Interview with Steve Hackett from 2017

When Life Is a Journey, the studio album released by Djabe and Steve Hackett came out recently, it made my best of the year list. So, I was anxious to hear this live set.

This is the quintessential coffee table book. That’s particularly true for those who love guitars.

This book is such a classy product. In fact, it's so impressive in terms of the presentation that I felt compelled to do one of our YouTube bonus feature videos about it.

If ever there was a perfect dream team then it would have to be the bassist with one of the legendary bands joining forces with the guitarist from another of the bands in the prog pantheon, namely Yes and Genesis.

The whole “do an album of covers” concept is a popular approach these days.

Lately I’ve been breaking our old rule at Music Street Journal.

I previously reviewed an album with these two artists. On that one Hackett got the first billing.

This single from Anderson, Bruford Wakeman and Howe is out of print, of course, but these days, it’s not that hard (or sometimes expensive) to get your hands on something like this.

This is an unusual album for Asia.

Kompendium is a huge musical project masterminded by Rob Reed, main-man of the very classy British prog band Magenta.

This is an excellent book in many ways. First, it’s a quick read – partly because it’s not all that long and partly because it’s written in such a way that it flows really well.

With a career spanning some 40 years, Steve Hackett has continued to blaze a trail across the prog firmament of which most other musicians can only dream.

This single from Anderson, Bruford Wakeman and Howe is out of print, of course, but these days, it’s not that hard (or sometimes expensive) to get your hands on something like this.

This is an enjoyable read that saunters through the chronology and culture of progressive rock.

Yes seldom do anything in a small way when it can be done in an epic manner. 

Our old rule at Music Street Journal was, if it’s out of print, we don’t review it.

Only the second album in the history of Yes to be recorded without Jon Anderson, this one, particularly since it’s the only other Yes disc with Geoff Downes on keyboards, is obviously compared to Drama.

Foxtrot might not get the attention that is afforded to Genesis works like The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, but it is really an incredible piece of work that should be in the collection of any Genesis fan or progressive rock fan in general.

Where do I begin on this review? I guess I should start by saying that I’m a Yes fanatic and I have been since I was twelve years old – and for those keeping track, that’s a long time ago.

This collection is a lot of literally “homebrewed” pieces by Steve Howe.

This box set is a class act. The whole thing comes in something that resembles a book. 

While any Yes album is better than the music of a lot of other bands, this is probably the group’s weakest live album.

I’ve always been a big fan of the Doors.

This new live album from Yes is quite good.

Yes recently did a couple of tours where they performed some of their studio albums in their entirety. This live recording comes from one of those shows.

I saw Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman and Howe on this tour and it was purely magical.

There was something ominous about the date of this concert -11.11.11 so it was very much a case of going for the one on the night.

There seem to be some Yes fans deriding the recent incarnations of Yes.

This is my first time seeing Yes with the Benoit David and Oliver Wakeman line-up.

This double CD set is a nice live show from the Aqua tour in Japan.  

Asia has been around for quite some time, and I think they are one of the few bands that has more live releases than studio albums.  

 I knew it would be hard to see Yes without Chris Squire! As "Onward" played, with a white Rickenbacker on stage with a spotlight, I felt myself tearing up.

What can be said about Steve Hackett that hasn't already been said?

This is a massive set. It’s also quite an interesting one.

This is Steve Howe’s first fully acoustic studio album.

This disc is one of my favorites from Genesis.

This is a reissue of the Yes album Open Your Eyes on 180 gram vinyl.

This is the two CD edition of Steve Hackett’s Out of the Tunnel’s Mouth.

Given the scope of musicians on this set, I'm shocked I've never heard of these guys before. This is a reissue of an album released in 1987.

The latest solo release from John Wetton finds him with a lot of great guest appearances. 

What an interesting ride I’ve had leading into this album.

This is just getting released on BluRay and with an extra concert.

This DVD is one of the best from Yes.

I really enjoyed the Steve Howe’s Remedy album.

First off, this is arguably a jazz rather than progressive rock release

I guess how you feel about this documentary will have a lot to do with which period of Genesis’ career you like the best.

Since we’ve already reviewed the DVD version of this set, this review will focus on the difference between this new BluRay release and that original one.

Here is another compilation of Yes music. It is the first two CDs from The Ultimate Yes, repackaged.

This is a pretty intriguing set.

For hardcore Yes fans, this is a real treasure.

This year Genesis released a career spanning box set. I don’t have that one yet, but I figured that this would be a good time to take a look at this one that came out several years ago.

This 35th Anniversary collection of Yes shares a lot of material with other compilations of theirs.

The third album from Yes, The Yes Album was a transitional disc. 

I like this set a lot. It’s classy. First we get the two CD set.

This brand new live album from Yes is cool stuff. For one thing, it's great to get live recordings of all the Drama songs. There are also two epics from Tales from Topographic Oceans and the "Leaves of Green" part from "The Ancient" on that album. They round the section out with a few other Yes classics. The live sound is great.

I've seen Yes close to twenty times (more times than I've seen any other band), and I can tell you that despite the technicality of their music and instrumental prowess, no two Yes shows are the same. That's true even when you see them on multiple nights in a row. Each performance is a little different because the music tends to take on a life of its own in live gigs. So, don't expect to hear the studio versions exactly covered here. For one thing, the line-up is different. For another thing, I don't think I've ever heard a live Yes song sound exactly like the studio version. I mean, why would you want that? You can listen to the studio version any time. I think these renditions are very faithful, and bring a new life to the songs at times. I highly recommend this, especially for those (like myself) who really love Drama.

An album that is rather maligned in fan circles, Tormato is a bit pop oriented, but really has some wonderous moments.

The latest set from Franck Carducci should please progressive rock fans.

Although this album is strictly instrumental, it’s one of the most “Yes-like” of Steve Howe’s solo catalog.

So, this solo album from Peter Banks was released on CD in 2009.

I remember seeing Yes on the Union tour. It was an amazing show.

I’m sure some would make the argument that we don’t need another Yes compilation album.

While I generally don't include live albums in my "best of the year" lists, I might make an exception for this. It's just such a powerful live set.

Asia return with their classic line-up for an out of this world album.

This is a new reissue of the original Yes concert film. While the main film remains unchanged from older editions, there is quite a bit of added material here.

This new various artists collection, as you would imagine, pays tribute to the music of Yes. It's an intriguing set.