Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Yes
Label: Atlantic Records
Released: 1978
Runtime: 41:15
Rating: 2/5
‘Tormato’ is an album that has stayed inexplicably underrated to this day. Why? Yes ditched the long, dreamy epics they’d spoiled people with up to then and mostly focused on writing shorter songs, songs with a beginning and an end. The sound is completely different, heavily filtered, and at times it sounds like it was run through a washing machine. You hear it most in Howe’s experiments with totally new sounds, which stray a long way from the basic tone we’re used to hearing from his Gibson ES 175. The sound is revolutionary and fresh, and the interesting thing is that pretty much every song has a completely different production.
The album opens with Future Times/Rejoice, with a snare drive that brings to life a proper military march. Rick Wakeman makes no secret of his enthusiasm for the latest advances in synthesizer technology. It was Rick, with his fresh ideas and sound, who basically signaled where the pop-rock production of the mainstream music of the day was heading, from Human League to Talking Heads. The album has two punchy, driving tracks built on straight-up rock chords, Don’t Kill The Whale and Release, Release, which tie straight back to the opener of the previous record, ‘Going For the One’ (1976), and its title track. Yes offer a real sonic contrast with Arriving UFO, which has a wild middle section where you land in the crossfire of Wakeman and Howe trading solo volleys. With his “distorted” guitar tone, Steve at times sounds so much like a keyboard that you’d swear the band had two keyboardists on this one. ‘Tormato’ is a dynamic album thanks to its extreme stylistic and sonic contrasts. Between the livelier tracks sit the gentle Madrigal, with its baroque harpsichord, and Onward, a gorgeous ballad with a completely different mood that calms the high-flying moments of Arriving UFO with beautiful, richly layered vocal harmonies. Yes do lightly touch on their famous era of super-long compositions with On The Silent Wings Of Freedom. A cathartic assault from the rhythm section showers the listener with bursts, and the bass guitar booms and slices through the track. Yes still use part of this song live today, in the instrumental rhythm-section interlude called Whitefish. It’s interesting that Yes end the song on an abrupt cut, right at the moment it’s really getting your ears going. Just when you’re wishing for another ten minutes, Yes slam you, against your wishes, with the fact that the record is over. I’m convinced that if On The Silent Wings Of Freedom had been stretched out into a classic Yes epic, the critics would have been a lot more lenient on “Tormato” in their reviews.
‘Tormato’ is definitely not to the taste of ears raised on ‘Relayer’ (1974) or ‘The Yes Album’ (1971). The style and sound of ‘Tormato’ are turned upside down compared to, say, ‘Close To The Edge’ (1972), but the difference in the message between the “get ups/get downs” from that record’s title track and the “rounds” from Future Times/Rejoice is practically zero. The band’s green streak is woven in most impressively in Don’t Kill The Whale, whose lyrics really do sound like the speech of some Native American wise chief. It isn’t just about worshipping animals, but a great spirit, a great teacher in this material world. While Native Americans were almost wiped out, we forgot the wisdom we once knew and respected. Oof, I almost forgot the bonus tracks. I’ll tell you right away why. There are a whole ten of them, but none are worth a special mention. The quality gap between them and the tracks on ‘Tormato’ is huge. The bonus tracks are mostly shorter songs, totally without solos, at that basic stage where you get an idea down on tape just “to get by” so you don’t forget the motif you came up with. These songs are really only interesting to die-hard fans, while the rest of you aren’t missing a thing. Many of them are just simple, second-rate rock ‘n’ roll, and Anderson’s vocals don’t fit rock ‘n’ roll at all, so these tracks are very hard to listen to. It’s unbelievable that this is the band that gave us ‘Tales From Topographic Oceans’. One interesting bonus song is Countryside. Steve Howe wrote it back in 1970 and first used it in an instrumental version called Corkscrew on his studio album ‘Turbulence’. A version with Steve humming away on vocals can be found on his album ‘Homebrew 2’ (2000) under the title Resistence Day. Countryside is the “Yes-style” version, and comparing all the versions, it shows best what Anderson’s voice actually means to this music, because it conjures up that familiar magic and distinctive atmosphere that makes the world of Yes so enchanting. Another bonus song worth mentioning is an early version of Does It Really Happen (‘Drama’, 1980), titled Everybody’s Song, with completely different chemistry from what Yes offer on their next studio album. The last bonus track is a real balm for the ears given how formulaic and predictable the rest are. It’s an instrumental orchestral version of Onward, which brings a great moment of release. But overall, if this reissue had come without these bonus tracks, absolutely nobody would have been harmed.
‘Tormato’ is a landmark record that separates the classic Yes creations of the seventies from the following decade, when Yes dizzyingly sailed into the waters of emerging trends and started working them into their musical body. “Tormato” or “Tormentor”! Take your pick.
Lineup
Jon Anderson – vocals
Chris Squire – bass and vocals
Rick Wakeman – keyboards
Alan White – drums
Steve Howe – guitars
Production
Yes
Tracklist
1. Future Times/Rejoice (6:45)
2. Don’t Kill The Whale (4:56)
3. Madrigal (2:23)
4. Release, Release (5:47)
5. Arriving UFO (6:03)
6. Circus of Heaven (4:30)
7. Onward (4:02)
8. On The Silent Wings of Freedom (7:47)
