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JULY 4, 2003
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Source: The Scotsman
http://www.entertainment.scotsman.com/headlines_specific.cfm\?id=7449
Pomp and circumstance
By Sarah Dempster
‘Brussels sprouts," says Rick Wakeman, "are like prog-rock. You’ll tell a
young kid to eat their sprouts and they’ll tell you they don’t like them.
‘Have you ever eaten one?’ you’ll ask. ‘No ... but I don’t like them’,
they’ll say. I’ve met a few rock journalists that have said they hate Yes;
they think we’re awful. I’ve said, ‘have you seen us? Have you actually
seen us on stage?’ ‘Well, no … but I know I’d hate you’. It’s ridiculous!"
he chuckles, laughing like a large drain. Most of Wakeman’s anecdotes are
like this. They meander, ramble, wander off, get tangled up in tangents and
emerge, blinking excitedly, only to find they can’t remember where on Earth
it was that they started from. They are, in this sense, rather like Yes,
only without the beards. Charming and self-deprecating but with a measure
of earnestness that comes from being a sometime member of, according to
this week’s edition of NME, "the s***test band in the world", Wakeman, with
his denim blouson, shaggy hair, tight jeans and permanently raised
eyebrows, looks a cross between a mobile disco DJ and a surprised sheepdog.
"Prog rock’s always had a bad ride," he says, perched on a sofa in the
lobby of a London hotel the morning after the triumphant opening night of
the UK leg of Yes’s reunion tour. "It even had a bad ride when it was at
the height of its popularity. But the interesting thing is that the band
sells out everywhere. Regardless of the bad press, the people keep coming.
And the audiences are getting younger, too."
Progo-phobia is a predominantly British trait. Venture overseas and you’ll
find entire continents rocking to the sounds of prog. The success of a
recent South American tour with Wakeman’s own band, the English Rock
Ensemble, continues to surprise him. "It was stunning. Seventy per cent of
the audience was under 25. You’d think they were at an Atomic Kitten gig …"
A small man in shorts saunters into the lobby and slaps the keyboard
maestro on the shoulder, making him jump. It’s Alan White, Yes’s balding
drummer and, along with enormous bass player Chris Squire, the only member
of this bickering, stubborn, preposterous and, says Wakeman,
"unmanageable", co-operative never to have broken ranks. "It’s really
something," says White in a transatlantic drawl. "What?" asks Wakeman,
peering up at his bandmate. "I thought I had to pay a parking ticket but
I’ve just found out the hotel paid for it! "
"You’re lucky," says Wakeman, as the drummer, chuckling contentedly,
wanders off again. "Now, where was I?" he asks, frowning. "Oh yes, South
America. It’s unbelievable. Our popularity down there really is strange,
especially considering they are a nation that loves to dance." You can’t
dance to prog-rock, can you? "Well, you can," corrects Wakeman, pouring
himself another cup of coffee, "if you’re epileptic."
Wakeman left Yes for the first time in 1974, when he decided Tales From
Topographic Oceans - the triple concept album based, by singer and lyricist
Jon Anderson, on Shastric Scriptures - was "ridiculous". "I turned my copy
into an ashtray," he once said. "And I don’t even smoke." He still thinks
it was "overblown".
As a response to the blownovery and ridiculosity, the 25-year-old virtuoso
launched himself on a solo career that would, he claimed, redress the
balance, wresting prog from the jaws of pomposity and heralding a return to
the genre’s more melodious, classically-tinged, roots. The result? The
Myths and Legends of King Arthur and The Knights Of The Round Table, a
medieval "song cycle" staged on ice. While armoured extras skidded into
pantomime horses and Wakeman sweated over his organ, critics wrestled with
apposite terms to describe the most gargantuan, money-burning, prog-ophonic
folly since, well, Tales From Topographic Oceans (the general consensus
seemed to be "bloody heck").
"But there’s absolutely nothing wrong with pompous music!" chuckles
Wakeman. "People went to war with pompous music, people get married to
pompous music. Pompous themes are lovely sometimes, so why can’t they be
used? I once said to a journalist; ‘If your vocabulary was 20 times that of
the journalist next to you, wouldn’t you want to use that vocabulary?’
Well, that’s all we were doing as musicians. We just had a bit more
training and a bit more experience in other areas, and we just wanted to
bring those in."
In the 28 years following the release of The Myths and Legends … the
organist’s levels of excess and success have ebbed and flowed like a
dieter’s blood pressure. There have been, in no particular order: another
three Yes reunions, ninetysomething albums, pro-celebrity golf tournaments,
three divorces and as many heart attacks, five children and one pantomime
appearance (Abanazer in a Cornish production of Aladdin), alcoholism,
spangly capes (first adopted as stagewear when a young Wakeman felt
embarrassed by a journalist’s description of him as "an octopus out of
control"), a bout of Legionnaire’s disease, The Return To The Centre of The
Earth, an obsession with UFOs ("I was away with the fairies!"), a car crash
("I thought I was about to die: again") and appearances on everything from
Masterchef and Call My Bluff to Never Mind The Buzzcocks. All of which has
helped solidify Wakeman’s status as the approachable, oft-bearded, face of prog.
For all his bluff blokeishness, it’s heartening to learn that Wakeman still
has the same lustrous, flowing lady-hair that flapped and bounced while its
owner sprung between keyboards during such magnificent, multifaceted Yes
epics as Close To The Edge and Heart of the Sunrise. It’s incredibly
glossy. Which shampoo does the 54-year-old use? "Shampoo? OK … um, well,
when I’m out on the road, I use whatever is in the hotel, to be honest.
When I’m not on the road I use, um, erm, oh God, um … I get it from Harvey
Nicks. I can’t remember. But I’ll tell you what I do use. I put camomile on
my hair. Schultz’ camomile lotion. I can only ever find it in Italy.
Florence. Go on," he says, grabbing a handful of his hair. "Pull that." I
tug the proffered bunch. "It’s tough, isn’t it?" he asks. It’s very soft, I
tell him. "Yes," he says, proudly. "That’s because it’s filthy".
These days, Wakeman claims he "finds it difficult to relax". Always has, in
fact. "I can’t completely unplug. I’m bad at that." He loves golf, though a
life-threatening bout of double pneumonia and pleurisy four years ago has
raised his handicap from nine to 13. Still, thanks to an encounter with a
meditation expert in India, Wakeman can now wake himself up without an
alarm clock, a skill that the he is obviously very proud of. "When I wake
up," he says, eyebrows higher than ever, "I can tell exactly what time it
is within seconds. It’s very bizarre."
And the future? "There’s always something in the pipeline," he chirps,
pouring himself a third - and final - cup of coffee. "There’s a big new
music programme that I’ve been asked to host. It’s a bit under wraps but
it’s a really clever idea. Sooty could host it and it would still be great.
If somebody came up with the right vehicle I’d jump at it. It’d be
music-orientated. It would have to be a Spinal Tap-type thing. But then,
all rock is Spinal Tap. Yes is 100 per cent Spinal Tap. The roadies call us
Dad’s Army. One said this tour was like a mobile old people’s home.
"To cut a long story short," he says, in the manner of a man who has spent
his long, eventful life doing the precise opposite and has the Brussels
sprouts analogies to prove it. "I’m having a ball".
Yes play Edinburgh Playhouse on Sunday
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