Ultimate Yes: 35th Anniversary Collection CD

Recorded between 1969 & 2003. Includes liner notes by Chris Welch.

For a band with outsized ambitions like those of prog-rock pioneers Yes, it makes sense to release an anthology that spreads itself out grandly over three discs. With its third disc, a home for 20 minutes of newly recorded bonus tracks, the appropriately titled ULTIMATE YES stops just short of box-set length (there have already been two of those to tell the group's story), but finely chronicles Yes's long career. Through a maze of head-spinning personnel changes, almost every album is touched on, from the early post-psychedelic phase (the title track of TIME AND A WORD) to the first musical muscle-flexing of guitar hero Steve Howe ("Yours Is No Disgrace"), the arrival of keyboard wizard Rick Wakeman (several tracks from milestone FRAGILE), and the band's high-water mark, CLOSE TO THE EDGE (the almost funky "Siberian Khatru").

"Tempus Fugit" from the under-appreciated, sans-Jon Anderson DRAMA, and a trio of tracks from the "comeback" album 90125 represent the finest of Yes's '80s output. Latter-day tracks ("Lift Me Up," "Homeworld") find the band's might undiminished decades into the journey. Hardcore fans will have all this material already, but will be drawn in by Disc 3, containing four brand-new pieces recorded in an "unplugged" acoustic format, including interesting re-workings of FRAGILE's "Roundabout" and the epic "South Side of the Sky."

Additional Tracks

Compilation producers: Yes, David McLees, Bill Inglot.

Yes: Jon Anderson, Trevor Horn (vocals); Bill Sherwood (guitar, keyboards, background vocals); Trevor Rabin, Steve Howe (guitar, background vocals); Peter Banks (guitar); Igor Khoroshev, Geoff Downes, Patrick Moraz, Rick Wakeman, Tony Kaye (keyboards); Chris Squire (bass, background vocals); Bill Bruford, Alan White (drums, percussion).

Producers include: Tony Colton, Eddie Offord, Yes, Trevor Horn, Tim Weidner.