How would you rank their albums?

I just listened to Close to the edge, loved it, but I want to know the general consensus on the rest of their albums, because if pitchfork is anything to go by, its that they have insane highs and insane lows (except topographic oceans I know that one was great and p4k were full of crap when they wrote that)

Tales from Topographic Oceans is their best, followed by Close to the Edge, Fragile, and The Yes Album.

The Yes Album and Fragile are good too.

Tales From Topographic Oceans is notoriously polarizing, with everyone either calling it a 10/10 masterpiece or 0/10 cheesy 70s prog wankery.

A lot of people like Relayer and Going For the One.

It's easily a 10/10 masterpiece. Disregarding the 'progressive rock is cheesy' meme you really can't look past the musicality of it. It is simply genius.

One hundred years from now, Don't Kill The Whale will be recognized as the masterpiece that it is

for some reason I like it more now that it was panned by pitchfork, and I havent even heard it yet

I don't really have an opinion on it personally but there's totally genuine reason to dislike Tales. What made the previous albums work was that Yes would occasionally come down to earth and have those acoustic sections or just normal rock parts and Tales lacks that and consists exclusively of 20 minute soundscapes of space rock.

1&2. The Yes Album and Close to the Edge are both my favorite albums and I find it very hard to pick a definite #1 here for me.
3. Relayer
4. Fragile
5. Going for the One
6. Yes
7. Time and a Word
8. Drama
9. Tales from Topographic Oceans
10. 90125
11. Tormato
12. Big Generator

I have yet to give much of a listen to their post-80s output besides Mind Drive.

The first half of Topographic Oceans is good, but I agree with the general criticism that it has no right being as long as it is.

Also
>Only in his 60s
>Looks like this
Will Steve Howe be fine?

Just buy their first 10 albums, they all have something worth listening to.

Except Tormato. It's shiiiiitttt.

Am I a fat middle aged man for liking progressive rock?

1. Fragile
2. CTTE
3. The Yes Album
4. Relayer
5. TFTO

Tales From Topographic Oceans was disappointing because it aroused a desire for the highest without fulfilling it. It projects as having importance that isn't really there. With close enough listens you'll realize that Tales From Topographic Oceans is just a mess of half baked musical ideas strung together to sound important. Close to the Edge is their highest achievement, every moment on that album is executed to its fullest potential and deeply rooted in some emotion or feeling that constantly stimulates the mind. The album sounds raw, earthy, and natural, and it doesn't really project as being important, it just goes out and achieves what it does, and the album gives off a kind of natural glow. Tales From Topographic Oceans does nothing but reach for ideas that were beyond the band's capabilities, which I actually think they underrated themselves, because you can tell throughout that album that they could have done a great followup to Close to the Edge had they gone for something more tangible.

...

I'm I would agree with you that that applies to The Ancients, which is pretty much filler anyway you listen to it, but the other three tracks have few parts that serve as filler, which will apply to Ritual in that last 3/4s of the piece (despite the track being one of the more epic Yes songs imo).

Yes - 7.5/10
Time and a World - 6.5/10
The Yes Album - 9/10
Fragile - 8.5/10
Close to the Edge - 10/10
Tales From Topographic Oceans - 5.5/10
Relayer - 7/10
Going For the One - 7/10
Tormato - 4.5/10
Drama - 5/10
90125 - 3.5/10
Big Generator - 4/10
Union - 4.5/10
Talk - 4.5/10
Keys to Ascension - 6/10
Keys to Ascension 2 - 6/10
Open Your Eyes - 4/10
The Ladder - 6/10
Magnification - 5.5/10
Fly From Here - 5/10
Heaven and Earth - 4/10

The band's whole discography is basically watching the various stages they went through coping with having pulled off prog rock's greatest masterpiece.

So you're basically telling me that aside from like 3 GOAT albums and 1 good one, they're basically a terrible, awful, abysmal band?

Close to the Edge is still on a higher plane than Tales From Topographic Oceans because it achieves more without trying to be epic or flashy, filling four sides with disjointed songs with musical passages that sound like they only serve to bring you to the twenty minute mark. Close to the Edge doesn't strain to achieve anything, it reached incredible heights while sounding very modest and humble. The first thing you hear after the finale of the title track is an acoustic guitar being lightly strummed and tuned, and the track builds from there to something stunning and beautiful. The second side of the album gives of this fleeting sort of beauty, like they knew that they wouldn't be capable of things on that scale forever. The very end of And You and I evokes this feeling that the sun is setting. The emotion of the track seems to acknowledge that things are coming to a close. Tales From Topographic Oceans feels too disjointed to evoke emotions this direct. It sounds entertaining on surface listens but really listen closely and it sounds like air.

...

My two cents:
1. Close to the Edge
2. The Yes Album
3. Tales from Topographic Oceans
3. Fragile
4. Going for the One
5. Relayer
6. Drama (criminally underrated)
7. Fly From Here (sort of a guilty pleasure, but I think it's good)
8. Their first two albums
9. 90125
10. Tormato (not as bad as people made it sound, but it had its issues)
11. Everything else they put out

The Yes Album-->Fragile-->Close to the Edge

Fish Out of Water >