Yes Refuses to Stop Being Yes, and “Aurora” Is the Proof

There is something almost stubbornly beautiful about a band releasing its twenty-fourth studio album. Not a greatest hits repackage. Not a cash-grab orchestral reworking. A proper, new, full-length studio record with original material, a thirteen-minute centerpiece, and artwork by Roger Dean. Yes, the band that has outlived most of its founding members and nearly all of its cultural moment, just dropped the title track from Aurora and announced that the full album arrives June 12 via InsideOut Music and Sony Music. And it sounds like they mean it.

The single, also called “Aurora,” clocks in at seven minutes and twenty-seven seconds, which by Yes standards practically qualifies as a pop song. It was one of the first pieces the band worked on when sessions began shortly after the Classic Tales of Yes tour wrapped in 2024, and it arrives alongside an animated video by Matt Hutchings, who has previously created visual work for Greg Lake, Oasis, and Iron Maiden. The track is being positioned as a statement of intent for the album as a whole, a signal that this lineup is not simply maintaining the brand but actively pushing the music forward.

That lineup consists of guitarist and producer Steve Howe, keyboardist Geoff Downes, vocalist Jon Davison, bassist Billy Sherwood, and drummer Jay Schellen. It is the same configuration that recorded 2023's Mirror to the Sky, itself a quiet critical success that, along with 2021's The Quest, gave Yes two consecutive UK Top 40 entries and marked a period of sustained productivity the band had not seen in decades. Sherwood confirmed work on Aurora was underway as early as 2024, telling Rolling Stone that the pace was being driven by Howe's creative energy and desire to keep moving.

The recording process reflected the modern reality of a band whose members are scattered across two continents. Davison and Sherwood, both originally based in the United States, have been spending increasing time in the UK. Howe and Downes served as the central creative axis, shaping material that often originated in home studios before being woven together through constant file sharing and periodic in-person sessions. Schellen, the only member still based solely in the States, has described this workflow as standard operating procedure for the last three records. It is a far cry from the communal studio lockdowns of the Close to the Edge era, but the results apparently carry the same collaborative DNA.

The full Aurora tracklist runs eight songs plus two bonus tracks: “Aurora,” “Turnaround Situation,” “Love Lies Dreaming,” “Countermovement,” “Ariadne,” “All Hands on Deck,” “Outside the Box,” “Emotional Intelligence,” with “Jambustin'” and “Watching the River Roll” as extras. The centerpiece is “Countermovement” at nearly fourteen minutes, the kind of extended composition that has always been the band's natural habitat. Geoff Downes noted in early 2025 that the material was more progressive sounding than recent efforts, which for a Yes album is a bit like saying a pizza place is leaning into cheese.

The album will be released in digital, special-edition CD digipak, and gatefold double-LP on 180-gram vinyl. A limited deluxe edition features light green vinyl discs, a bonus CD of instrumental versions, and a Blu-ray with Dolby Atmos, 5.1 surround, and high-resolution stereo mixes. The packaging includes artwork by both Roger Dean and his daughter Freya Dean, continuing a visual partnership that has defined the band's aesthetic identity since the early 1970s.

There is, however, a complication. The Fragile Tour, which was set to see Yes perform the 1971 album in its entirety across the UK and Europe starting April 22, has been postponed. Howe requires an operation and needs recovery time. No further details have been given, and no rescheduled dates have been announced.

Meanwhile, the wider Yes universe continues to spin on multiple axes. Founding vocalist Jon Anderson is heading out on tour starting April 17 with the Band Geeks. Rick Wakeman, the band's most famous keyboardist, released a new solo album just this past November. The fact that there are essentially two parallel Yes-adjacent touring operations happening simultaneously is the kind of thing that would be confusing if it were not so perfectly on-brand for a group that has had approximately forty-seven different lineups since 1968.

What matters right now is the music. And if “Aurora” the single is any indication, Howe and company are not coasting. They are doing what Yes has always done at its best: building large, intricate, unapologetically ambitious structures out of sound and daring you not to be moved by them. Twenty-four albums in, that takes more than talent. It takes conviction.