South Side of the Sky
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| “South Side of the Sky” | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
|||||
| Song by Yes | |||||
| Album | Fragile | ||||
| Released | 26 November 1971 (UK) 4 January 1972 (U.S.) |
||||
| Recorded | September 1971 | ||||
| Genre | Progressive Rock | ||||
| Length | 7:58 | ||||
| Label | Atlantic Records | ||||
| Writer | Chris Squire, Jon Anderson | ||||
| Producer | Yes and Eddie Offord | ||||
| Fragile track listing | |||||
|
|||||
"South Side of the Sky" is a song by progressive rock band Yes from their album Fragile. It is one of the relatively few group performances on the album.
It opens with the sound of a howling wind. It then bursts into a heavy, riff-dominated rock song. At around 2:08, Rick Wakeman's piano comes in along with another few seconds of wind. the piano is gentler than the rest of the song, and even somewhat classical, but with a similar melody to it. At around 3:19, Chris Squire and Jon Anderson start singing wordless vocal harmonies along with the piano. This continues until about 5:42, when the earlier heavy riff part returns, with the wind in the background. The song fades out in the end to the same howling wind that occurred throughout.[1]
In the liner notes of the remastered edition of Fragile, it is said that this song is about a tragic polar expedition that ends in death, as evidenced by lyrics such as "A river, a mountain to be crossed/ the sunshine, in mountains sometimes lost/ around the south side, so cold that we cried" and "The moments, seem lost in all the noise/ a snow storm, a stimulating voice".[1] In the introduction to this song in Yes' 2003 concert at the Montreux Jazz Festival, Jon Anderson said, "This is a song about climbing mountains... It's dangerous, but we all must climb mountains every day."[2]
"South Side of the Sky" was covered by the band Spock's Beard. The song is heard on the special edition third disc of their album Snow.
A cover of this song, with vocal contributions by Jon Anderson, appears as the first track on Glass Hammer's 2007 album Culture of Ascent, a concept album about mountain climbing in the Himalayas.
