90125 (album)
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90125 | ||
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LP & CD by Yes | ||
Released | November 7 1983 | |
Recorded | 1983 (?) | |
Genre | Rock | |
Length | 44 min 35 s | |
Record label | Atlantic Records | |
Producers | Trevor Horn, Yes and Garry Mouat | |
Professional reviews | ||
RollingStone review | 3/5 | link (http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/cd/review.asp?aid=19531) |
ARTISTdirect review | 4½/5 | link (http://www.artistdirect.com/store/artist/album/0,,189220,00.html) |
Yes Chronology | ||
Classic Yes (1981) | 90125 (1983) | 9012Live: The Solos (1985) |
90125 is a rock album by Yes released in 1983 (see 1983 in music). The title refers to the album's number in the Atlantic Records catalog (and appears as the central group of digits in the album's UPC).
90125 was the second album from the crossbred Yes & The Buggles, and was much influenced by Trevor Horn's production work. Arguably the video treatment of 90125 also owed much to Horn's media savvy; in all the album represents a radical shift for the band from prog-rock to a more accessible sound, more akin to Saga or Kansas, who combined pop styles with progressive rock.
Trevor Rabin composed many parts of the album as a solo project, before meeting with bassist Chris Squire in 1982. If Trevor Horn's production impacted the band's sound, Trevor Rabin's songs were indicative of an emotional appeal missing from some of Yes' earlier albums, which relied more upon cerebral abstract concepts.
The first track, "Owner of a Lonely Heart", became Yes' only #1 hit in the US. It seems to advise caution about love, with a refrain that says a lonely heart is "much better than...a broken heart". After it was featured in the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, a remix by Max Graham reached #9 in the UK in 2005. "Changes" is notable for its introductory and closing sections with syncopated beat. "Cinema" is an instrumental with fluid guitar and keyboard melodies, which segues into "Leave It," arguably the album's most creative track, with heavy use of the human voice as instrumentation. (The song's video, with its suit-and-tied, vertically inverted, and digitally manipulated band members, was equally creative.) The last track, "Hearts", is an apparent counterpoint to the first, concluding "two hearts are better than one."
"Cinema" won the 1984 Grammy for the best rock instrumental.
Track listing
- "Owner of a Lonely Heart" - 4:29
- "Hold On" - 5:17
- "It Can Happen" - 5:28
- "Changes" - 6:19
- "Cinema" - 2:06
- "Leave It" - 4:12
- "Our Song" - 4:18
- "City of Love" - 4:51
- "Hearts" - 7:35pl:90125