Review of House Of Yes: Live At The House Of Blues

Introduction

Young people nowadays might only know of Yes as the band responsible for the soundtrack for the popular computer sci-fi game Homeworld, but the group was founded in 1968 and was one of the most successful progressive rock bands in the 1970s. Like many other "supergroups", they kept on going through the 80s and 90s encountering declining success, but have enjoyed a mini-revival recently.

The successful Yes line up of the early seventies when they enjoyed the most critical acclaim for their work saw the band`s line up include Jon Anderson on vocals, Rick Wakeman on keyboards, Chris Squire on bass, Steve Howe on guitar and Bill Bruford on drums - although personnel changed frequently through the years!

This DVD features Anderson, Squire and Howe along with Billy Sherwood, Alan White (who replaced Bruford in the band) and Igor Khoroshev. The concert contains 15 tracks spanning the bands career and was filmed in 1999 at Las Vegas` House of Blues during the group`s Ladder tour.

Video

Although the disc is promoted as being in full-frame, the concert is actually presented in 1.85:1 non-anamorphic widescreen, so a quick press of the zoom button filled my widescreen television screen nicely, albeit with a slight loss of definition.

The picture quality is pretty good as you would expect from a recording made only two years ago - the image is crisp and detailed, with no grain or dirt evident. Visually, it`s not especially exciting, being the usual mix of footage of the band playing/singing plus shots of the crowd.

Audio

The soundtrack is presented in a choice of either Dolby Digital 5.1 or Dolby Digital 2.0. I prefer Dolby Digital 5.1 for live performances, and Dolby Digital 2.0 for music videos, so I watched the concert with the multichannel sound selected.

The first thing to say about the sound is that the level of the menu music is FAR too high. I popped the disc in, sat down and nearly shat myself when the menu music kicked in. Annoyingly, the main feature has its level set to normal, so when you watch the concert and return to the menu, prepare for eardrum perforation!

The sound itself is of high quality, with the music and vocals reproduced well, although I felt that the clarity of the mix emphasised Anderson`s falsetto voice perhaps a little too much - the studio albums that I`ve heard don`t have quite such power on the vocal track and I felt that on certain songs the vocal performance overshadowed the music too much.

Musically, as ever the group are superb and the disc demonstrates the ability of the musicians.

Features

All too often music discs arrive devoid of extras, so it is always nice to see something in the way of additional materials. In this case we have a tour book (slide show), Dolby Digital 5.1 remix of the Homeworld video (footage of the very nice looking game) which runs for about nine minutes and a 12 minute "making-of" the 1999 album "The Ladder" which is quite interesting and features interviews and footage of the band.

All this is wrapped up in nice Yes style menus, which are easy to navigate (although too loud!).

Conclusion

Overall, this is a well-presented disc, which contains some good songs from the Yes catalogue. Anderson is accompanied by some of the original line-up (although not Wakeman) and the new members perform well. I prefer the slightly toned down Anderson vocals of the studio mixes found on the albums, although I this is a matter of personal preference and I know Yes fans who prefer the live sound.

The sound and video are both good, with twenty minutes worth of extras - and the fifteen tracks run for over 100 minutes, so you get quite a lot of entertainment for your money.