Tales from Topographic Oceans, Yes (Super Deluxe Edition: 12 CDS + 2 LP + blu-ray box set)
You just couldn’t resist it, could you?
Umm, no. What?
Another reissue… The same old crap repacked for susceptible drongos like you.
It’s not the same old crap, it’s got new remixes, new versions, new recordings of works-in-progress and – finally – some live recordings of Yes’ greatest, well one of their greatest, albums.
Waddya mean ‘finally some live recordings’? I’ve seen your bloody CD shelf, loads of bootleg downloads. Surely you’ve got them already?
Well, yes, no. I mean, the ones I’ve got are actually better… and complete, but they weren’t in Steve Howe’s tapes library so they’re not in the box. It’s nice to have some official cleaned-up versions.
So nice you have to buy a 12 CD box?
Well, I like having the official stuff.
Even if that bloke Steve Wilson gets to mess it all up with his remixes?
Well, I shan’t be playing those much. Or the instrumental versions he has done. Or the single versions.
Single versions? I thought the whole idea was to bore you into a mystical state through duration and repetition? Peak hippyshit.
Well, I wouldn’t put it quite like that.
What would you put it like then?
Look, I explained this to you last time, Tales from Topographic Oceans is a double album based on a footnote in Paramahansa Yogananda’s Autobiography of a Yogi. Jon Anderson, the singer, and Steve Howe, the guitarist, composed the initial suites of music at night on tour, and then the band all worked on it together.
But we all know it’s boring as fuck. I mean Rick Wakeman dissed it from the word go, and it’s renowned as overlong and overambitious.
But it’s that ambition that makes it stand out, makes it unique. I mean, who else was releasing spiritual stuff like that?
Well thankfully, nobody else. One band is enough.
You’re just ignorant. A bit of spiritual insight, too much wonder or magic and you run away scared.
At least I don’t end up buying massive box sets full of stuff I already have.
And remixes and live tracks.
That you won’t ever listen to again.
Maybe. Maybe not. And there’s talk of them doing Relayer next in the box set series.
Woohoo. For goodness sake Johnny, reign it in. You spend more on box sets and reissues than beer.
That’s a good thing isn’t it?
Not in my books. Pub?
Oh, ok then. Can you carry this though, this box set is bloody heavy.
Ok, but it’s your round.
Again?
Think of it as an outpouring of spiritual love.
Johnny ‘soft summer mover’ Brainstorm
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