“I actually died in her arms. You look back and say, ‘Well, that was supposed to happen’”: Jon Anderson on the song he wrote for his wife – although it’s about the time before he’d met her

PASADENA, CALIFORNIA - AUGUST 29: Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member Jon Anderson, founding singer of the classic rock band Yes, performs onstage during his "1,000 Hands" solo tour at The Rose on August 29, 2019 in Pasadena, California. (Photo by Scott Dudelson/Getty Images) — (Image credit: Getty Images)

In 2024 Jon Anderson released True, his first album with new colleagues The Band Geeks. It includes the song Thank God, which is a message for his wife, Jane. But as he told Prog, it’s a bit more complex than that.

The illness that led to Jon Anderson’s final departure from Yes was a blessing in disguise – although it took the singer a while to realise it.

Faced with an uncertain future as the co-founding vocalist struggled to recuperate, his colleagues decided to move on with a replacement in 2009. And while Benoit David lasted only three years in the position, the arrival of Jon Davison in 2012 meant Anderson has never returned.

“I actually died in my wife’s arms,” he says of his 2008 illness. “Basically, I couldn’t stop coughing. I think I just had a leftover from a tour where they used a lot of smoke for the lights to make them look better. And in that smoke, there was something that really affected me.

“You look back and say, ‘Well, that was supposed to happen.’ I didn’t want it to happen, but I was just entrapped in the physicalness of life, and Jane was there for me.”

Thank God - YouTube

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He’s certain that Jane was always meant to be there for him, and he focused that belief on the song Thank God on True, which began taking form decades ago.

“I was in the middle of an album with Yes in Vancouver [1999’s The Ladder], and we had Christmas off, so Jane and I went to visit Robin Crow, a friend with a place outside Nashville,” he says. “He has a beautiful studio. We wrote an album and Thank God was one of the songs, although the album was never released.”

While working on True, Anderson sent the track to colleague Richie Castellano, and the result is the last number on the album. “It’s very simple, minimalistic music and he put it together beautifully. I sang it two days ago in New Jersey; my wife was in the front row, and I’m singing to her. She’s looking at me saying, ‘Get the words right!’

“The danger of doing all this music is that you register the lyrics are coming with slight nervousness. So you think, ‘Okay, I’ve got to remember the middle of Awaken, for instance, and I occasionally forget bits.”

He notes: “When I sing Thank God for her, it’s the period before I met her I’m singing about. I actually saw her in my meditations. So when I met her, I shook her hand and I thought, ‘We’re going to get married later; I love you.’”

Jon Anderson & The Band Geeks "Counties and Countries" - Official Music Video - YouTube

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While Anderson’s voice has certainly matured over the years, it’s in incredible shape for a man his age. “I feel so grateful, thankful and amazed at times that I get up onstage and I’m warbling away without too much worry,” he says.

“There’s a certain energy you attain over a period of time when you’re singing. But at times you feel like it’s not you; it feels subliminal. When I’ve got to go for a high note, like, ‘I get up, I get down’ [from Close To The Edge] I wonder if I can get it this time. As I come up to it, I’m hoping it will be okay,… and then there it is. ‘Thank you’ is all I can say!”

Does he do anything to keep his voice in shape? “Oh, lozenges! That’s basically what I use; it’s Chloraseptic. I should do an advert for them. I use them every day – though it can be dangerous when you’re sucking away at a lozenge and trying to sing at the same time.”

Jon Anderson & The Band Geeks - "Once Upon A Dream" - Official Lyric Video - YouTube

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Exercise has also been an important aid. “I started going walking just over a year ago. I live in a sort of similar place to [Lancashire home town] Accrington; the topography is the same. I’m living up in the hills, and I’d go for a walk every morning. Then, after about six months I started trotting, and now I jog and walk. I do 10 minutes of each and it’s really helped me keep as fit as I would like to be at this age.

“I just went for my one-hour exercise, and I was listening to some music that I wrote a few years ago, but thinking about the True album. It’s going to be another challenge to go on tour and perform it. That’s going to be great.”

He’s doubtful they’ll perform the full record, partly due to his Yes legacy. “I don’t know if we can; I’d hate to do it all and then everybody says, ‘But what about Close To The Edge?’ It would be good to play more of it than the three songs we’re currently doing.”

Artists

Stephen Lambe is a publisher, author and festival promoter. A former chairman of The Classic Rock

Society, Stephen has written ten books, including five about music. These include the best-selling

Citizens Of Hope And Glory: The Story Of Progressive Rock and two books about Yes: Yes On

Track and Yes In The 1980s. After a lifelong career in publishing, he founded Sonicbond in

2018, which specialises in books about rock music. With Huw Lloyd-Jones, he runs the Summer’s End

and Winter’s End progressive rock festivals, and he also dabbles in band promotion and tour

management. He lives in Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire.

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