Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe - History

History

Although conceived by Anderson as being a Yes reunion, others in the band were keen to distance themselves from the "Yes" name. At the time, the name for the band "Yes" was co-owned by Anderson, Alan White and Chris Squire, and Squire and White were still continuing with Yes along with Trevor Rabin and Tony Kaye; for these reasons, it was not possible for ABWH to use the "Yes" name anyway. Anticipating this problem, Jon Anderson suggested they call themselves "The Affirmative",, but the other band members felt that was disingenuous. The name "No" was also suggested, but in the end, they decided to simply name themselves after the members of the band.

When Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe toured, they titled their shows "An Evening Of Yes Music Plus", a name that was also used for their subsequent live album. ABWH were sued by Yes in an attempt to prevent any mention of Yes in the ABWH promotional material.

Eventually, ABWH and Yes resolved their differences and produced a Yes album titled Union. The album included recordings originally intended for separate albums by both groups. Several songs originally intended for the second ABWH album, tentatively titled Dialogue, surfaced on the 1990s bootleg We Make Believe and the underground Yesoteric bootleg compilation. This material included demos by Anderson but without the other three that were subsequently released as part of Jon Anderson's The Lost Tapes box set series as Watching the Flags That Fly.

Songs from the ABWH album have been included on subsequent Yes compilations and Yes concerts.

The band was satirised in the Dead Milkmen song "Anderson, Walkman, Buttholes And How!"