Yes Hits The Half-Century Mark

Glenn Gottlieb – Yes
(l-r) Geoff Downes, Steve Howe, Alan White, Jon Davison, Billy Sherwood.

Yes will take its legacy for a road trip as the pioneer progressive rock band releases plans to celebrate 50 years of making music.

It’s been half a century since Jon Anderson and bassist Chris Squire formed Yes. To say the band has experienced lineup changes through the years would be somewhat of an understatement. Frontman Anderson and the group went their separate ways in 2008 and Squire passed away in June 2015 from acute erythroid leukemia, leaving guitarist Steve Howe as the most senior bandmember.

Today’s Yes – Howe, drummer Alan White, keyboardist Geoff Downes, vocalist Jon Davison and bassist Billy Sherwood – will embark on a 30-plus date adventure dubbed “#YES50: Celebrating 50 Years of Yes.”

“Much has changed since I joined Yes in 1970, but the core elements of the band have remained consistent” Howe said in a statement.  “We want to mark this anniversary with a tour that encompasses some of our best-loved work and revisit a few classic pieces that have been lost for a while.  We look forward to sharing the 50th anniversary with the fanbase, playing classic songs that celebrate the broad musical style of Yes.”

The tour opens in early June with two nights at the Arcada Theatre in St. Charles, Ill.  Denver, Detroit, Atlantic City, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles and Boise are among the destinations before the North America tour wraps with two nights at The Fillmore in Philadelphia.

Yes was active in 2017 and spent part of the year touring with Todd Rundgren and Carl Palmer’s ELP Legacy.  Data submitted to Pollstar showed the package selling 1,401 out of 1,928 tickets at the Hershey Theatre in Hershey, Pa., for an evening’s gross reaching $88,535.

General onsales for select dates begin March 30.  Keep checking Pollstar’s Yes page for updates.