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Permanent Waves - Good or Bad?


Lorraine
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107 members have voted

  1. 1. What do you think of Permanent Waves?

    • I love it!
    • I don't like it.
    • I can take it or leave it.


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What the frack, is this question for real? PW maybe the best album EVER!

Best 70s album ever!

Okay is this really a thing?

PW is released Jan 1, 1980.

98.6% of the album's exposuer happens in 1980.

So it is the first 80's album. No?

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What the frack, is this question for real? PW maybe the best album EVER!

Best 70s album ever!

Okay is this really a thing?

PW is released Jan 1, 1980.

98.6% of the album's exposuer happens in 1980.

So it is the first 80's album. No?

 

It really is. It has been decided that the 80s did not start until after 1982. Bit of a relief, really.

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What the frack, is this question for real? PW maybe the best album EVER!

Best 70s album ever!

Okay is this really a thing?

PW is released Jan 1, 1980.

98.6% of the album's exposuer happens in 1980.

So it is the first 80's album. No?

You sound a lot like Savage.

 

We happen to have a thread where you can present your case regarding this all important and vital Rush issue.

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What the frack, is this question for real? PW maybe the best album EVER!

Best 70s album ever!

Okay is this really a thing?

PW is released Jan 1, 1980.

98.6% of the album's exposuer happens in 1980.

So it is the first 80's album. No?

You sound a lot like Savage.

 

We happen to have a thread where you can present your case regarding this all important and vital Rush issue.

It has become a bit a controversial topic in the Rush Gospel. The Seventyalites claimeth the album belongeth in the Holy Decade of the 70s. Others claimeth the album both casteth sorrowful eyes back at a more glorious time and also becameth a harbinger of sounds to be heard in the Fallen Decade of the 80s.

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I haven't got time to argue this. I have to practice my drums. Excuse me....

Yes. Practice. Neil didn't get where he is by messing around with arguments about calendars.

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I wonder how Union feels being the only fool person who voted no? :unsure:

 

 

That's alright, Union. You stand tall and proud! :wacko:

Maybe he was listening to the wrong album. Didn't Linda Ronstadt have an album called Permanent Waves? Or maybe it was Barry Manilow?

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It has become a bit a controversial topic in the Rush Gospel. The Seventyalites claimeth the album belongeth in the Holy Decade of the 70s. Others claimeth the album both casteth sorrowful eyes back at a more glorious time and also becameth a harbinger of sounds to be heard in the Fallen Decade of the 80s.

Fallen Decade of the 80's? That is crazy talk! The 80's...yes the earlier years are slightly better. The 80's Rush is the greatest Rush! What forum do the Teens of the 80's hang out in?

 

:o You live in Enid and you're asking me?

I don't get it.

Edited by Battlestarfilmmaker
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EDIT: Moved my diatribe to the appropriate thread. To respond to the question at hand, I like it but don't love it. All the songs I like on it are done better live so I pretty much never listen to Permanent Waves as a complete album. Edited by Apollo
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"Fallen Decade of the 80s."

 

This is funny but comments on a real attitude that feeds divisiveness, with those maintaining PeW's '80s status defensively against those who claim it for the '70s, as if to leave it in the grasp of the '70s is to somehow admit to some hypothetical inferiority of '80s Rush along with '80s music in general.

 

I don't buy into the musical inferiority of the '80s music, generally speaking, at all. The '80s is really my favorite decade of music by far, even more than the '60s. The Cure, New Order, Tones on Tail/Love and Rockets, Echo and the Bunnymen, The Smiths, REM, U2, The Clash, The Police, The Gun Club, Pixies, Guadalcanal Diary, Mission of Burma, Sonic Youth, etc etc. It was/is an embarrassment of riches. '80s Rush on the other hand is a mixed bag, but I don'tclaim PeW and MP are '70s albums because I dislike the '80s (I don't at all, as I explained), but because I think they are part of the creative arc that culminated what was started with 2112. From 2112 through MP Rush was The Beatles of power chord geek rock, and I mean that in the most complimentary way, loving both power chords and geek rock (I think Radiohead from '96 through 2004 is the closest thing to classic Rush that contemporary rock has to offer, though Radiohead was embraced by the hipster Illuminati while Rush had always been dismissed; I think the reason has to do with Radiohead's post-modern pessimism while Rush was a bunch a sunny, suburban Canadians; hipsters want their art gloomy, at least superficially so). So, I really love '80s music. If you didn't live through than dig a little deeper than Cindy Lauper and Berlin and you'll find the most amazing f-ing stuff. I still get chills when I stumble across tracks like this:

 

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I love the early eighties stuff myself but, I'm sorry, nothing beat the sixties/very early seventies. Maybe you had to be there and old enough to appreciate it to understand.

 

If the music of the eighties was great, it had the sixties to thank for it.

 

All in my opinion of course. :)

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I love the early eighties stuff myself but, I'm sorry, nothing beat the sixties/very early seventies. Maybe you had to be there and old enough to appreciate it to understand.

 

If the music of the eighties was great, it had the sixties to thank for it.

 

All in my opinion of course. :)

 

It's all perspective and influence. 60's needed the fifties like the fifties needed the big band/swing/blues. All eras leading up to Y2K had identity but my concern is that I don't see decades having identity anymore. Is it my getting older and not seeing it? Maybe, but if that's the case why are there so many classic bands still packing arenas?

Edited by calirush
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Oh god, where do I start?

 

1. The music, while no doubt technically accomplished on all fronts, it feels sterile, formulaic, and there are few compositional risks taken (and when they ARE taken, they're inevitably embarrassing). It almost feels like a combination of the worst possibilities of '70s arena rock (cheesily anthemic choruses, overwrought hooks, boring songwriting) and '70s prog rock. Rush tries to appeal to a middle ground between experimentation and accessibility; nothing wrong with that, but their music fails at both.

 

2. Neal Peart's lyrics are often embarrassingly overwrought and pretentious, often reading like they were written by an acne-afflicted teen whose access to literature is limited to a copy of Atlas Shrugged and a handful of bad fantasy/sci-fi novels.

 

3. The synths, when applied, almost always end up sounding dated and artificial. While not as bad as, say, Yes or ELP, they're annoying enough to be noticeable.

Edited by Union 5-3992
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"The music, while no doubt technically accomplished on all fronts, it feels sterile, formulaic, and there are few compositional risks taken (and when they ARE taken, they're inevitably embarrassing). It almost feels like a combination of the worst possibilities of '70s arena rock (cheesily anthemic choruses, overwrought hooks, boring songwriting) and '70s prog rock. Rush tries to appeal to a middle ground between experimentation and accessibility; nothing wrong with that, but their music fails at both."

 

Hmm, I kind of get where you're coming from. From the mid-'80s until a couple years ago I completely ignored Rush, more or less agreeing with the "soul-less" tag. Then I re-embraced their '70s prog rock cheesiness/awesomeness (rock on Garth) and in doing so discovered they've made some decent stuff of late. So, while I'm not as dismissive as you I mostly agree, esp with your Vapor Trails assessment; outside of MP I think it may be their best album, looked at objectively (subjectively I'd put it below most of their '70s stuff, but I still like it more than anything from Signals on). Your affection for Power Windows confuses me in light of your broad rejection of most of their other stuff but no matter. At any rate, I don't think you give their '70s work enough credit; it was somewhat unique. Dorky but also often amazing. How one cannot give La Villa or The Spirit of Radio (just to name a couple) their due I don't get. I don't often agree with Neil but when he defends their early stuff saying they were just kids experimenting I love that; I loved the experiments and I loved the innocent enthusiasm. When you say that they failed at trying to achieve a middle ground between experimentation and accessibility I have to completely disagree; by making compositional experimentation accessible they achieved something fairly rare, sometimes unique; for my part they are the only "prog" band that has ever appealed to me, apart from some early Yes, or Floyd if you include them. I don't know of anyone else who created something like side 2 of Hemi or side 1 of Moving Pictures. Both perfection, and PeW treads a perfect balance between the two.

 

Again though I applaud your recognition of Vapor Trails; it's the only post-MP album that would make me a Rush fan apart from MP and earlier.

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I love the early eighties stuff myself but, I'm sorry, nothing beat the sixties/very early seventies. Maybe you had to be there and old enough to appreciate it to understand.

 

If the music of the eighties was great, it had the sixties to thank for it.

 

All in my opinion of course. :)

 

Oh, just defending the '80s, esp by comparing it to the '60s. The '60s will always be king, because if you want to promote another decade of music as best, you have to argue how it is better than the '60s. I wouldn't say that any decade was better than the '60s, just that the '80s is my favorite. Will always adore Beatles, early Kinks, and early Stones though. Nothing else like it.

Edited by Rutlefan
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