Tales from Topographic Oceans is the sixth studio album by the English progressive rock band Yes, released on 7 December 1973 by Atlantic Records. It was the band's first studio release to feature drummer Alan White, who replaced founding member Bill Bruford in 1972. Singer Jon Anderson conceived the album's concept during the group's Close to the Edge Tour after reading a footnote in Paramahansa Yogananda's 1946 book Autobiography of a Yogi. The text summarised four categories of Hindu scriptures–the shastras (specifically the śruti, smriti, puranas, and tantras)–which address distinct fields of knowledge. Anderson and guitarist Steve Howe subsequently spent the remainder of the tour developing the album's lyrical themes and musical structures.
Following two months of rehearsals in London, the band decided to construct a double album consisting of four side-long tracks based on each scripture, with runtimes ranging between 18 and 21 minutes. Keyboardist Rick Wakeman was critical of the concept, feeling unable to contribute effectively to the experimental direction required to fill a double album, which led to his growing estrangement from the group. To utilise Britain's first 24-track tape machine, Yes elected to record at Morgan Studios in London rather than a rural location, famously decorating the studio space to resemble a farm. Artist Roger Dean integrated the band's thematic suggestions into the album's gatefold cover art, which later informed his stage designs for the supporting concert tour.
Tales from Topographic Oceans was a commercial success, becoming the first album in the UK to achieve Gold certification based solely on pre-orders before topping the UK Albums Chart for two weeks. In the United States, it reached No. 6 on the Billboard 200 and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America in 1974. Critical reception was sharply divided upon release, with detractors viewing the record as a symbol of progressive rock's self-indulgence and excess, though retrospective reviews have grown more favourable. Yes supported the album with a five-month tour across Europe and North America, during which they performed the entire double album live; continuing tensions over the material ultimately prompted Wakeman to leave the band at its conclusion to pursue solo projects.
Background and writing Conception
By 1973, Yes had stabilised with a line-up of frontman and lead vocalist Jon Anderson, bassist Chris Squire, guitarist Steve Howe, keyboardist Rick Wakeman, and drummer Alan White, who had replaced original drummer Bill Bruford in the previous year. Their fifth album, Close to the Edge (1972), was released to commercial and critical acclaim, and the band toured worldwide to support the album between July 1972 and April 1973.
Anderson had begun searching for ideas for their next album during this time, one of which involved a "large-scale composition" as the group were writing successful longform pieces, including the 18-minute "Close to the Edge". While in his hotel room in Tokyo during the Japanese tour in March 1973, Anderson found himself "caught up in a lengthy footnote" in Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda which outlines four bodies of Hindu texts named shastras. Yogananda described them as "comprehensive treatises [that cover] every aspect of religious and social life, and the fields of law, medicine, architecture, art..." that "convey profound truths under a veil of detailed symbolism". Anderson "became engrossed" with the idea of a "four-part epic" concept album based on the four texts, though he later admitted that he only had a basic understanding of them. King Crimson drummer and percussionist Jamie Muir recommended Yogananda's book to Anderson at Bruford's wedding reception earlier in the month. Anderson said of Muir: "I felt I had to learn from him. We started talking about meditation in music—not the guru type but some really heavy stuff." Anderson gained further clarification of the texts from talking to Vera Stanley Alder, a mystic, painter, and author of spirituality books that had a profound influence on him. The 1973 BBC documentary series The Ascent of Man also gave Anderson "a lot to think about", and was influenced by host Jacob Bronowski's explanations of Earth, the Solar System, and human "knowledge and truth".
Yes moved on to Australia and the US in March and April 1973, during which Anderson pitched his idea to Howe, a prolific songwriter and arranger in the group, who took an interest in building on Anderson's concept. The pair held writing sessions in their hotel rooms lit by candlelight, exchanging musical and lyrical ideas. Howe recalled: "Jon would say to me, 'What have you got that's a bit like that...?' so I'd play him something and he'd go: 'that's great. Have you got anything else?' and I'd play him another tune". One riff that Howe played was initially discarded, but it was later incorporated into side three as by then, the two sought for a different theme that would suit the track. Howe looked back on this time as a "golden opportunity" for Anderson and himself to "explore the outer reaches of our possibilities", and avoided predictable choruses and song structures. A six-hour session in Savannah, Georgia, that ended at 7 a.m. saw Anderson and Howe complete the outline of the album's vocals, lyrics, and instrumentation, which took the form of one track based on each of the four texts. Anderson described the night as "magical [that] left both of us exhilarated for days". Anderson and Howe presented the album's concept to the rest of the band, which was met with some uncertainty; Howe recalled: "But Jon and I did manage to sell the idea ... sometimes [we] really had to spur the guys on".
Phil Carson, then the London Senior Vice President of Atlantic Records, remembered that, during a dinner with Anderson and Nesuhi Ertegun, Anderson was originally going to name the album Tales from Tobergraphic Oceans. He claimed he had invented the word "tobergraphic", which he used to depict one of astronomer Fred Hoyle's theories on space. Ertegun informed Anderson that "tobergraphic" was similar to the word "topographic" and described its meaning, and Anderson changed the title accordingly. An interview with Eddy Offord and a Melody Maker advert congratulating Yes for winning a readership poll published in August and September 1973, respectively, touted the upcoming album as Tales from the Tobergraphic Ocean and Tales from Tobergraphic Oceans. Wakeman jokingly nicknamed the album Tales from Toby's Graphic Go-Kart.
Rehearsals at Manticore
After touring finished, Yes regrouped at Manticore Studios in Fulham, London, a former cinema bought by fellow progressive rock band Emerson, Lake & Palmer, in May 1973. They spent eight weeks rehearsing and developing Anderson and Howe's initial ideas. This resulted in four tracks, as Wakeman described: "One was about eight minutes. One was 15. One was 19 and one was 12", but the band had to decide whether to refine them to fit a single album or extend them to make a double. Howe recalled a mutual agreement to make a double, which Wakeman supported provided that the group could come up with strong enough material. Anderson had gained confidence towards a double from the success of Yessongs, their first live album, released as a triple in May 1973 that contained almost 130 minutes of music. Wakeman described an early musical concept for Tales from Topographic Oceans around the time of its release, whereby its parts could be interchangeable at any time depending on the audience's reaction, thus allowing the band to perform upbeat portions back to back and skip the slower sections until a later time in the piece. The problem, however, was putting such a concept on a record.
The group agreed to make a double album but had no ideas at hand to develop, so the four tracks were fleshed out through improvisations. Wakeman disagreed with the "almost busking, free-form thinking" approach and the musical "padding" that resulted, which he thought needed further rehearsal. He felt sections resembled "avant-garde jazz rock, and I had nothing to offer". Squire recognised "a lot of substance" to the four tracks but at times they lacked strength, which resulted in an album that was varied and scattered. Despite the uncertainty, Anderson stated in the liner notes that Squire, Wakeman, and White made important contributions to the music. Anderson looked back at this time and thought the band were on the same page, but disagreements from Wakeman and producer Eddy Offord marked the end of the period of "illusive harmony" that had been in the group since Fragile. Yes took a break roughly one month into rehearsals, during which Anderson vacated to Marrakesh with his family and wrote lyrics.
Recording The group were split in deciding where to record; Anderson and Wakeman wanted to retreat in the countryside while Squire and Howe preferred to stay in London, leaving White, who was indifferent, as the tie-breaking vote. Anderson wanted to record at night under a tent in a forest with electrical generators buried into the ground so they would be inaudible, but "when I suggested that, they all said, 'Jon, get a life!'"Roche, Peter. Jon Anderson of Yes raids rock vault, talks "Topographic Oceans" 40 years on. Examiner.com. (12 September 2013) Retrieved on 12 May 2016. Yes were joined by Offord, their engineer and producer who had worked with the band since 1970 and mixed their sound on tour. He pushed their manager, Brian Lane, to record in the country, thinking "some flowers and trees" would lessen the tension that the album was creating within the group. Yes were swayed to remain in London, but wanted to avoid the familiar surroundings of Advision Studios in Fitzrovia, so they chose to record at Morgan Studios in Willesden as it housed a 3M M79, Britain's first 24-track tape machine, which presented greater possibilities in the studio. Despite the advantage, the machine malfunctioned often and required periods of down time for repairs. Squire worked in the studio for as long as sixteen-hour days, seven days a week.
In July 1973, Yes settled into studio 3 at Morgan for a period of ten weeks. Lane and Anderson proceeded to decorate the studio to resemble a farm; Squire believed Lane did so as a joke on Anderson as his tent idea was shut down. Anderson brought in flowers, pots of greenery, and cutout cows and sheep; white picket fences were placed around Wakeman's keyboards with amplifiers placed on stacks of hay. When Black Sabbath moved into studio 4 to record Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, singer Ozzy Osbourne visited and recalled a model cow with electronic udders and a small barn in the corner, "like a kid's plaything." Offord remembered the cows being covered in graffiti and the plants dying halfway through recording, "that just kind of sums up that whole album". One time during recording, Anderson wanted to replicate the sound he heard while singing in the bathroom and asked lighting engineer Michael Tait to build him a three-sided tiled booth for him to sing in. Despite Tait explaining how the idea would not work, he built one using plywood and glued tiles on the inside. Sound engineer Nigel Luby recalled tiles falling off the box during takes. Wakeman distanced himself from the band as recording went on and spent most of his time drinking and playing darts in the studio bar. Osbourne befriended him and remembered Wakeman was "bored out of his mind", and invited him to play the synthesizer on "Sabbra Cadabra". Wakeman would not accept money for his contribution, so the band paid him in beer. While talking to reporter Chris Welch in August 1973, Anderson dispelled rumours that someone was quitting the band, and that a difference of opinion from an unnamed member had been resolved.