Simon Rushworth
In the second part of our interview with Yes drummer Alan White we discover the new creative force forging ahead alongside the band’s old stagers.
And the man who worked with ex-Beatles George Harrison and John Lennon explains how he came to get one of the biggest gigs in British rock.
Check out White and his bandmates throughout next month with a homecoming gig at Newcastle City Hall on November 20 bound to be the pick for the veteran drummer.
rushonrock: There are rumours of a new Yes album for 2010. Is an album of original material in the pipeline?
AW: We’ve been talking about it now for some time. Everybody has been busy writing at home and we’ll bring it to the table after the tour. It’s basically Steve [Howe], Chris [Squire] and myself who will sit down and work on the new record but Ollie [Wakeman] is starting to do some writing and he’s been doing some stuff with Benoit [David] on the road. There’ll come a point when we pull everything together.
rushonrock: Is Ollie Wakeman a mirror image of the old man?
AW: You know he’s totally like him. It’s uncanny. He looks very much like Rick and he goes about his work in the same way. He even tells the same old jokes! I used to know him when he was a little boy and it’s great to see him all grown up and a rock star in his won right. But I don’t think he was ever going to be anything else. The poor kid was brainwashed by his dad from an early age and forced to listen to Yes music every minute of every day. No wonder he knows our music better than we do.
rushonrock: How come Wakeman junior is on the tour and not his dad?
AW: I just think Rick decided he wasn’t necessarily up for the lifestyle linked to long and arduous tours which can last for six or 12 months at a time. It does take it out of you at our age but the rest of us feel we can still hack it. We’re all up for the British dates and we’ve just come off the back of a brilliant US tour. We still think we can do this thing pretty well. At least we’ve had plenty of practice.
rushonrock: Did you have an alternative career mapped out if drumming hadn’t come off?
AW: When I left school I intended to go to college in Bishop Auckland and train to be an architect. But the band I was in changed its name from The Downbeats to The Blue Chips and we went down to London and won a national competition run by the Melody Maker. The judges included Cilla Black, Ringo Starr and Alan Freeman and we made a few papers and magazines on the back of it. I remember we drove back up to the North East in a van covered in lipstick and off the back of that there was a report written in one of the County Durham newspapers. The principle at my school read it and called me into his office one day. He told me that his advice was to stick to the drumming! I think it was his way of saying my schoolwork wasn’t really up to scratch.
rushonrock: So what followed The Blue Chips?
AW: I joined Billy Fury and the Gamblers. I then played with Alan Price for a year and a half before I set up my own band. Then I got the call from John Lennon to play with him on the Imagine record and I was still only 20. I did the Joe Cocker thing and then, at the grand old age of 23, I was invited to join Yes. The rest, as they say, is history.