All's a Chord 8: 1998

From:   John Peterson

As a bass player I've always been interested in the interaction between guitarists and bass players in the development of music. Could you tell us a bit about your working relationship with Chris Squire over the years and about how the two of you interact in putting YES music together? Any particular situations that stand out, etc. Thanks and keep on with the wonderful playing.

"When I met Chris in 1970 he certainly impressed me and I thought that we were going to do great things together. We did, we often sat together and worked out, we played each others' riffs, he'd play me or I'd play him; we did quite a bit of that on many, many records so really there's too many years to describe we've interacted and how we've harmonized and double traced each other a lot. I couldn't really attempt that at this stage. We have done some great work together and we did better together. A lot of people wanted us to be together because of that musical interaction that we have. It's funny I do get a lot of bass players, it's true isn't it? It's funny because I like to play bass as well.

"But playing with Chris is a different sort of thing. Really when I play bass I guess I'm influenced by Chris as much as he is because I certainly like the climbing and the descending sort of patterns that Chris does and I've recently done all the bass on QUANTUM GUITAR, my new record, and I've most probably grasped a lot of Chris' ideas along the way and incorporate a little of that into my music at all times just because he opened my ears to a more melodic bass approach, more crunchy bass approach, all sorts of approaches that he had that were always just right for the music. I think that's what he got right, that's what we were always trying to do was find the right parts for this music, and Chris went to a lot of length--sometimes slowly but always effectively to get his bass part to be pretty outstanding. And sometimes when we look back at an early track, say something from the 70s, I can be astounded at what Chris is playing, I've forgotten really that he was constantly so busy, always winding and weeding around, looking for more opportunities to play a different note. So I'm glad you enjoy Chris and I enjoy playing with Chris and I hope everybody enjoys us playing together."

From:    Sergio De Acha

My question has to do with your creative process. It seems like over the years you have accumulated riffs that you then put together into a piece of music or into a song. You have borrowed pieces from previously recorded songs and placed them into new compositions.

From my perspective, it seems like an approach to a new composition or new piece of music should be a fresh one. How do you go about your music, Do you leave pieces unfinished for a period of time until you get the right "inspiration"/"riff" to complete it? Or do you literally sit down and don't get up until the piece is done.

"Mostly the first theory, where I write bits of music and gradually fit them together. Every now and again something happens where maybe if I sit in studio and decide that I'm going to record something then in a way I will forge everything to completion during the recording, so sometimes that's how I finish my writing really; by saying, ok, this is just about written, I'll record it and sort of make it finish. But other tunes go round in my head sometimes for ten, fifteen years before I even decide how I want to play them. I don't really mind that because I've got a lot of music going 'round kind of in circles, I suppose, until it settles in some place or another. But you write it in every different way you can imagine, and that's what keep it fresh I think, I think, that there isn't a formula to write music, and therefore every time you do it there's something new and fresh about it because you can't write it the same."

From:    Neil Goodwin

I recently saw this guitar for auction on the internet. Is this 'the' guitar you are photographed with in the 1977 GFTO official tour or is it just a surplus one from your collection. If so why why why are you selling it? This is the one guitar i thought you would have retained in your collection.

"The guitar I for a very short offered for sale [on Guitar Rondo] was not my 1964 ES-175D, but it was a custom 3-pickup model. I've never offered and I'm ever going to offer my guitar for sale. I was offering that Custom for sale for a very short time and then I was quite glad nobody bought it because I've sill got it. But it's not as important to me as my main 175, and that's the reason I did offer for sale because it's not as important to me. Also I sell guitars because I'm not going to play them: I decided that I don't have space enough to play them, I have other instruments I'd rather play. Also I'm a collector, and that means inevitably I buy, sell, and trade. Being a collector you can't just buy continuously and never sell; you might do that at the beginning of your collection but then after you've had a collection for a while you'll buy and sell and trade, and you'll improve your collection sometimes as I have by making it smaller."

[From WebMaster]  What plans do you have for your 175 do you have after your demise? Put it in a museum…?

"I've said various things on that subject at various times and most probably I'll change my mind again. At one time I said I'd like it to be buried with me [laughs], and then another time I've said I'd like it to be at the discretion of my family, what they would like to do with it. They may consider then it might go in some such a place to be shown. And that in a way wouldn't be a bad thing, to retire a guitar in a marvelous museum. So I don't really think about it [laughs]!"

From:   Rick Handel

I've read that Wes Montgomery is one of your favorite guitar players. I'm a big "straight-ahead" jazz fan, and I was wondering if you have ever considered recording jazz "standards" or original pieces in this style. That would be a musical dream come true for me!

[From WebMaster]  At one time you did plan an album of jazz numbers.

"That's right. I've got two of them recorded already, they're both quite big pieces, they're both five minute pieces, and they're called 'West Winds 1' and, at the moment, 'West Winds 2'. And also "Sweet Thunder', which will open my PULLING STRINGS album is a jazzy piece and I may well rerecord that on my future record that I want to do of jazz tunes. A few standards might get in there, having recorded with Martin Taylor on MASTERPIECE GUITARS various standards, and I even had the opportunity to count the tunes that I'd like to hear Martin play, and help him assemble them. I like those tunes. I'd never thought I'd really get around to playing them but I think I enjoy them too much now not to, so I do include a few when I play. I have got something in progress that's a little bit like that."

From:    Martin Epps

"I've read all the stuff about the guitars, and it's all gobbledegook to me. However, I'm interested in your car collection! Do you still have the blue Bristol and the Mercedes G wagon? I saw you in east Finchley one night last year with another Mercedes full of kids, so please Steve, tell me about the cars! Do you have any others? Do you race? Do you ride a motorcycle? If so, what? If not, would you like to? Odd questions I know, but there you are! Best wishes from Southgate, N14.

"A car to me has become a Mercedes Estate car. We've got three of them and that's the only kind of car I'm really interested in now, and we've come to realize that cars are essential and very practical things and need to be the same, very practical and very reliable. So that's what we drive. I had the Bristol for 17 years, I've sold that just as I was making THE SYMPHONIC MUSIC OF YES, I sort of felt the car had seen me through since 1976, through to that time, and I was really quite tired of it by then, and the G wagon I kept for 10 years and then I got another Estate car just for myself. So I switched to Estate car as well although I've been driving the wife's and driving the one in America for a long time and I eventually just got one in England, so that's what I drive.

"I did have a time where I used to fantasize more about cars; I went and drove them and I drove a Mazarrati, Ferraris, I tried Jaguars a few times and gave them up for ghost. I drove quite a few different cars, and then I just found that what I drive now is what I like to drive. It just meant a whole lot of decisions. I went to the Studebaker factory in November factory in South Bend, Indiana, and I go there every time I can and I buy more books on car design, and I've got massive collection of car design books, and American car design books, so I love the Studebakers: the Golden Hawk and the Commander, the earlier Commander was just great. So I did have my own views about cars and enjoyed knowing what virtually every car was, any kind of super car. I got to the end where I found I was driving a lot more and I wanted a different sort of car."

From:    Dan Freed

You have worked a lot with Alan White and Bill Bruford as drummers, but their styles are quite different from each other. I'd like to know from your perspective how things are done differently when playing with each of them.

"It's a bit like describing what's different about people, what's different about them as musicians is pretty much what's different about them as people. It's fascinating working with both of them. Alan and I have a sort of way where we just have to be able to see each other and everything's fine. As long as we can see each other we know that we can look and somehow through that look whatever the message is will transmit, it's either like too fast, too slow, too heavy, too quiet--somehow, one look. Because if I look at Alan and it's pushing really hard I'll look over at him and he'll notice and he'll just know that that I'm saying, no, that's pushing too much. Same thing, if I thought it was too slow and I looked at him then magically he would know by my body language mainly I might droop a bit, this is droopy, or if he and Chris are playing fast and I can't keep up, I'll look at him and I'll kind of go, you're crazy, you guys are nuts! And he gives little signs. Alan and I have had a lot more opportunities to do that on stage.

"Bill and I have worked a short period but also a little bit more in the studio together. Bill is really full of surprises--he showed up to do some work with me on TURBULENCE and I played him this track 'The Inner Battle' and it had a drum machine going through it that I pinned most of the guitar around, and as he was on the album replacing those. What I played obviously I'd gotten used to it being there and it was sort of a boof-kif boof-kif thing that went around and everything, kind of like clung to this and pivoted on it. Bill went out there--we were doing other tracks so I think he was pretty set to go, we had the sound set on everything we'd done on the tracks together on TURBULENCE, then on the 'Inner Battle' he walks out there and somehow just knew what to play; he got there and he played this stuff and I literally couldn't work out what it was he was playing at all, at any one time I didn't know what he was doing but it was great. And I said to him, 'That's incredible, I don't know what you're doing it, let's get it right when you're happy and I'm happy…' So he comes back into the studio to hear it and I said, 'Well it's amazing, I never expected you to play anything like that at all. What the hell are you playing?' [laughs] So he described to me that he'd got this part which is in an incredible time signature he'd worked out, I think it's 13/8 or something, it might be a simpler time signature but what he did was every time the bar went round he changed the first instrument in the pattern to be the next one around, so the second bar would start with the tom tom as opposed to the bass drum, and so on, each bar of this time signature.

"So that's the story, work out for yourself that both are very fascinating people. Dylan and Virgil, my sons both play drums and I've always got on with drummers, I find them really good, well-spirited people, they really care about things and that's important."

From:   Paul Webb

I just saw you in the "Open Your Eyes" tour and really enjoyed your playing. I have long appreciated your use of various guitars to achieve different tonalities. I've seen you take this approach to the concert stage as well to some degree.

I noted your use of a stand to hold up your acoustic guitars. I could really use such an item myself and can no longer locate a manufacturer. Was yours custom made or is it commercially available?

"Just commercially available, you shouldn't really have any trouble getting one of them. Call Guitar Center, they're a pretty national guitar shop now and they would most probably tell you. But I did help to get that idea going; not that it was mine, it actually predates my life; guitars were designed on the 19th century on guitar stands as well, they looked very elegant when you sit down and you have this little pedal stool with a Spanish guitar on it. But it didn't catch on, and then I saw it as a way to play multi-guitars, and had the tree and stand-up guitars, and also the ones that I'm using now, where the sitar guitar comes off the pedal board frame.

"There's a lot of different ways of doing it, they could come out at the ceiling one day. We did design other things that were never seen and were going to include them in the guitar book but didn't. But there are some other devices that didn't work [laughs]. Of course my favorite one is the rail that ran to the right of me with the steel guitar on it, so when I wanted it I pulled the guitar and it and it just came in on a rail, like a train, and then it went back when I didn't want it. And that thing is coming back, that's what I'm hoping to use quite soon. It was a very clever thing. But you need a big stage because if I'm playing in a theatre I wouldn't be able to use a rail, there's not any room for it, not very often anyway."

From:    future perfect

Thanks for the inspiration. What was the relationship like between Yes, King Crimson, Genesis and ELP in the 70's? What about now?

"That's a very difficult question to answer. All I can speak for is how Yes somewhat saw the other bands. Certainly I won't deny at that time we saw them as competition, we were in certainly the same area of music and we had our own styles. But we slightly came on the back of ELP, although that's not mentioned very often, but that's what it did for me, ELP have got some groundwork in, actually with Eddie Offord, and then we came in and not took anything away from them, but we were a new attraction. We played together on a few occasions with ELP and it was usually quite combustuously fiery, there was a feeling-- today, I know, that it might have fueled by the fact that Rick, Keith, one of them, doesn't seem to appreciate the other one fully, and I'm not sure which way round it is. So at that time there was a bit of too much competition if we got together on the same stage so we saw ELP as, like King Crimson, they were there almost before us, we were almost in their jet stream a bit, but we felt very, very confident that we were making our own mark, that we didn't like to be compared to those bands. But there again the motion, the movement of music was a great thing to be part of. I think we were a little bit the same with Genesis, a little bit precious that maybe that whether they could take anything from us, whether we could take anything from them, could we get further. But maybe they were just fleeting moments. I think to be perfectly honest there was a feeling of, like in England, not ignoring other people but just you absorbed how good these bands were and you didn't pamper to that too much, you didn't sit around and listen to it all the time, because in a way you didn't want to be influenced by it, it was a concern that Yes weren't going to sound like these other bands, and be like them.

"So in a way we kept out of their hearing range a little bit by just being away on our own, and I tend to think that's what all those did, Renaissance, the Gentle Giants, and all the other bands, everybody was so industrious that I don't think we held any malice, we just wanted to get to where we were getting, we didn't want anybody to get in the way, but they weren't in direct competition with us in any way at all. And, King Crimson? Well we lost Bill to King Crimson but I don't know what we can say about that, we accepted it, we met them afterwards, and everybody remained great friends. What I was talking about earlier was just a surface awareness of desire for Yes to become successful and things not get in the way, but they didn't. ELP rubbed shoulders with Yes more than anybody else but we weren't really very alike, there wasn't any a big pairing off of any numbers of them particularly, and I suppose Genesis was just a bit further away; of course I later wrote with Steve Hackett, and I met Phil Collins, and Peter Gabriel once or twice. I feel tremendous respect for them and they forged ahead with the same thing we were, we were lucky we had Atlantic, they had a label that was doing they could for them as well. It was pretty much like we were in our camp, and they were in there."

Have you ever played with Robert Fripp?

"No."

From:    Dennis Haklar

When you are on tour or transporting your guitars to another country via airplane, what do you do to prevent pressure changes, humidity or other elements from causing possible damage to your amazing guitars?

"All my guitars have to go by freight quite often and the only thing you can do is start by putting the guitar in the case in the right way: the strings are detuned and there's no tension on the guitar. Hopefully you've got a good case, and then it goes in a flight case with a few other guitars. Their survival is down to one major ingredient. If they're good guitars they're going to be OK when I get them out. If they're trash guitars they're going to be bent out of shape and no good. So I know that those guitars can withstand the sort of treatment that I've given them because I've been doing that since 1970 in particular. Obviously before then I was doing it locally in England and a little in Europe where I was usually in control of my own guitars. Usually the instruments I use with Yes with the exception of the 175 has always been freighted around. Also there were other guitars I use that were never freighted, like the ES5 Switchmaster, and also the Super 400 Gibson that I use. So any of the main guitars usually went with me. In fact on the FRAGILE tour I carried two myself, the 175 and the Switchmaster, around America by plane and fought to get them on every day, so you can imagine how hard that was [laughs], two big guitars."