On the 18th of April 1975, I was part of the reverent mass of mostly males in the Apollo, Glasgow. Steve Howe played The Clap. Jon Anderson sang in that twee angelic monotone. I really didn’t understand the complications of the near-songless music, possessing none of Yes’s albums. But the band were huge, somehow I’d obtained tickets, and so, baffled, bemused and impressed with myself for being there, I wondered who the hell Patrick Moraz was. Not a patch on Rick Wakeman, anyway. There was a lot of hair, beards, flares and patchouli. I wished I understood it, was part of it. But I wasn’t.

Six months later, in an almost empty Apollo, a curious and uncertain audience faced the sly brutality and ambiguous threat of a band called Dr Feelgood. We’d read about them in NME and Melody Maker, heard little or nothing of the music. They wore suits, had short hair and made a stone-faced, vicious racket that was too alarming to be funny. Lee Brilleaux was plainly dangerous and Wilko Johnson just frightening. It was the most exciting thing I’d seen on stage since the Rolling Stones in 1973. It was maximum rhythm and blues and I understood it immediately, embraced it utterly. Some great songs, including by the legendary Mickey Jupp. It was just such a pity the first album sounded so weedy. It would be 1976 before the live masterpiece Stupidity fully conveyed their power on vinyl.

Dr Feelgood still exist, with not a single original member. Lee and Wilko are dead. and as for Yes…well. Touring next year, performing the album Fragile in its entirety, “plus classic cuts.” The lineup has Steve Howe (who I spotted in the queue for Banksy’s Dismaland in Weston-Super-Mare a decade ago), Geoff Downes from the weird Buggles era of the band and some other names I don’t recognise. Meanwhile, Rick Wakeman and his son Oliver are touring at the same time with Yes-related material, apparently.

Oh no…

David Hepworth once wrote that “all bands reform, eventually.” Well, such is the desire for an approximation of past noise that now one, or no original members will do. Remake, remodel. Hundreds of band brands are being rejigged and promoted for moneyspinning tours, for example Wet Wet Wet touring with a different lead singer and only one original member while their former front man, Marti Pellow performs the same songs backed by sessioneers. And elderly soloists like Cliff Richard strut and fret uneasily on the stage, suspiciously in perfect voice, unable to renounce that dopamine hit of audience acclaim. And the cash.

Here’s some doggerel on the subject. Oh, and Neil Young will be parading his lumpen thrash jams next year too, in Bellahouston Park, Glasgow. I would rather listen to the James Last Orchestra. Still touring, even though James himself last breathed earthly air a decade ago.

Compulsory rock retirement: A Manifesto