Yes, Frampton coming to Santa Rosa

During its heyday in the 1970s, the progressive band Yes reinvented rock music with its lush arrangements, classical and jazz influences, cryptic lyrics and outlandishly artistic stage sets.

Songs became expansive; some lasted an entire album side and could be even longer live. The music Yes created was — and is — blissfully serene, heart opening, spiritually uplifting.

Which is why it's been hard to imagine the depth of enmity and distrust some Yes musicians have had for one another over the years. Those hard feelings have led to countless personnel changes, with band members such as keyboardist Rick Wakeman leaving and returning through the revolving door that is Yes.

The current lineup, coming to the Wells Fargo Center with opening act Peter Frampton on Tuesday, includes three core Yes members: virtuoso guitarist Steve Howe, bassist Chris Squire and drummer Alan White. Handling keyboards will be Oliver Wakeman, Rick's son.

The most conspicuous absence from this tour is ethereal vocalist Jon Anderson, who left Yes due to respiratory ailments two years ago but has plans to tour briefly this autumn with Rick Wakeman in the U.K. Anderson has been replaced by Benoit David, who was leading a Yes cover band in Canada when he was chosen to front this incarnation of Yes.

“Everything is sung the same key, the original keys,” Howe said during a recent interview, adding that people are astounded David can match Anderson's range. “He wants to rise to the challenge of doing something which most people thought was impossible.”

Writing in the Baltimore Sun about a late June Yes concert, Evan Haga wrote “Yes, he (David) sounds remarkably like Anderson, but yes, Anderson is sorely missed.”

So the question remains: Is this band really Yes?

“All I can tell you is that this is the only Yes lineup, so if you don't like it, too bad,” Howe said with a laugh.

When this version of the band came together a couple of years ago, it used the three core members' names on the marquee, not the name “Yes.”

But soon that changed, as “we gradually developed into a more unified Yes, and a more happy and capable Yes, because the internal happiness of the group is something not to ignore,” Howe said. “I mean Steve Howe smiles on stage. I never used to do that because it was agony.”

To answer the question, Howe concluded: “This is a pretty real Yes. It's no less real than any other lineup we've ever had, because it works.”

The current group is playing much of the best work from the classic Yes period, including “And You and I,” “Yours is No Disgrace,” “Perpetual Change,” and “I've Seen All Good People.”

Most recent sets have included the 1983 hit, “Owner of a Lonely Heart” followed by Yes' signature “Roundabout” to close the show and an encore of “Starship Trooper.” Sets have been changing nightly, but the band plays most of these songs during each concert.

Yes has always been known for charting its own course, yet the band has a well-tuned ear for what its fans want.

“Of course you have to be doing this because it's what you believe in, but if you don't find an audience, then you're doing it just for yourself,” Howe said. “You have to work with the audience; that's what a live concert is all about.”

Howe said the band is more faithful today to the original sound of Yes compositions than they were in the '70s.

“Over the years I have become almost fanatical about reinterpreting and performing the songs from the '70s,” he said, “the actual notes, the actual timing, the actual text, the actual effects.”

Howe will also be touring this summer with the '80s supergroup Asia, known for a more hard-driving sound than Yes. Asia plays Napa's Uptown Theatre on Aug. 29.

The Yes-Frampton tour re-creates a double bill from 1976. Back then, the artists were at their creative and popular peaks, playing sold-out stadiums.

Frampton's golden locks graced the cover of his mega-selling “Frampton Comes Alive!” album, the disc that propelled him to stardom.

The frilly mane is gone but he continues to play — and use his signature twangy vocal effects in — “Do You Feel Like We Do.” And he still plays the syrupy “Baby I Love Your Way” complemented by a smattering of new songs.

For Yes and Frampton, the stadium era is almost certainly over. But seeing Yes, even without two core members, and Frampton in an intimate indoor setting should give the bands and their fans a greater ability to connect.

Michael Shapiro writes about music and theater for The Press Democrat.