TREVOR RABIN, the six-string wizard (and songwriter) behind “Owner of a Lonely Heart,” shares the stories behind six classic YES tracks and six tracks from his masterful new album, Rio
STORY BY ANDREW DALY PHOTO BY HRISTO SHINDOV
ESOTERIC AS HE is, it shouldn’t
come as a surprise that Trevor Rabin has crafted a record that’s “stylistically tough to categorize.” But if one were to try, you could call Rabin’s latest, Rio, a guitar-driven, proggy, yet oh-so very poppy, country-and-western opus. Oh, and it’s loaded with political and social undertones regarding his native stomping ground of Johannesburg, South Africa, too. How’s that for an earful?
Of course, if you’re Rabin, this eclecticism is par for the course. After all, this is the man who wrote beloved radio staple “Owner of a Lonely Heart” yet still seems comfortable refuting all labels slung his way, instead “visiting other genres, and injecting influences along the way.” And that’s saying something considering Rabin’s work with Yes is nearly universally loved, with “nearly” being the operative word, as there’s always someone who must remind the group that Rabin’s debut with Yes, 90125, is “overplayed.”
Again, that might be true, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that 90125, which wasn’t even supposed to be a Yes record, captured the zeitgeist in the fall of 1983 through its merging of prog, pop and proto-MTV bluster.
Looking back on his mindset as he entered the fold, Rabin tells Guitar World, “I’ve always tried to approach the guitar with an open mind. And back then, I looked at it from the point of view of being an arranger for an orchestra rather than just aimlessly soloing over things. The guitar is such an interesting instrument; it can be a sound palette, do swirly things, create harmonies and be presented in endless ways. I have never taken a single-minded approach and always wanted to be rather acrobatic about it, which is an approach that created wonderful results on 90125.”
To Rabin’s point, his inventive mindset, which dates to his days as a teenage phenom in Rabbitt, was the perfect juxtaposition alongside Jon Anderson’s vocals and Chris Squire’s basslines.
“The funny thing about that record is what preceded it, which was Geffen unceremoniously drop
