The second day of Yes' short tour of Poland was perhaps the most satisfactory. There is not much to be said about this show specifically, since the evening was rather uneventful - and, as the other two reviews will have indicated, an uneventful Yes concert is precisely the Yes concert to be wished for...

This was the largest venue of the three: a huge, round sports hall called Spodek (which is "saucer", very much the actual shape of the edifice) in the center of Katowice, in the south of Poland. The building is far from beautiful - or comfortable for the audience - but it is Poland's largest hall, seating well over seven-eight thousand, and most Western bands give their shows there.

Aesthetics and comfort aside, another deficiency of the hall is the acoustics. The acoustics are just bad there. It was really designed as a place for large indoor sports events, and the idea to use it for rock shows must have come too late in the design, or altogether after the building was completed. This time I had a seat well into the back of the hall and high above the stage: from my vantage point I could see the musicians' faces but not their facial features, could see hands but not fingers. The good thing about it was that I was able to view the whole stage and that, unable to see the details, I could easier concentrate on the music itself (in Warsaw it was a tad hard to focus on the music when I could just watch Howe's fingers do their fast magic on the fretboard instead). The bad thing was that, where I was sitting, the sound reached somewhat muffled, low on upper frequencies and certainly not loud enough. I cannot say if the sound engineer was in a position to fix this; I do know that despite frequent, impatient "louder!!" cries from the audience, the sound did not improve throughout the show.

And yet it was the best show of all three. First, it was absolutely flawless. No big disasters like the two in Warsaw, and no small flubs, either. Just smooth and nice and easy all the way through. Yes have spoiled us fans with their drive towards perfection, and perfection of performance was what we expected and received in Katowice.

Second, the previous day's uneasiness on the part of the band was completely gone: Yes were all confident and obviously in high spirits. This was immediately apparent to me as Siberian Khatru started off with kick and disciplined vigor. Howe's solo in the closing section was right on the spot and I loved to see him actually jump on a high note; I never saw him do this during the other two shows. Jon, too, managed to cast off his initial apprehension. This time he was chattier, funnier and more confident about his rapport with the audience and about his own voice, I thought; he sounded louder, clearer and "brighter" than before.

With this comes a little regret: it is the second show that should have been broadcast on the radio, not the first one. I don't know how significant the difference was really; it was probably been as much in my mind as in reality, but at least there wasn't a single technical trouble, and I don't think I could be that much mistaken about the sheer energy the band was projecting off their stage the second time.

Lastly, the third difference. There is something special to seeing not a thousand, but in excess of seven thousand people, fellow Yes fans, gathered together in the spacious hall. From my first row in Warsaw I had to turn back to take a peek at the audience; in Katowice I had at least half of them in front of me, below. The deafening applause... And more. During Steve Howe's acoustic intro to And You And I I closed my eyes for a moment, and when I looked again, I saw dozens of little points of light scattered over the darkened, hushed hall. Many of those sitting on the ground level lit their cigarette lighters and were holding them high above their heads. I don't know if it's a specifically Polish custom or if people do this sort of thing ever

Jon Anderson:
[??? Something in Polish] It's great to be with you - a wonderful feeling to be here in your wonderful country. Here's a song, written by the great Paul Simon of Simon and Garfunkel, about the children of the world who live in America. America is coming through into the 21st century. And the song is called 'America'.

Jon Anderson:
Steve Howe on guitar!

Jon Anderson:
Thank you! [??? Something in Polish] Be sure nobody else is coming running past will you? It's wonderful to be with you this evening, thank you. The next song we will play, ahh, recorded before I was born, way before - it's true! And we were in London, and you know in London, at 4 o'clock you have to have tea. Very important, teatime. But Eddie Offord was our producer, engineer, and he would make the tea like this, sort of thing. But I won't go into that because we're on the radio. We're on the radio tonight, live, all over Poland. Heeey! Hello Aunty George. So I heard this and it was "Quick, Eddie, start the recording now, please"...

Jon Anderson:
Thank you so much. It's ahh, great to introduce you to, leave you in the capable hands, the fingers, the guitar style of Mr. Steve Howe!

Steve Howe:
Alright, thank you very much! Alright, that was called 'Diary Of A Man Who Vanished' and before that, for my wife, I played 'Mood For A Day', thank you very much. I'm going to finish now my little set with, um, the very first, ahh, country and western or Chet Atkins picking piece I ever wrote and, ah, some say it's my best. It's called 'Clap'!

Jon Anderson:
Steve Howe! We'd like to carry on with a song, what? Steeeve! With a... Steeeve! [??? Something in Polish] We'd like to do, ahh, a song together, in English we call it a duet, in Polish you say duet, so it's a duet, just two people on a song from the 'Open Your Eyes' album. [??? Something in Polish] Here we go, a duet.

Jon Anderson:
[??? Something in Polish] Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Here's a song ahh, we recorded in Switzerland. We were working in Switzerland for a time, and the song is, ahh, from the album, ahh 'Going For The One' album. Here's a song, and it's a song called 'Wonderous Stories'.

Jon Anderson:
This is ahh, a privilege for me to sing this next song. I wrote this song 15, 16 years ago, maybe more, 17 years, for solidarity. [??? Something in Polish] So I will sing for you just the verse, from my heart to you. Because ahh, Poland, Poland, Polsta changed the world, you know 'Change The World'.

Jon Anderson:
Our wonderful keyboard player, all the way from Moscow, a really great guy, Igor Khoroshev!

Jon Anderson:
The grand master of the bass guitar, Mr. Chris Squire! And the amazing drumming, the original action man, Mr. Alan White here!

Jon Anderson:
[??? Something in Polish] Thank you so much. I need a drink. Where's that guy? I need a Coke-a! [??? Something in Polish] Three Coke-a! I'd like to thank, ahh, everybody for coming this evening. Thank you. [??? Something in Polish] This song, we'd love you to sing, and half way through, these guys, these, ahh... don't worry, let me talk to this guy. Excuse me, Mister, um, hello. It's okay, they can dance. Let 'em dance, and have singing and cha-cha-cha. So, half way through, not the beginning, yet. Not the beginning, half way through. I'll show you, I'll say everybody stand up, like this. Where's those cows? Oh, they're okay. What's that? What is that? Okay. It sounds like, ahh, one of those little cars you have, like Porsche. Here's a song, sing along please.