The Best Of The Best

Ten years after he passed away, Chris Squire's influence, both as a person and as a musician, remains as powerful as it has ever been. Those who knew him and played with him discuss the man, his talent and his legacy.

- Stephen Lambe

Chris Squire’s passing on June 27, 2015 was a massive shock to the progressive rock community. Squire was an icon — a genuinely larger-than-life figure from an era that produced so many musicians of great character and virtuosity. Although Yes co-founder Peter Banks had died two years previously, Squire was also the first artist of that stature to leave us, although his contemporaries Keith Emerson, Greg Lake and John Wetton would sadly follow within a couple of years. But when Squire died, we realised that our heroes are mortal.

It was a moment of existential crisis for many of us.

During the course of his final battle with acute erythroid leukaemia, he remained defiant. His bandmate from 1982 to 1995, Trevor Rabin, was one of the last musicians to chat with him.

“The very last time I spoke to Chris, he was in hospital in Phoenix,” says Rabin. “It was days before he passed, and he wasn’t thinking about his demise. On the contrary, one of the last things he said to me was, ‘I can’t wait to get out of here so I can get back on the road.’ There was no consideration that he wasn’t going to make it right to the end.”

It had already been announced that Squire would step back from Yes while he received treatment, with longtime friend and colleague Billy Sherwood stepping in for him, but suddenly Sherwood found himself having to fill those massive shoes on a permanent basis. He looks back on that difficult period with sadness.