album.  So things may be chaotic (his term) right now, but it's good to know the guys are as excited as we are to get the show underway.

Update: Trevor posted again today (which is entirely keeping with his usual behavior in this regard).

Thursday, July 7, 2016

Media Watch: All the boys are in their places!

Today the highly-anticipated news of the ARW touring band lineup was announced on a few outlets, such as this article at Prog Report:
http://progreport.com/arw-anderson-rabin-wakeman-announce-band-upcoming-tour/
...and as every long-time die-hard fan knew on a cellular level, Lou Molino is the drummer.  Trust me, dear readers, he's always the drummer.  And the selection of Lee Pomeroy is not much of a surprise either, given the recent fandom speculation.  Rounding out the backing band is utility player Gary Cambra, primarily known for his work with alternative rock legends The Tubes.

Saturday, July 2, 2016

A little bird told me...(or not)

The popularity of a thing can often be measured based on the social media reaction and/or online presence.  In the wake of more official announcements concerning the future of ARW, discussion quickly spread to online forums and social media platforms.  Keeping an eye out as I do for such things, I noticed something of late: people are following the incorrect Twitter account for ARW.

The official account is @ARWTour, which has a paltry three followers and only one post.  Participation on social media is standard practice for promotional purposes, but it appears whomever is administering this account has fallen down on the job somewhat.  It seems almost an afterthought compared to the updates on the official Facebook page, and in fact the account itself may only be a few days old.  An unofficial but far more active Twitter account had been previously established - and it certainly looks official.  I was fooled until I went back to the official site for verification.  Its' prior existence certainly lends legitimacy to anyone who might be looking for an account to follow.  It appears from the handle used in the official Facebook page header that the account name they desired to use had already been claimed, which may explain the delay in establishing the Twitter account.

So while you may certainly continue to follow @AndersonRabinWak if you like, just be aware that it is not the official Twitter account for our favorite trio.  Perhaps the more followers the official account garners, hopefully they will finally get with the program of updates and retweets and so forth.