YES – Songs From Tsongas: Yes 35th Anniversary Concert [Classic Lineup / SACD reissue] (2026)*HQ*

320_1 /// 320_2 /// HQ

”Songs from Tsongas: Yes 35th Anniversary Concert” is a historic live release capturing the seminal progressive rock band YES, captured on May 15, 2004, at the Tsongas Arena in Lowell, Massachusetts. The recording captures the definitive “classic” lineup of YES – Jon Anderson, Steve Howe, Chris Squire, Rick Wakeman, and Alan White – celebrating their 35th anniversary. This landmark performance finds the pioneers of progressive rock in peak form, capturing the technical ambition and signature soundscapes that defined their career.
Now 2026 “Songs From Tsongas: Yes 35th Anniversary Concert” is being reissued in SACD, obtaining a superb quality sound.
The career-spanning setlist offers a deep dive into the band’s vast discography, featuring a rare performance of “Every Little Thing” from their 1969 debut album and the modern epic “Mind Drive” from Keys to Ascension 2. Notably, this concert stands as a historic document in the band’s timeline, serving as the final live album to feature the unmistakable voice of original singer Jon Anderson.
Released by Evolution Music Group as part of the Front Row Center collection, this Triple Hybrid SACD set preserves the performance with pristine fidelity. The high-resolution format captures the intricate interplay between the band members with breathtaking clarity. This is the most transparent and detailed presentation of a world-class band band at their peak, meticulously produced for the ultimate high-fidelity experience.
We heard many YES live albums, “Songs From Tsongas: Yes 35th Anniversary Concert” should be the best.

This tour was the last YES tour to take place in arenas instead of theaters, so, needless to say, the shows were pretty large. The concert was performed by YES’ classic line-up, which makes it special for that reason alone. The performances on the album are very strong and there appears to be little post-concert cleaning up of the sound and performances. The band plays in top form and the sound quality of the live recording is top notch.

In terms of the songs, here are some highlights: while “Mind Drive” really brings across the power and innovation of the song though loses the contrasts and dynamics found in the studio version (none of the acoustic sections are played live unfortunately).
“Southside of the Sky” is amazing and the trading solos at the end of it between Howe and Wakeman is very exciting and really shows off their respective strengths.
“Every Little Thing” is a lot of fun. It is rearranged from how they played it on their first album, which is itself a rearrangement from how the Beatles played it. The acoustic material makes this set very interesting as the pieces are all reworked for that sort of presentation. So, for YES fans who have heard these pieces so many times, this set provides a nice respite: while one can hear some classics they can hear them in new, different, interesting and fun ways as rearranged by the band itself.
Finally, this line-up played a Trevor Rabin song (Rhythm of Love) and it comes across very credibly. Wakeman soups up Tony Kaye‘s simple keyboard line and Howe’s solo, while is “very Howe” and different from Rabin’s, fits nonetheless. Well done!

Perhaps the best part of this tour is the set-list. I cannot think of a set list from any other tour that is so long and so varied! At least thirteen different albums are represented and some extremely rare pieces were played, such as “Every Little Thing” (not played since 1969), “Sweet Dreams” (only played on a couple of tours), “Southside of the Sky” (played regularly for the first time starting in 2002), “Going for the One” and “Turn of the Century” (not played on tour since 1977), Ritual (anything played in full from Tales from Topograhic Oceans is pretty rare), “The Meeting” (an ABWH piece), and perhaps rarest of all are significant segments from the second volume of Keys to Ascension (“Mind Drive” and “My Eyes”) and “Time is Time” (from Magnification) which had never been played live before or since.

The band also included material from the 1980’s when Steve Howe was not the guitar player. So material from virtually all YES eras was played from the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, even including music from the “technically” non-Yes album Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe.
To make the set-list even more interesting, this era of YES saw them experimenting with the then 10-year old idea of playing “unplugged.” The second disc of the set is the acoustic portion of the show. Yes converted many of their classics, including things like “Roundabout” and “Owner of a Lonely Heart,” to acoustic pieces.

So, the attraction for this show was the fact that it was not only a show by the classic line up, but it was also an anniversary show celebrating their 35 years as a band, which explains the diversity of material played, and highlighted their new feature of playing their material acoustically.

So, ultimately, if you are a YES fan, we highly recommend this 3-Disc set, and if you are not a fan, this is not a bad place to start with YES. You get the fantastic combination of great sound, great playing, the classic line-up, diverse set-list, unusual set-list with a lot of rarities, and the fun acoustic features.
Highly Recommended

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Disc I
01 – Intro / Firebird Suite (Live From Tsongas Arena)
02 – Going For The One (Live From Tsongas Arena)
03 – Sweet Dreams (Live From Tsongas Arena)
04 – I’ve Seen All Good People (Live From Tsongas Arena)
05 – Mind Drive Parts 1 & 2 (Live From Tsongas Arena)
06 – South Side Of The Sky (Live From Tsongas Arena)
07 – Turn Of The Century (Live From Tsongas Arena)
08 – My Eyes (Excerpt from Foot Prints) (Live From Tsongas Arena)
09 – Mind Drive Part 3 (Live From Tsongas Arena)
10 – Yours Is No Disgrace (Live From Tsongas Arena)

Disc II
01 – The Meeting (Piano Solo) (Live From Tsongas Arena)
02 – Long Distance Runaround (Live From Tsongas Arena)
03 – Wonderous Stories (Live From Tsongas Arena)
04 – Time Is Time (Live From Tsongas Arena)
05 – Roundabout (Live From Tsongas Arena)
06 – Show Me (Live From Tsongas Arena)
07 – Owner Of A Lonely Heart (Live From Tsongas Arena)
08 – Second Initial (Guitar Solo) (Live From Tsongas Arena)
09 – Rhythm Of Love (Live From Tsongas Arena)

Disc III
01 – And You And I (Live From Tsongas Arena)
02 – Ritual (Live From Tsongas Arena)
03 – Every Little Thing (Live From Tsongas Arena)
04 – Starship Trooper (Live From Tsongas Arena)

Jon Anderson – lead vocals, percussion, guitar
Chris Squire – bass, backing vocals
Steve Howe – electric, acoustic and steel guitars, backing vocals
Alan White – drums, percussion
Rick Wakeman – keyboards

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