Note: this post is image-heavy (for those of you with slower browsers).
Over the years they appeared on magazine covers together, and did an endorsement ad for Ampeg together, but their interaction in live performance was truly a joy to behold, because it's all in those smiles...watch just about any YesWest video or performance footage and at some point you will see Chris and Trevor with smiles meant solely for each other.
When they say a picture is worth a thousand words, well, sometimes it really is true. This sequence in the performance of the song in the 9012Live concert film (which was also released separately as a promotional video) is what caused me to originally term their relationship an epic bromance. During the 9012Live tour, Chris and Trevor were playful - often downright silly - throughout each performance, but this was one of those classic evocations of interaction regarding the way in which rock music can be distinctly sexual. And for a song which originally contained a blatantly sexual narrative it's fitting (even if we didn't know it back in 1985).
The song was performed as a part of Yes' appearance at the Atlantic Records 40th Anniversary concert at Madison Square Garden in 1988, which was broadcast worldwide. During their customary interaction, Chris does something even more obviously affectionate.
As those who have viewed 9012Live and various pro-shot shows are aware, Chris and Trevor had an entire routine for this song, it was choreographed (and in the aforementioned film, you can see that Trevor is so over the whole thing - he rolls his eyes at Chris just before the part where Chris pretends to knee Trevor in the crotch).
"Love Will Find A Way"
The video for this song is randomly weird as videos of the 1980s tended to be, but Chris and Trevor's mimed interaction during the instrumental break is particularly hilarious.
"Shock To The System"
Color-coordinated outfits aside, their interaction in the song during the end solo/vamp is akin to what they did with "Hold On" but I tend to think they may have been having fun with it strictly as parody or to distract themselves from the fact that they - especially Trevor - didn't enjoy playing this one at all.
This one incorporates a true BFF ritual: the secret handshake. For the outdoor shows in sheds on the Eighty Dates tour where they couldn't use the rotating stage, a routine came about for the introduction to Trevor's solo spot where Jon told a story about a boy and his friend, the boy practiced music every day and his friend polished the stool he sat upon, complete with humorously dramatic enactment. But in the Mountain View version there's a few other details...one was the prank played on Trevor of injecting the seat of his stool with water (and you can clearly see his wet behind as he walks around on the stage during the solo), and also their Aren't we cute? hug for the audience.
Talk release party broadcast 3/16/94
This promotional event was held at the Hard Rock Cafe in Hollywood, and there was a lot of alcohol ingested during the proceedings. The participants (and the very rowdy audience) became progressively intoxicated as the evening went on, which lent a decidedly comedic aura, with an emphasis on party. Trevor and Jon gave an interview the following day where Trevor all but publicly acknowledged he was thoroughly hungover and he noted he hadn't actually slept since the previous night.
Host Bob Coburn made this hilarious observation towards the end of the broadcast - after Trevor performed a drunken singing impersonation of Jon - as he witnessed Chris and Trevor's antics:
"Uh-oh, Chris and Trevor are hugging, no, Chris is mugging Trevor, look out!"
Trevor quipped, "Jon, I know you're in the car, listening."
Coburn attempted to regain control, but by then it was probably much too late.
"Trevor, quit mugging Chris over there! And now they're mugging for the cameras, it's a giant mugging here at the Hard Rock."
Trevor said, "He's full of -" then howled like a dog.
"I Am Waiting"
During the denouement of this song as performed on the Talk tour in 1994, Chris would walk from his side of the stage over to Trevor's - something he did often during a YesWest show - they would play the final sequence in unison, and then at the very end, Chris would offer Trevor his index finger which Trevor would grasp, then raise their arms up high, finally putting their arms around each other's shoulders and taking a bow. It was thoroughly adorable and with hindsight I can appreciate that after all they'd gone through by that point in their shared existence they still cared for each other deeply.
