Entre_Perpetuo

Wow, it took me forever after posting the thread to actually come up with a list myself. A lot harder than I thought! Even in the background in the mid eighties, Alex never ceases to stand out.

Not sure if this thread has been done before, but I figured I'd start it anyways. Pretty straightforward: what's the best guitar sound/song on each album. In your opinion of course (unless it disagrees with mine ;) ) (As usual posting only the albums I've listened to ) Rush: ...Working Man for the riff, but if you ignore Alex's less experienced earlier style the whole album is great for guitar! 2112: 2112, namely the solos in Presentation, Soliloquy, and Grand Finale, but I love the start of Something For Nothing AFTK: Xanadu (for the intro) Hemispheres: La Villa Strangiato (was there ever any question?) PeW: The Spirit Of Radio MP: Red Barchetta Signals: The Analog Kid P/G: Between The Wheels PoW: Territories/Middletown Dreams HYF: Turn The Page/Open Secrets/Lock And Key ... CA: Clockwork Angels (that guitar entrance is still the most amazing sound on the album to me)

I love that song too. You are right - the song has a lot of energy. I just listened to Grace Under Pressure in its entirety (thanks Lorraine). My opinion hasn't changed. Its a good album. Red Sector A is still the star for me followed closely by Between The Wheels. Red Lenses is one of their worst of at least that era and probably ever..... Power Windows tomorrow and then it gets scary from there..... Really glad to see you're getting in depth out past Moving Pictures, Narpski. :) Red Sector A's definitely my favorite, but I don't think DEW get's enough credit in the forum, like CTTH and Tom Sawyer. DEW is an excellent song as well. I have the albums up to Power Windows and have heard them many times over just not the 80's one's recently. I know the bass tone ( the Wahl or whatever it is) is going to kill me on HYF. I like Mission but the rest we will see on Thursday..... Well, I love Forced Ten and Lock And Key from HYF, but the last two songs especially are semi-forgettable, if that helps your pre-listening experience. Thanks. I will probably have to hold my nose but I am going to get through it. The one's beyond that are really going to be problematic I have a feeling. I tried to listen to Roll The Bones before once or twice. Yowza.... :( It'll get better after you plow through Presto and Roll The Bones. You should AT LEAST like Nobody's Hero or Driven. Also, Lock and Key on HYF is badass. You know that's saying something when you put "badass" and "Hold Your Fire" in the same sentence. I didn't know where else to stick this thought so here it goes. As promised I listened to Power Windows today. Its not even as good as I remembered it being. No wonder it ended there for me.... :( Given that's the case, I'd be surprised if you end up liking anything off Hold your Fire. I think you'll like all of their albums up to and including S&A a little more, though. Yeah, I'd say PoW and HYF are probably the most musically similar albums in Rush's catalogue...good luck Narpski.

Marathon Cygnus X-1, Book I: The Voyage

I have so many I could post, but I took to long reading the thread :D My personal favorite is "pictures that you plug into your eyes," though. :P

Treat it as less of a standalone song and more of a soothing segue between two rocking tunes and you have a short piece of music that is absolutely essential. Its to good at its job to dislike, and actually, I love it! Trust me, I totally understand it's near-perfect album placement, just like Different Strings is to Natural Science, and AFTK is my favorite Rush album, guaranteeing my affection for Madrigal, but in the end a song aught to be able to stand on it's own two feet no matter how well it fits into the scheme of an album. Madrigal just doesn't have that ability.

To me Natural Science and Jacob's Ladder sound more like music from the future, they're not really throwbacks You're basically right, they're both highly progressive and sound noticeably different from past epics, but looking at the whole picture, prog moved more towards TSoR type stuff than Jacob's Ladder in the 80's (which is more progressive than Natural Science IMO).

I love that song too. You are right - the song has a lot of energy. I just listened to Grace Under Pressure in its entirety (thanks Lorraine). My opinion hasn't changed. Its a good album. Red Sector A is still the star for me followed closely by Between The Wheels. Red Lenses is one of their worst of at least that era and probably ever..... Power Windows tomorrow and then it gets scary from there..... Really glad to see you're getting in depth out past Moving Pictures, Narpski. :) Red Sector A's definitely my favorite, but I don't think DEW get's enough credit in the forum, like CTTH and Tom Sawyer. DEW is an excellent song as well. I have the albums up to Power Windows and have heard them many times over just not the 80's one's recently. I know the bass tone ( the Wahl or whatever it is) is going to kill me on HYF. I like Mission but the rest we will see on Thursday..... Well, I love Forced Ten and Lock And Key from HYF, but the last two songs especially are semi-forgettable, if that helps your pre-listening experience.

I've never been to a real concert with tickets and public access and everything :(

I love that song too. You are right - the song has a lot of energy. I just listened to Grace Under Pressure in its entirety (thanks Lorraine). My opinion hasn't changed. Its a good album. Red Sector A is still the star for me followed closely by Between The Wheels. Red Lenses is one of their worst of at least that era and probably ever..... Power Windows tomorrow and then it gets scary from there..... Really glad to see you're getting in depth out past Moving Pictures, Narpski. :) Red Sector A's definitely my favorite, but I don't think DEW get's enough credit in the forum, like CTTH and Tom Sawyer.

Madrigal. It easily has the least to offer lyrically and musically out of all of these albums (aside from maybe Lessons, but Lessons rocks harder). It's only saving grace is it's perfect album placement (which any good song shouldn't rely on) and being on one of these most amazing albums giving fans a reason to like it (or at least, that's mainly why I like it :P ).

Going with the albums I've yet listened to, as usual. Rush: ...whatever prog is here is equal throughout the album... 2112: 2112 AFTK: Cygnus X-1 (sorry, Xanadu's awesome and all, but Cygnus is waaay further out there) Hemispheres: Cygnus X-1: Book II (but you could make a decent argument for La Villa since it hadn't really been done before) PeW: The Spirit Of Radio (this is a tough one, really. But after Hemispheres, being progressive meant progressing in new ways, Ladder and Science were epic throwbacks towards the seventies definition of prog, even with a forward sound, but TSoR really jump started the next era of progressive rock, if you ignore Pink Floyd's The Wall that is) Moving Pictures: Tom Sawyer/Vital Signs/Witch Hunt (really all three were well beyond any kind of sound prog had known before, but if I had to pick one, it'd probably be Tom Sawyer. Where TSoR latched onto a modernized sound, pushing prog forward, Tom Sawyer came full circle and helped define the sound of prog in the 80s) Signals: Subdivisions/Losing It (equal) GuP: Between The Wheels PoW: Middletown Dreams (very, very tough one. Most of this album is so very 80s sounding, it's difficult to pick out much progression at all) HYF: Force Ten (or maybe Tai Shan :P ) ... CA: Clockwork Angels

Easily the Hemispheres Tour. The voice plus most of the best of their proggy seventies genius. If I could pick two I'd go with T4E though, if only for the full 2112.

Losing It most definitely! Heck, it should've been on the last tour since they had they whole string section going with them. Easily one of their absolute best slow songs.

Forced Ten Marathon

Need Some Love I Think I'm Going Bald

"Living in their pools, they soon forget about the see..." —Natural Science "The most endangered species The honest man Will still survive annihilation Forming a world State of integrity Sensitive, open and strong" —Natural Science

Afterimage 2112 Overture

Half The World Tai Shan

Ha! I did that just to screw with the thread. :P Red Lenses Kid Gloves

In The Mood Red Lenses

The Garden Tears

Permanent Waves Hemispheres

There is no such thing as too much love for one of the greatest songs ever written by any band anywhere at any time. So why is it that you give Closer To The Heart NO LOVE AT ALL?? It doesn't even belong on the album because it doesn't fit in with the other songs. Back in the seventies when AFTK came out, the only song ever played on the radio was CTTH. I didn't dislike it, but I didn't really like it either. It was just a song and there was nothing unique or impressive about it. It is on account of that song that I never bought the album and didn't think much of Rush. Seems to fit really well into the album for me. Acoustic folky intro, simple synth lines, high-fantasy lyrical references, odd percussion, high pitched Geddy. Heck, it fits more than Madrigal. But I love that song, it basically introduced me to Rush, so I may be biased. :P

I posted a while back and chose Cygnus, but even though Cygnus will always be my favorite, I think Xanadu is really the better song. ...but I'm not changing my vote, too much love for Xanadu already :P