Yes! Is this the most pretencious, overrated band of all time?

I confess I was a fan as a student and still am. Their lyrics always were pretentious nonsensical gobbledygook but they sounded nice.

They were the loudest band I ever saw, louder than The Who, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and a host of others. Unbelievably brain numbingly eardrum burstingly loud.

I've always liked progressive music, but although enjoying quite a bit of the output from Yes. I would never list them among my favourite bands. They could certainly play. Their albums before Topographic Oceans were pretty solid with The Yes Album being the one I still listen to on occasions and Close to the Edge is a great long track (if not quite up to Nine Feet Underground or Moon In June standard)  

Steve Howe always impressed me as he was folk/psych guitarists who tried not to be an electric blues player. So he was a bit different from the normal guitar hero. 

The 70s was a mixed era with some very fine music and a twist in the tail when punk rock introduced something more basic. From a personal perspective, we had the finest musical group in Emerson, Lake and Palmer, the best productions from the Electric Light Orchestra, the freshest band in the Clash and some excellent albums from Shirley Collins and the Albion Country Band, Caravan, Deep Purple, VDG, Led Zeppelin, Macca/Wings and the Desperate Bicycles and the Stranglers. And Sandy Denny was alive and writing some the best songs I have ever heard. 

However, there was a lot of music that I just didn't get .... the Eagles, Boston, Foreigner, REO Speedwagon ... who were certainly not bad musicians, but mean nothing to me ... James Taylor, Jackson Browne and similar equally left me mystified. Then the Bee Gees (the Group that made the superb Odessa album) caught a bad dose of falsetto and created the most pretentious soundtrack of all, which was followed by the curse of John Travolta (I mean what was that all about). 

Peter Gabriel was enigma as he created the wonderful Trespass album and followed it with some more interesting records with his backing group Genesis, but then he left after the Lamb Lies Down (which was his low ebb) and Genesis decided to carry on ... OK so they made lots of money and got rich, but the music was .... the up side is PG blossomed without the constraints and limitations of the backing group and made some really fine music. 

We'll all have our own favourites and records we just can't stand. I know many hereon like groups like Joy Division and New Order and although the first of these released at least one good single, New Order sound dreary to me (sorry). I'm sure lots of music I love sounds dreary to others. One poster was not a fan of Ed Banger & the Nosebleeds, which surprised me. 

... so a note to hi-fi manufacturers if at a hi-fi show you decide to play Dire Straits, PC or Frank Sinatra then sorry, but as the Stranglers once advised I'll walk on by.  If I hear Sandy Denny or the Beatles or the Incredible String Band or even String Driven Thing or the Flying Lizards then I'll walk in, sit down and listen to the music 

Tony ... do you like the Ozric Tentacles? 

All the best, Guy 

LOL

In answer to the thread title their are a number of bands that could contest the most pretencius, overrated of all time..

I would like to award the title to U2 ,

To my mind they are the dictionay defenition of  pretencious .  Overated , formulaic, singalong lager fueled wedding music for the musically challenged  ! fronted by a man so self indugent and removed from reality that he  hasnt noticed that he has gone so far up his own backside that he has almost turned himself inside out . 

Plus why the need for sunglasses in doors ? seriously why ?  

feel better now thats off my chest

TWP

Totally agree TWP. U2 are definitely THE most pretentious band period. Jingle jangle rock at it's worst. 

Now we've lit the blue touch paper we had better retire and await a barrage from those misguided U2 fans.

+ 1 Steve and TWP.

How could I forget the almighty Bono and freaking Co?

Guy, never really got into O.T.

As for fatcat, are you doing a Rebekah or a David?

KR

Tony

I love the early Yes albums,Same goes for U2.

Rick Wakemans first solo albums must be more pretentious than Yes imo.

His on ice Wembley Pool stands out as the most pretentious on a grand scale live show ever imo.

Stu. 

Both.

Laughing at and loving it.

Pretentious is a word people love to throw at Yes, but were they pretending to be anything that they were not?

Jon Anderson's lyrics are not literal statements, but use words for colour, or just for how they sound. They do not stand the analysis of political, or emotional lyricists, but their music was not about that. There are plenty of lyricists who do the literal and political, so if you want that, listen to them.

His lyrics are no more pretentious or silly than Liz Frazer for instance, who people raved about ten years later.

Half hour solos, I haven't spotted any on any Yes record, or live concert recordings for that matter. Yes do have some long instrumental sections, and one track does have a solo around five minutes (Yours is no Disgrace) but then so do lots of other bands, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, I hesitate to mention Grateful Dead.

They did have one of the most amazing rhythm sections until Bruford left, and Howe and Wakeman's abilities were astounding. They could play, so why pretend that they couldn't?

Anderson's style, like many vocalists is a personal taste, take it or leave it. For me it fits.

They were cutting a fine line, and when it went wrong, it falls apart quickly, and sadly the last tour showed that, as have a few albums, but at their best they made music that no other band could have.

Perhaps their music is escapist, rather than analytical, but it has stood the test of time for a lot of people.

As for bands who are pretentious, U2 do definitely come high up the list, but for me it would be The Clash, three middle class art school poseurs who wanted to be working class heroes, the one true working class member eventually got on their nerves, pity as Mick Jones seems such decent bloke.

My take.

'Yes' - always pretentious meandering twaddle.

Gabriel's 'Genesis' - classy, in a different league.

Later 'Genesis' - dreadful pop.

'U2' - great up to Joshua Tree album (1986 ?), then pretentious garbage.

Sorry Jamie, but I heard a Yes album (sorry can't remember which) recently, the first time for 30 odd years and I thought it sounded terribly terribly dated. Just my humble view.

Like your Clash comments though - on the button !!

The Yes Album is monster, really good. Bits of Yessongs and Close to the Edge are pretty good. But really, there isn't a great deal of substance to Yes. It's daft, and often enjoyable for all that. Most of the rest of their stuff is boring, virtually unlistenable twaddle.

For me, the most pretentious, overrated band of all time is REM. God, they're dull and Stipe is almost as big a pretentious, overblown tit  as Bono. U2, the resolutely unpolishable turd that is Dexy's Midnight Runners and The Eagles all run them a close second.

Agree it was ludicrously over-the-top and pretentious. And deeply unwatchable/unlistenable. But I'm rather glad it took place. It adds immensely to the gaiety of all our lives.

I could never like a band whose lead singer is named after a dog biscuit.

Could I also offer Queen as a band not to be allowed entry into my record collection for the above reason?

Jono

I agree with Jamie, Yes were a superb band in their early days & were all excellent musicians. "Yessongs", their live triple LP, still gets lots of play in my place and the recent MoFi CD of "The Yes Album" is excellent.

Who to some are pretentious are very good to others so I can't really criticise any of the bands mentioned so far. U2 were never to my taste (although I quite like "Rattle and Hum") but I always thought they were taking the mickey out of themselves really.

ELP's 'Works Volume 1' has to be the very definition of pretentious. 

Looks like this is turning into another 'I don't like that band, therefore there must be something inherently wrong with the musicians or their music' thread.

It is perfectly acceptable to like music, or other arts that can not be justified by current fashions of acceptability, and it is also perfectly acceptable to dislike music that can be justified in such terms.

Musicians making unsubstantiated political claims is another thing, and that is where U2 and Bono fall foul of many people's tolerance.

As for substance in music, I can give one example of substance in Yes compared with The Clash. I have twice sat on drums for bands who included Clash songs in their set, and it was probably the most boring time I have ever played. Trying to play Bruford's, or even some of Alan White's drumming will only enhance your abilities, and challenge you to play better, it full of substance.

(I will repeat myself.) Listening for substance in Yes' lyrics will offer nothing, they are simply a vocal part of the music, but as far as the music, musicianship, ability to play with rhythm and fuse rock with different influences, they are among the best. It is music of its time, and does sound from the 70's, but no more so than New Order sound of the 80's, or Nirvana of the 90's.

So last month we picked on Pulp, this month Yes, what band will we pick on next month?

(There is something very rewarding about the spell check, when it highlights Bono, and you click 'ignore').

Has some made a dig biscuit called 'Freddy Mercury'? It will never sell.

Dig biscuit? I know he was a funny bugger but........

Jono

EEEK !!! Forgot I had that on the big black stuff. Horrid. Those teenage hormones must have been affecting me when I bought it back in those dim and distant days. Or I drank too much 'Long Life'.

Absolutely. I had the pleasure of seeing Negativeland, who got into loads of trouble with U2's lawyers for doing a parody of I still haven't found what I'm looking for. They performed the song, with a movie running of a guy looking around his house for something, under the bed, in closets... "but I still haven't found what I'm looking for." Different version on YouTube.

That said, I still like to listen to War every once in awhile.

Man you are lucky you got to listen to any music?

People used to spend most of there time on bog after drinking that stuff.

Stu.

Stu,

Unfortunately ImageShack doesn't want to upload tonight but what about the old Watneys Party Seven. Many a can consumed at parties in the '70s, amongst other 'consumables'.

When I started Med School on 1973 Whitbread Trophy was only 10p a pint, subsidised by one of the Whitbread family who was a grateful patient at the Hospital. It really was watery piss really and when I ran the bar for a while I introduced Fullers London Pride which was straight draught form a tapped barrel. Much better.

Ahh.. such memories.

ATB

Steve