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Yes - Leave It

Music Video
ArtistYes
SongLeave It
DirectorKevin Godley
DirectorLowel Greme
IntroNo
OutroNo
Sound MixStereo
Technical Specificationscolour - format unknown

Wiki

Synopsis

Yes perform "Leave It" in formal black suits against a stark white background, but the seemingly simple setup quickly becomes a surreal visual experiment. Their bodies and faces rotate, stretch, fold, multiply, and break apart through elaborate video effects, while the band remains largely fixed in place. The image repeatedly shifts between recognizable group formations and abstract distortions, turning a straightforward performance clip into a playful study of movement, symmetry, and early computer-assisted imagery.

Factoids & Trivia

  • Eighteen different versions of the video were produced. The variations experimented with different arrangements and treatments of the band's images.
  • The version most commonly seen today is version 11, which became the standard edit and was subsequently treated as the official video.
  • MTV aired a half-hour special about the video's production in 1984. The channel also presented a marathon showing the different versions.
  • The clip was created during the promotional campaign for *90125*, the album that reintroduced Yes to a mainstream 1980s audience with a more polished, electronic sound.
  • "Leave It" was one of the early music videos to make prominent use of computer-generated and video-manipulated imagery.
  • Some of the alternate versions are now difficult to find, making the project an unusual piece of partially lost music-video history.
  • The song reached No. 24 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States.

Lyrics

(Squire/Rabin/Horn)

I can feel no sense of measure
No illusions as we take
Refuge in young man's pleasure
Breaking down the dreams we make
Real

One down one to go
Another town and one more show
Downtown they're giving away
But she never came back

No phone can take your place
...
© Yes - Leave It. This is an excerpt, provided as citation under fair-use.
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