After a highly successful 2023 tour with THE BAND GEEKS, Jon Anderson decided to expand the creative partnership with the band to create new material for a potential new studio album. The result of this effort is “True”, which will be released on August 23 by Jon‘s new label, Frontiers Music Srl.
The first single from “True”, a song called “Shine On”, can be streamed below. The accompanying official music video will make its online debut later today.
“True” is a nine-song album which will be a welcome gift to all fans of Jon‘s 40 years as lead vocalist of the multi-platinum Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame inductee YES. The LP’s collection of songs harkens back to YES‘s classic 1970s sounds as well as to their latter-day success with the album “90125”.
The album was co-produced, engineered and mixed by THE BAND GEEKS bassist and musical director Richie Castellano.
“True” track listing:
01. True Messenger
02. Shine On
03. Counties And Countries
04. Build Me An Ocean
05. Still A Friend
06. Make It Right
07. Realization Part Two
08. Once Upon A Dream
09. Thank God
Jon and THE BAND GEEKS embarked on their 2024 U.S. tour on May 30 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. The tour will encompass three legs and will run through September. Additional September dates will be announced in the upcoming weeks.
In a recent issue of Mojo magazine, Anderson said that he was open to reuniting with his former YES bandmates Rick Wakeman and Steve Howe.
“I was talking to THE BAND GEEKS and said, hopefully we can play in London and Steve will get up and do a couple of songs with us, maybe Rick too,” Anderson said. “It just means talking. When I’m out there singing on my own, I still think I’m part of YES. They still feel like my songs.”
Anderson co-founded YES in 1968 with bassist Chris Squire, and remained with the band until 2008, when YES replaced him with Benoit David, an Anderson sound-alike who previously fronted the YES tribute band CLOSE TO THE EDGE. David left YES in 2012 and was replaced by Jon Davison.
In July 2020, Howe told Rolling Stone that there is virtually no chance of the surviving members of YES reuniting for a tour.
“I don’t think [the fans] should stay up late nights worrying about that,” he said. “There’s just too much space out there between people. To be in a band together or even to do another tour like ‘Union’ is completely unthinkable,” referencing the group’s 1990 “Union” LP and tour, which brought together the previous YES album’s lineup (Jon Anderson, Chris Squire, Trevor Rabin, Alan White, Tony Kaye) and the then-ex-YES members’ group ANDERSON BRUFORD WAKEMAN HOWE (Jon Anderson, Bill Bruford, Rick Wakeman and Steve Howe). “It was difficult when we went through that, particularly because of the personalities,” Howe said. “I’m not saying any one person is to blame, but when you get a big hodgepodge like that together, it’s pretty much a nightmare. We made a nightmare of possibly a good thing back in 1990. I don’t think there is the stamina or the appetite for that kind of thing again.”
Anderson, Wakeman and Rabin had started touring as ARW: ANDERSON, RABIN AND WAKEMAN in 2016 and then adopted the YES FEATURING JON ANDERSON, TREVOR RABIN, RICK WAKEMAN moniker shortly after the group’s 2017 Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame induction.
Howe last toured with Anderson and Wakeman in 2004.
YES has released over 20 albums across its career, including its self-titled debut in 1969 and “Tales From Topographic Oceans” in 1973.