by GearSmith » Thu Aug 11, 2005 4:29 pm
I bought it last night and watched a few tracks. So far, I am underwhelmed. To be fair, I plan to spend more time with this over the weekend, but I am comparing this Tsongas show to the show in San Diego from the same tour and the comparison is not favorable for Tsongas.
"Rhythm of Love" is not one of my favorite Yes songs, but I was really impressed with this one in San Diego. Steve just freakin' wailed on the solo. The Tsongas version was simply not good. I feel the same about South Side. The band seemed out of sync in places and Steve was way too low in the mix in important places.
I know I am new to this board, posting-wise: I've lurked over the years. But I am not new to Yes. I am extremely supportive of the group and my comments above are not meant to imply dissatisfaction with the boys. I am just disappointed because I know how good they really are and I feel that for one reason or another, their true greatness has never been caught live.
Videos from their prime are crippled by the lack of good fidelity and the most recent offerings have other problems. Slow tempo (e.g. CTTE never seems to capture the true frenetic nature of the opening on the studio version), mixing issues (for one reason or another, most live versions skew the mix so that one person or another is left out), etc. I dunno, maybe their music is too nuanced to capture correctly in live settings.
Sorry to be negative, it is just frustrating that my favorite group seems to have this problem with their live recorded legacy. I think they are better live than in the studio, typically. IMO, it has just never been captured correctly.