*pic by Mike Newman

He’ll be on the East Coast from now till the end of May, so check out jonanderson.com for all the tour dates.

Here in NYC, at B.B. King’s, on Saturday, April 30th!

Check the interview out on East Village Radio, Thursday noon-2pm (ET)

UPDATE: DIG INTO THE ARCHIVED INTERVIEW HERE…

I’ve got a helluva show for you on Thursday, featuring Matt Whyte from the super-rockin’ Earl Greyhound band.  Their sophomore album, Suspicious Package, which is also a great porn title, will be released on Hawk Race Records next Tuesday, April 13th.  And if you’ve been listening to my show lately, you already know it totally rocks!

They just finished a short-tour with Coheed and Cambria and now their tour with OK GO starts next week.

Here are the tour dates.

Get Suspicious Package.

…and maybe I’ll giveaway a copy too if you listen to Beyond Beyond is Beyond at noon eastern on East Village Radio on Thursday, April 8th, 2010! ; )

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photo by Mike Newman

AND IN OTHER GOOD NEWS… I have a couple pairs of tickets to give away to Jon Anderson’s show at B.B. King’s in NYC this Sunday!

Email your favorite Jon Anderson lyric to beyondbeyondisbeyond at gmail dot com or Tweet it to @BBiB, for your chance to win.

Good luck, ‘cuz as you know, ‘God, you know he wears a blue t-shirt too with God inscribed, in heaven, on both sides.’

Tune in to Beyond Beyond is Beyond on East Village Radio at noon eastern on Thursday, April 8th!  We’ll rock together.

As seminal progressive rock band Yes gets ready to head out on the North American road for a tour that will last exactly one month, we get the chance to talk to Yes bassist, Chris Squire, on Thursday on Beyond Beyond is Beyond.  So tune in to East Village Radio on January 14th at noon and hear me cower before another one of my idols.  Okay not really, but yeah, kinda.

Stuff I wanna talk to him about: current lineup, studio plans, Jon Anderson, Fish Out of Water, XYZ project with Jimmy Page in the early-80s, Benoit David, Oliver Wakeman and what modern music Chris listens to.  So let’s see if I have time, or just the memory, to ask him about all these things.

YES FEBRUARY CONCERT DATES

• February 2            Poughkeepsie, New York,           Civic Center
• February 4            Concord, New Hampshire          Capitol Center for the Arts
• February 5            Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania                   Penn’s Peak
• February 6            Washington, DC                        Warner Theater
• February 9            Boston, MA                               House of Blues
• February 10           Montclair, NJ                            Wellmont Theater
• February 12           Atlantic City, NJ                       Tropicana Casino
• February 13-14      New York, NY                            Town Hall
• February 17           Cleveland, OH                           House of Blues
• February 18-19      Chicago, IL                               House of Blues
• February 20           Detroit, MI                                Motor City Casino
• February 23           Dallas, TX                                House of Blues
• February 24           Houston, TX                              House of Blues
• February 25           New Orleans, LA                       House of Blues
• February 27           Orlando, FL                              Sea World Orlando
• February 28           Boca Raton, FL                         Sunset Cove Amphitheatre

Get Tickets for shows

Tune into East Village Radio

UPDATE : Dig the archive of this show.

Tune in to East Village Radio at noon Thursday, Christmas Eve, to get your Xmas Eve started with some nice holiday jams…I’ll be slaving away for you over a hot microphone, like a good Jew!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GYW9Y3pRBs]

This one’s more palatable…

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBbV57sJFHY]

Recorded during Yes’ 35^th Anniversary tour in 2003, Yes – The New Director’s Cut, features two full length concert performances from the classic line-up of Yes (Anderson, Wakeman, Howe, Squire, White) from the N.I.A. Birmingham and Glastonbury Festival. This DVD edition sets out to appease fans who were a little less than pleased with the editing, narration, and interview clips (during songs) of the original tour document, Yesspeak. And it succeeds greatly. There is a great venue vibe contrast from show to show, as the first DVD is indoors and the second is outdoors, at the Glastonbury. And although the set lists are very similar, fans will love the two equally amazing takes of the 15-minute plus masterpiece epic, “Awaken”, from 1977’s Going For The One album…the highlight for this Yes fan.

Evident from these performances, these guys are some of the best players in the business and are all still on top of their game. It seems like Yes really shines its brightest (and the fans the most satisfied) when playing the deeper cuts like “Don’t Kill The Whale”, “South Side of the Sky”, “To Be Over” and the aforementioned “Awaken”. They are most certainly the highlights of Yes – The New Director’s Cut. The only times the shows sag a bit are during the Yes super-hits which the band sometimes seem to sleepwalk through. Maybe we’ll get to see a ‘Yes – Deep Cuts’ tour where Yes abandons the usual must-play hits and provides the fans with more of the magical surprise songs when Anderson returns for their 41^st year (you reading this, Yes?). But until then, dig into the excellent 4 hours-plus footage of Yes – The New Director’s Cut and send out your good vibes to Jon Anderson’s health.

“Not Yes”

September 18, 2008

Disappointed, and very Disrespected

Disappointed that, with the exception of one phone call from Alan, none of the guys have been in touch since my illness, just to find out how I am doing, and how we will foresee the future for YES. And disappointed that they were not willing to wait till 2009 when I’m fully recovered.

And I feel very disrespected, having spent most of this year creating songs and constant ideas for the band, spending time with Roger Dean creating a stage design, also working with VH1 and Sirius and XM Radio to help promote the welfare of YES.

Getting sick was not “on my radar”, and I thank my own angel Janeee and my family for helping me through this difficult time, and the many well wishers, friends and fans alike, for understanding that ”things happen”.

Of course I wish the guys all the best in their ‘solo’ work, but I just wish this could have been done in a more gentlemanly fashion. After all YES is a precious musical band.

This is not YES on tour…

I send best wishes to one and all,

Jon Anderson
September 2008

So I’m with Jon on this one and I won’t be supporting the ‘Not Yes’ band that will be touring for the actual Yes’ 40th Anniversary.  But I will see Jon when he tours solo when he makes his full recovery in 2009.  Sorry Benoit…I hope you have a blast and make some nice ducats, but unfortunately your rise to fame isn’t coming up completely roses.

Best wishes, Jon… see you in 2009!

Jon Anderson out of Yes, replaced by tribute-band singer

Veteran proggers rockers Yes have gone the Journey and Judas Priest route and selected a tribute-band singer as their new frontman.

Yes’s iconic singer Jon Anderson is suffering from reactive airway disease, a condition akin to asthma, and is unable to tour or record at present.

The new guy in Yes is Benoit David from Canadian Yes tribute band Close To The Edge.

Benoit is also the singer in Mystery – check out their track on the prog CD we gave away free with Classic Rock issue No.122.

Bassist Chris Squire, guitarist Steve Howe and drummer Alan White are arranging a new line-up of Yes with Oliver Wakeman (keyboards) and Benoit on vocals.

The band plan to tour North America towards the end of this year, with a break in early 2009 given Howe’s prior commitments to Asia, and then further Yes touring in other countries.

Here is Benoit David singing with Close To The Edge on YouTube.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3BFuxBayxg&hl=en&fs=1]
 

Did you watch the video of the new singer?  He sounds just like Jon (in a weird stalker clone kind of way), doesn’t really have ‘the look’ (whatever that is), and is certainly not Jon Anderson (no one else like him).  Jon is too big a part of Yes to try to replace him at this point.  They tried it in 1980, and it didn’t work…although that Drama album was not half bad.

I’ve got to agree with one of the blog commenters here, either wait for Jon’s full recovery or hang it up and work on other projects.  I’m very biased.  Jon literally IS the heart and sould of that band!  Right?!

I wish the best to Jon!  Get well soon.

Let’s start with the bad.  YES has cancelled their 40th Anniversary tour slated for this summer due to Jon Anderson’s respiratory issues which he was hospitalized for last month.  Read the press release here.  It’s good to hear that it’s preventative more than anything.  Have a respiratory-realxing summer, Jon.  We love ya!  Dig this for now…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jn_aus63GE&hl=en]
And for the good news, Phish songwriter Tom Marshall was adding a lot more speculation to the recent Phish reunion possiblity rumours. Read Tom’s interview here.  So till then, dig this…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIHNR7qGiHw&hl=en]

Listen to this creepy sounding audio recording from 1860 that was just unearthed, just to prove that Thomas Edison wasn’t that great after all.  (You’ll find the audio in the left side middle of the article).  Pretty damn cool and even more lo-fi than your boy, Ariel Pink.

Required Classic Rock listening, in book form.  We just got a copy sent to work and I’ve been diggin’ in, as of today!  Of course it’s not totally complete (or it would be endless), but it’s always fun to read about hundreds of classic albums, when you’re me.

Hidden Track‘s got a nice review of one of my favorite newer bands, who I’ll be seeing Wednesday night at Mercury Lounge.

Oh yeah, I interviewed Jon Anderson from Yes last week.  Here’s the first few seconds of the 20-minute conversation with my female-pharynxed friend.  And yes, I was pretty damn nervous…I’ve only been listening to Yes records pretty regularly for over 25 years!

Josh found a killer new music blog.

This looks like the perfect time for a Guns N’ Roses reunion!

R.E.M. 

Take the new Rolling Stone music quiz…and see if you notice a mistake.  And leave your score below…