The Rock And Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony took place this past Friday night, April 7, 2017 at the Barclay’s Center in New York, and Yes was inducted this year along with . Geddy Lee from Rush introduced the band and even stuck around after their speech to jam with the band on “Roundabout”.
I’ll be honest here in that I definitely thought Rush and Yes were the same band when I was a teenager and my only exposure to that music was the classic rock radio stations in the Chicago suburbs. The synths and the high falsetto level vocals seemed pretty damn aligned and I remember thinking it was funny when I was learned it was in fact two unique bands. I ended up much deeper on the Rush train and never really spent too much time with the Yes catalog, so maybe I need to give them a deeper chance.
After the “Roundabout” performance the band also delivered a HoF level performance of “Owner of a Lonely Heart”…
Rolling Stone was there and brought back some thoughts.
Yes’ rendition at the Barclays Center did not disappoint: Alan White’s drums landed with the rude force of a thunderclap, and Trevor Rabin’s riffs curled and snapped. Anderson pushed his voice into its most urgent register, leading the band through the single’s undeniable call-and-response chorus. By the end of the performance, several band members were playing their instruments in the middle of the crowd on the floor of the Barclays’ Center, including Rick Wakemen, who came out from behind his embankment of keyboards and picked up a keytar.
