They're a bit like Sparks, Jon and Vangelis, aren't they? Oddball keyboard player and falsetto vocal. I only just realised that today.
If I were asked what albums were most deeply entwined in my life, I think I'd have to name 69 Love Songs and this one. Yes, I was sixteen when I fell in love with this record, but I still love it, and I don't think of it as a 'guilty pleasure'.
This is Jon Anderson's finest hour, as far as I'm concerned. His singing, especially on the slower sections, like the second half of the title track, Outside of This and Beside is profoundly affecting and quite beautiful.
This first version of State of Independence is still the best, better than any of Donna Summers or Jon Anderson's later attempts. Apparently it came out of a fourteen-minute semi-improvised jam in the studio: I'd definitely buy a third version of the album if they put that jam out as an extra on a re-issue CD.
Remember, Ben, that first evening when we got properly chatting to each other, after I persuaded you to come and see Dick Morrissey play in Clare Cellars late in 1983? It was via Morrissey's playing on Back to School that I knew of him.
When I was Not Very Happy at school, I would listen to this record in the dark on my headphones. I knew every inflection of the vocals, and I even knew exactly where the crackles and other imperfections of the vinyl occurred. At least I thought they were imperfections of the vinyl, but when I bought the album again as one of my first two CDs five years later, I found a couple of them were on the CD too.
Early in 1982, Polydor put out a new version of the album that included I'll Find My Way Home after that was a top 10 single. It also swapped Sides 1 and 2 round. You were allowed to exchange any existing copy of the album for a new one, but I chose to keep mine, because I liked the order and the balance of the album as it was.
 MusicBrainz entry for this album
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