I remember when Patrick Moraz was with Yes and they were all so bored they decided to do solo albums. The results were pretty much awful, but Jon Anderson's brand of awful was kaleidoscopically awful. It was the all time stupidest album I ever heard with weird synth boings and gongs, tons of phase shifting effects for the headphone and bong crowd, repeated nursury rhyme licks over and over and over, lyrics like "Chee chee ree ree! Chee chee ree ree!" and the goofiest read along book gatefold record cover I have ever seen before or since. It's as if he took acid and thought "I Am the Walrus" actually meant something profound!

Someone asked me at a party once what the worst album I had was, and I gleefully ran over and pulled out Olias of Sunhillow. We got about five minutes into it before one of the listeners lept to his feet and grabbed the needle off the turntable with a big ZZZZZIPPPP! It's THAT bad! You gotta be on drugs for this one to make any sense whatsoever.

Then Rick Wakeman came back and they continued their downward spiral with wonderful lyrics like "Don't Kill the Whale! Diggit! Diggit!" What happened to Rick Wakeman anyway? When he returned to Yes, it was as if he hadn't an idea in his head any more. His dorky synth sounds on Tormato are laughable. They sound like a children's video game... Blues Clues goes prog rock! Then Wakeman got Jesus and got all John Teshed out and started cranking out profoundly boring "new age" records. I have no idea who the target audience for that kind of crap is... people who are half asleep all the time, I guess.

I always thought of Yes whenever I saw Spinal Tap. Jon Anderson definitely is Nigel Tuftnell with the midget dancing around the tiny model of stonehenge!

If you have followed Yes throught the years, you are aware of the abstract images that Jon Anderson conjures up with his lyrical genius. This LP is way over the top! He manages to tell a story here, and still stay true to his "mystical" style of writing. This album is not just good Progressive music, it's a celebration of what Progressive music is all about. Moving, and awe inspiring. Nobody paints a mental picture like Jon. The fact that this gem has made it to CD after all these years is incouraging. In a day when music is all about pain, rage and anger, this LP brings back memories of a time when music was artisic, and uplifting...not primal therapy for the socially disturbed. Like other works of it's kind, this was music for the mind, written from the heart. I said the same thing about Chris Squire's "Fish Out OF Water". They do not make music like this anymore. Buy it now before it dissapears completely.

An amazing album that symbolizes a time long gone when some artist took rock music to places it has never been to since. Not that this is the best music ever, but I love it, and there just isn't anything like it anymore. Jon believes in this music with all his heart, and it shows here. You don't have to be an old prog rocker dude to get this album. I'm 18 and into antifolk and punk who can hardly remember the early 90's and I dig this CD. In a weird way Olias fits in my mind with that music. Jon just made the music that was in his warm, crazy, spaced-out heart, at the same time giving a beautiful operatic rock middle-finger to the whole music industry. If you are a fan of 70's Yes, this is a no-brainer; just buy it. If your not, but you want to hear the ultimate piece of prog rock, or you are just curious what classical elf music on acid sounds like, get this CD.

I purchased this album based on the glowing reviews at Amazon.com but I am very disappointed. This album is musically weak; it is no match for the combined musical genius of the former members of Yes. Save your money on this one and spend it instead on Relayer by Yes if you don't already have it. In my opinion, Relayer is the most musically complex album ever produced by Yes and represents the pinnacle of their work.

Jon Anderson at this point in his career was not just wasting his time on a solo album like most other previous solo albums by fellow Yes members. This album is quite different from what Yes was doing at this point. This is an awesome album. At times, it's sounds like he was obviously on drugs while producing this music but that makes it even better. This album is way under-appreciated in all aspects and if Jon was here right now I would be obligated to forcefully hug him just thinking about how well he did on this album. Just to think that the vocalist of Yes did this entire album on a solo effort, with its rhythmic syncaptions, hypnotic melodies, and overall trippy fantasy world atmosphere, the thought is just astounding that he was able to pull off this album. This album is so good that you need to buy it now for the sake of your well-being.