{"id":2721,"date":"2010-05-01T08:08:37","date_gmt":"2010-05-01T12:08:37","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2010-10-10T19:01:22","modified_gmt":"2010-10-10T23:01:22","slug":"things-trevor-horn-did-during-long-solos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/things-trevor-horn-did-during-long-solos\/","title":{"rendered":"Things Trevor Horn Did During Long Solos"},"content":{"rendered":"<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/3QwU4vgi2ao?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><p>In our recent thread examining <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/things-singers-do-during-long-solos\" target=\"_blank\">things singers do during long solos and other instrumental breaks<\/a>, we discussed the move known as <strong>The Anderson<\/strong>, named after Yes singer <strong>Jon Anderson<\/strong>&#8216;s surprisingly effective, drama-free approach to commanding the stage during long stretches when he could have had nothing better to do than iron out the wrinkles in his dashiki. Someone wondered if the reference to the move&#8217;s lack of &#8220;drama&#8221; was a commentary on the brief period when the <em>Drama<\/em>-era Yes was led by <strong>Trevor Horn<\/strong>, then of The Buggles&#8217; fame and soon to be better known as a producer of slick, fairly interesting &#8217;80s (and beyond) pop. Although the reference to the Horn era was unintentional, this observation necessitated a full-blown examination of the contrasting instrumental break styles of Anderson and Horn.<br \/>\n<!--more--><br \/>\nIt takes almost a minute into the opening clip before the camera cuts to Horn, who by that point in the song is ready to sing. He stands is ground calmly, much like Anderson, but he&#8217;s more apt to grab the shaft of the mic stand. For comparison, check out Anderson at the <strong>1:45 mark<\/strong> of the following video, where he&#8217;s grabbing the mic itself, a mic mounted on a boom stand, I might add. Then, as the the instrumental break in &#8220;Long Distance Runaround&#8221; takes off Anderson is seen clapping along in 23\/9 time. Consistent with the principles of The Anderson, it&#8217;s as if to say, &#8220;I&#8217;m not just a dumb singer; I understand the intricacies of this music as much as Wakeman or Howe!&#8221;<br \/>\nAuu-693vQBs]<\/p>\n<p>Getting back to the Horn-era clip, you&#8217;ll notice a reliance on dramatic hand gestures. For a guy who didn&#8217;t have a fraction of the live experience of Jon Anderson, Trevor Horn is a pretty accomplished, if conventional, frontman. It&#8217;s when Chris Squire&#8217;s bass solo kicks in, at the <strong>3:17 mark<\/strong>, that I first miss the leadership of Jon Anderson. Horn tries to soulfully clutch onto the mic stand, in a move reminiscent of that Blood, Sweat &amp; Tears-replacement singer&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/things-singers-do-during-long-solos\" target=\"_blank\">Blinded by da Blooz<\/a> move. Then&#8230;he&#8217;s got nothing else.<\/p>\n<p>Word is, when this song was composed Squire and Howe intended to trade licks for a good 3 minutes. Because of Horn&#8217;s inability to hold center stage during the long instrumental break, the break had to be cut to a scant 30 seconds. (By the way, can we take a moment to appreciated Howe&#8217;s use of 3 guitars on this short song?)<\/p>\n<p>Beside the video for &#8220;Tempus Fugit,&#8221; likely filmed on the same day, I could not find further video evidence of Horn performing with Yes. I was hoping to compare a Horn performance of an Anderson-era classic. Too bad. My research did lead me to contemplate many things I had no business contemplating, such as why Anderson split from the band, how the band so quickly adopted worse fashions than what they wore in the &#8217;70s, whether Squire&#8217;s switch from the Rickenbacker bass to the hideous thing he plays in this clip was a requirement to match his new outfit, and so forth. I think I&#8217;m going to have to read up on this weird period in Yes&#8217; history and reflect on the destructive forces of the 1980s. Feel free to spare me the journey to some Yes fanboy websites and fill me in on some of these details in the comfort of our hallowed halls. Thanks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In our recent thread examining things singers do during long solos and other instrumental breaks, we discussed the move known as The Anderson, named after Yes singer Jon Anderson&#8216;s surprisingly effective, drama-free approach to commanding the stage during long stretches when he could have had nothing better to do than iron out the wrinkles in <a href='https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/things-trevor-horn-did-during-long-solos\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[96,24,23],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2721"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2721\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}