JON ANDERSON : TOUR OF THE UNIVERSE

  1. Harmony
  2. Father Sky
  3. Standing Still
  4. Bring On The Day
  5. You Lift Me Up
  6. Long Distance Runaround
  7. State Of Independence
  8. Set Sail
  9. Who Could Imagine?
  10. The Revealing Science Of God (Dance Of The Dawn)
  11. First Song
  12. Nous Sommes Du Soleil
  13. O'er
  14. Show Me
  15. White Buffalo
  16. And You And I
  17. Change We Must
  18. Harping
  19. Your Move
  20. Yours Is No Disgrace
  21. This Is

Label : Warner Music Vision

Released : August 2, 2005

Venue : XM Satellite Radio Studio, Washington, D.C, USA

Recording Date : April 1, 2004

Length : 156 minutes

Aspect Ratio : 16:9

Review (AllMusic) : Recorded at the studios of XM satellite radio on April 1, 2004, Tour of the Universe is Jon Anderson's first solo home video. Characteristic of his work, it is visually lush. This isn't just Anderson, sitting in front of a small audience in a radio studio with his guitar, keyboards, and harp. Each song has accompanying video footage: sometimes abstract graphic ../images; sometimes film footage of urban landscapes ("State of Independence"), the Vietnam War era ("Long Distance Runaround"), Native Americans and the American West ("White Buffalo"), Australian Aborigines and, it appears, other indigenous peoples around the world ("Change We Must"), or tanks, battleships, and military aircraft ("Yours Is No Disgrace"). There are also spoken interludes by Anderson and, unfortunately, periodic obnoxious advertisements for XM. "Show Me" adds Rick Wakeman, one of Anderson's bandmates from Yes, on piano, and choirs provide occasional backup vocals. These seem to be prerecorded and pre-filmed, and other some prerecorded instrumental material is also included, but otherwise Anderson performs solo, singing and playing his own solo songs, plus some material from Jon & Vangelis and a few Yes favorites. Without the more elaborate band arrangements, a closer focus is placed on Anderson's ethereal high-tenor singing voice, which is fine, and on his lyrics, which tends to reveal their extremely poetic, if somewhat vague nature. (This is especially true if one clicks on the version with lyrics in the "Special Features" section, which produces an edit of the performance, 15 minutes shorter than the regular 73-minute version and with only still photographs, in which the lyrics appear on the bottom of the screen like subtitles.) A sense of exactly what Anderson is on about in his lyrics and music is perhaps the point of including two short lectures by college professors in the "Special Features." Dr. Ron Knott spends 14 minutes discussing "The Golden Mean," a mathematical pattern found in nature and employed in such fields as architecture and, as Roy Howat of Cambridge University points out in his nearly 13-minute talk, in the music of such composers as Béla Bartók and Claude Debussy. How this relates to Anderson and his music isn't clear, even though, in the main video, he dons glasses to speak directly to the camera and explain, "The Golden Mean is the gateway to inter-dimensional reality." According to Anderson, it also has something to do with crop circles, although he acknowledges, "That's as far as I've got." That's OK. One expects no less of one of the godfathers of progressive rock.

Review (ProgArchives) : Jon Anderson is easily my favourite recording artist of all time, with or without Yes. Brilliant vocals, masterful songwriting and fantastic live presence contribute massively to this. This DVD, however, really does not show what Jon can pull of in a live setting. The entire DVD is made up of acoustic renditions performed solely by Jon, and more than often accompanied by (lame) CGI and 3D live projections. The performance on this DVD is sufficient for one man, but this doesn't really do alot of these songs justice, for example, The Revealing Science Of God. Jon also has a mishap with the vocal section of this track, but the song loses nearly all of its feel due to the staleness of one guitar and one voice playing it alone. Sonically, this DVD is quite good. Aurally, this is near perfect, but visually, its hampered by the use of the 3D projections. Example: Jon Anderson projected onto a billboard in a CGI city is alot less enticing or thrilling than seeing the man live on a real stage in a real performance setting. Other than this, I have few complaints, and its fantastic to see many Jon Anderson solo tracks played along side those which are considered to be the most controversial Yes songs. A great DVD, but hampered by its single instrumentation and cheesy editing.