Not great all the way through, but the good bits are hard to ignore.
The peculiarly named YOSO are really a continuation of the progressive rock band Circa, which featured both ex-Yes/Detective keyboard player Tony Kaye and former Yes/World Trade multi-instrumentalist, singer and producer Billy Sherwood. They’ve now teamed up with famed Toto singer Bobby Kimball to form what, for all intents, purposes and promo photos is essentially a trio, even though guitarist Johnny Bruhns and drummer Scott Conner are also listed as full band members.
With the background of the people involved, this debut album actually sounds exactly like you’d expect it to. Sherwood in particular has always been a Trevor Rabin-like multi-talented character, and it’s his World Trade and the commercial Yes influences that lie heaviest here, whilst on the occasional funky west-coast leanings the familiarity of Kimball’s voice just screams Toto. It’s my educated guess that Sherwood is the biggest player here as the songs and instrumentation have his stamp all over them, especially his layered backing vocals on the superb ‘Yoso’ itself which kicks off the album in brilliant style with complex countermelodies and Bruhns’ off the wall guitar solos. Kaye also has his day in the sun with more freedom on the Hammond organ than he has since early Yes, and the sympathetic production, also by Sherwood, gives everyone equal billing and nice spacious live sound.
There’s a distinct Toto edge to ‘Path To The Heart’, ‘Close The Curtain’ and ‘Only One’ and Kimball’s voice is surprisingly strong throughout, similarly the Yes-like ‘Come This Far’ and ‘Walk Away’ threaten to break into something more adventurous but stay on the simpler side of progressive rock. The album works best when they find middle ground between Yes and Toto like on the upbeat ‘The New Revolution’, the killer title-track and the epic closing song ‘Return To Yesterday’, but unfortunately that doesn’t happen often enough and as well written and performed as these songs are, truly exciting moments are few and far between.
The real bonus here is a live disc of the band playing three originals from the album (‘Yoso’, Walk Away’ and ‘To Seek The Truth’) amongst a set of Toto and Yes covers, of which the Yes tracks ‘Cinema’, ‘Owner Of A Lonely Heart’ and an early medley are the best, but it’s also nice to hear the lesser known Toto songs ‘Good For You’ and ‘Gift With A Golden Gun’ amongst ‘Hold The Line’, ‘Rosanna’ and a lively ‘White Sister’. ‘Elements’ is a good album that’s actually one of the best produced discs I’ve heard in a while. It’s not great all the way through, but the good bits are hard to ignore.
Phil Ashcroft