rftag

In terms of studio albums, I love the acoustic guitar intro to the title track on Farewell To Kings.

 

I also love the intro to Camera Eye.

 

I terms of live albums I love the "Broon's Bane" intro to Farewell To Kings on ESL.

 

There is one song by Rush in which I think the intro sucks, but it makes the song that follows the intro all the more awesome (Witch Hunt).

 

But in the broadest sense, what can top the intro to 2112?

 

 

I think HF was one of the best songs on CW, and was really good live on the R40 tour.

 

I see the song as a welcome homage to their 70s era hard rocking stuff, but in my personal opinion it's definitely not a contender for top 20 status.

I'd be surprised if they had never done LSD and shrooms, considering the era in which they came up.

 

Alex has talked about doing Ecstasy.

 

They've probably also all done some coke, given the nature of the industry and the era in which they came up. In fact I've read second hand reports online that Neil had a coke problem at one point and has written about it (I've never read any of Neil's books).

 

I doubt they ever did heroin or PCP.

 

They obviously never got deep into the hard stuff (except perhaps for psychedelics in their early days).

 

Alex smokes weed like a Rasta to this day of course...

My favorite is definitely the cover of Hemispheres.

 

Runner-ups would be Permanent Waves and FTK, in that order.

 

I also really like the covers of TFE and Presto but don't like the albums.

I'm totally satiated with what Rush have us, and the R40 tour was an improbable blessing.

 

We got to see them do stuff again we thought we would never hear again live.

 

My only gripe is their pussyfooting around the question of to what extent they are "done:.

 

That. Annoys. Me.

 

Just tell us what we can reasonably expect from 'Rush' in some form or other in the future.

 

A single possibly?

 

A limited engagement somewhere playing a short list of old stuff?

 

Don't leave us hanging.

 

Just say you're done as Rush for cridakes

 

I'm totally satiated with what Rush have us, and the R40 tour was an improbable blessing.

 

We got to see them do stuff again we thought we would never hear again live.

 

My only gripe is their pussyfooting around the question of to what extent they are "done:.

 

That. Annoys. Me.

 

Just tell us what we can reasonably expect from 'Rush' in some form or other in the future.

 

A single possibly?

 

A limited engagement somewhere playing a short list of old stuff?

 

Don't leave us hanging.

 

Just say you're done as Rush for crisakes

I vote "hell no", but I can understand why some might think it's overrated.

 

The reason is that a lot of people consider side two to be underwhelming.

 

I personally never cared for Vital Signs, and didn't initially like Camera Eye (though now it's one of my favorite Rush songs); always loved Witch Hunt.

 

I think it's a great album, and certainly one of their best, but I definitely don't think it's their best album.

I would say yes. In my opinion, there is only one minor flaw: The Camera Eye doesn't need to be as long as it is. It's a good song, but it would have been just as good (if not better) if it were only about 5-6 minutes long.

 

Way back when I first listened to Moving Pictures, Camera Eye did nothing for me. I regarded it as filler; I just thought it was way too long and repetitive.

 

Then at some point - I can't recall when but it was a long time ago - I was listening to the album while dozing off and fell in love with that part that comes at the beginning of the NYC and London parts where there is that repetitive 4 chord pattern where the 4th chord is sustained. I made a loop of that sequence and listened to it again and again and again. I found it so soothingly meditative.

 

[Kind of ironic since one of the things I initially didn't like about the song is that I thought it was too repetitive.]

 

It became one of my favorite Rush songs and was thrilled to see it was on some R40 stylists.

 

I saw two shows on the R40 tour but Camera Eye wasn't in the setlist either time (neither was Natural Science, another song I really wanted to see). My only regret about the R40 tour (fortunately I got to see them play both on live periscope feeds).

 

I loved Witch Hunt from the first time I heard it (many do not), but never liked Vital Signs (still don't).

 

This is why I can understand why some may think MP is overrated; a lot of people don't particularly care for any of the songs on side 2 (though for me the only disappointing song on the album is Vital Signs).

It's a great album not perfect. I like all of the songs on the album except Vital Signs. With all due respect to fans of the song I always thought it was a real stinker (the ending is the best part but most of the song sounds like they're channelling Supertramp; it sounds more like a Signals song and I always thought it's positioning as the final track on the album - although it was one of the first recorded - seemed to 'signal' the sonic direction in which they were headed).

Best 3:

1. Subdivisions

2. New World Man

3. Analog Kid

 

Worst 2:

1. Chemistry

2. Digital Man

 

I used to hate Countdown and at one point might have had it listed among the worst but it has unexpectedly grew on me in recent years and now I'd probably rank it as the fourth best song on the album.

 

 

 

 

Entre Nous by several miles.

 

I'm surprised it isn't more popular. It was released as a single but never took off like TSOR or Freewill did.

 

The instrumental midsection is one of my favorite things Rush ever did. Just beautiful.

 

Cinderella Man isn't a bad song by any means in my opinion but I've never listened to it unless I was listening to the whole FTK album; I've not once felt the need to play it alone. I have on many occasions felt the need to hear Entre Nous.

 

I personally think the title track to FTK is very underrated; I have many times felt the need to listen to that track.

Time Stand Still.

 

Either that or Didacts and Narpets.

It is a fairly obvious bemoanment of zealotry, mob mentality, bigotry, ignorance, prejudice, fear of 'the other', whether the 'other' be immigrants, minorities, people with unorthodox ideas, etc.

 

The last few lines of the song sum it all up:

 

"Quick to judge

Quick to anger

Slow to understand

 

Ignorance

And Prejudice

And Fear walk hand in hand"

 

This isn't one of their songs where the message is in anyway ambiguous, in my opinion.

I assume "heaviest" means hardest rocking (i.e. their more 'metal' stuff). I would think that is how most would interpret "heaviest", but some might take "heaviest" to mean "most profound", in which case it could in principle be a soft acoustic guitar or synth driven song.

 

I am responding with the presumption that the OP was asking what we think Rush's 5 hardest rocking songs are (perhaps the OP could clarify what he or she meant by "heaviest"; if he or she already has I apologize for not seeing that clarification before I posted).

 

I'm also considering only studio versions of original Rush tracks that appeared on one of their albums (thus excluding songs from Feedback, particular versions on live recordings, or rarities that never appeared on a studio album like Garden Road).

 

This in my opinion immediately limits the selection to their first four albums, because in my opinion that is where their heaviest songs are found.

 

They reintroduced a harder rock guitar sound into some of their music in the 1990s and it would be a part of their musical palette to some extent forever after, but I never really found any of that stuff to be particularly "heavy" in the hard rock sense; certainly not as heavy as some of the tracks on their first four albums.

 

So, in order of least to most heavy of the heaviest, here we go:

 

5. Anthem: The opening and the echoing guitar riff just make this a very heavy hard rocking song, though it's way too mellow in parts to be higher in this list.

 

4. Bytor and the Snowdog: This is a very hard rocking song; one of the few in Rush's catalogue which one would be hard pressed to argue isn't heavy metal. But as their first full blown experimentation with prog it too often sounds more psychedelic or proggy to rate higher in this list in terms of pure heaviness.

 

3. Bastille Day: This is basically Rush anticipating Bruce Dickinson era Iron Maiden by 6 years. A heavy song, arguably heavy metal; I can never listen to this song without imagining how it would sound with Bruce Dickinson singing it. But perhaps the Iron Maiden association is driven in part by the fact that it's a song about an historical event and Maiden loves to sing about historical events.

 

[Would have LOVED to have heard Dickinson fronted Iron Maiden cover this in their prime.]

 

2. Cygnus X1 (Book I,from FTK): A close contender for the number 1 spot, the heaviest (in the hard rock/heavy metal sense of the term) parts of this song are arguably heavier than anything on 2112, but it's not heavy in enough of the song to rate number 1 in terms of heaviness.

 

1. 2112: Overture, Temples of Syrinx, and Grand Finale are in my opinion the heaviest and most metal Rush ever got, with the possible exception of Cygnus X1 (Book I, on FTK). The parts of The Presentation when the priests respond are also pretty heavy.

It would definitely be the period from their debut through Signals.

Boy, I sure have been out of the loop.

 

So, they finally made it clear that they are definitely done?

 

Haven't seen the Time Stand Still documentary.

 

I was fairly certain they were done at the end of the R40 tour, but there were conflicting reports as to whether they were truly "done done" for at least a year after R40.

 

Originally the narrative was that R40 was definitely the last tour "of that scale", but they were cheekily leaving the door open to there being "more Rush" in some unspecified way in the future; whether that meant releasing new singles occasionally or a new studio album without a significant tour or a one off live performance now and then was left as an exercise for the reader.

 

I take it that the Time Stand Still documentary finally removed all doubt?

 

Does it sadden me? Not particularly. They had a great run, and the R40 tour was a great exclamation point at the end of the sentence. I saw two shows during that tour and thoroughly enjoyed both.

 

My only regrets are that I had tickets to the final show in LA but couldn't make it, and that they did the same setlist at both of the shows I saw (Atlanta and Portland), setlist A; it was setlist A again at the final show ironically.

 

I really wanted to see them do Natural Science.

 

Oh well.

 

That was a great tour. All of the setlists were good (some a little better and longer than others) and the whole Periscope thing allowed us to 'see' the shows we couldn't be at in real time, with live comments, which was great.

 

It's not like they had another Permanent Waves in them. I appreciate everything they did in one way or another over their 4 decades, but they passed their peak in terms of studio albums decades ago. Their last 2 studio albums were surprisingly good for a band of their age - a lot better than a lot of the stuff in the years between Signals and Vapor Trails.

 

But in terms of studio albums it's really been a process of lowered expectations for me ever since Signals. Their last two albums exceeded my expectations considerably, but truth be told they weren't on the level of anything from the Terry Brown years, even if they were arguably better than anything they put out since then (a remarkable achievement).

 

I'll miss the shows more than the prospect of new materiel frankly. Rush live was always very special.

 

It's always a bit sad to see the end of an era. I think it's cool they lasted as long as they did and were as good as they were so late in their run.

 

They gave us more than enough.

 

I'm more appreciative than sad.

The first Rush song I ever heard was "The Spirit of Radio", and I loved it immediately. I didn't know it was Rush however (I hadn't yet heard of Rush) and was wondering who the woman singing the song was. That would have been sometime in 1980.

 

I first became aware of Rush from seeing older kids wearing Rush concert shirts and/or Rush album covers painted on the back of their denim jackets (that was a thing in the early 80s). They were typically long haired, leather jacket wearing types which led me to presume they must be a pretty intense heavy metal band. I had no clue that this was the band that did that song I had heard and liked so much.

 

I didn't realize The Spirit of Radio was a Rush song until years later.

I had an English teacher in high school who actually assigned us the lyrics of "The Trees" as a poem to study and interpret and write an essay about.

 

She actually graded us as being more or less correct in our interpretation in accordance to how closely our interpretation mirrored hers, which she revealed after all the papers were turned in.

 

According to her, this was a metaphor for the US civil rights struggle; the Oaks were the whites, and the Maples were the blacks.

 

She offered as conclusive evidence of this the line "they wonder why the maples can't be happy in their shade" (i.e. shade was a reference to skin color).

 

She also asserted that the "noble law" was a reference to the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which she seemed to think had forever ended racism.

 

My personal opinion is that this song is one more inspired by weed than anything else, but to the extent one wants to find a "deep message" in it, it seems to have been intended to impart some sort of libertarian ideological point (Neil was presumably still quite enamored of Ayn Rand at this point).

 

Great song nonetheless.

I think the main thing that has kept me interested in them even when they veered into musical directions that didn't particularly appeal to me is that their first 8 albums are so incredible. That and the fact that they are a great live band.

 

That's not to say their post-MP material doesn't do anything for me (in fact their last two studio albums were in my opinion the strongest since the Terry Brown days), but they generally don't do for me what the first 8 albums did.

 

Nevertheless I've never felt my continued interest in them was unrewarded. They're always interesting.

 

And Rush fans are usually very cool, interesting people, so I've met a lot of great people over the years

 

 

Their first 8 albums and their live performances.

 

 

 

 

 

The transition from pre-chorus to chorus for Witch Hunt is literally a musical orgasm.

 

Agree with this, but respectfully disagree with everything that comes afterwards.

This thread is WAY too long to check and see if I'm not repeating something someone else already said here, but my (probably) unpopular Rush opinions are as follows:

 

1. I think the debut album is awesome

2. I think the title track to Farewell To Kings is a great song

3. I don't think any album after Moving Pictures is as good as anything before (that may not be an unpopular opinion). This is very subjective of course and is not intended to say that no albums after MP aren't great; I just think the ones before touched me in a way the ones after didn't.

Geddy Lee producing or playing bass for Metallica strikes me as an oil and water mix. Especially at that point in time, when Geddy was enamored of a synth driven, more 'pop' rock sound and Metallica was still extremely heavy.

 

I actually liked Metallica's first 4 albums, but nothing afterwards.

 

They are very different bands of course with a very different aesthetic. But there are some interesting parallels.

 

Both bands' debut albums were rawer and harder rock than what followed (though Metallica was of course in a much heavier genre of rock than Rush; thrash).

 

Both bands changed their sound a lot with each release, and both were criticized and praised for it.

 

Both bands have a point in their album catalogue which divides many of their fans as to whether they were ever as good afterwards.

 

For Rush, that point is either Moving Pictures or Signals. For Metallica, it's either Master of Puppets, And Justice For All, or 'The Black Album'.

 

But after all is said and done it's really a comparison of apples and oranges.

Overrated - Roll The Bones - I realize that there are a lot of people don't particularly care for the song - but the fact that anyone likes it makes it overrated

 

Underrated - Circumstances - great song, and Geddy is more amazing than usual on it

 

Yes. I think Roll The Bones may be their worst song. Rush rapping? Ouch.

Most underrated? Well, I think the debut album is generally underrated. But I've always thought the title track from Farewell To Kings is underrated. I think it's a great song but it seems that's a minority opinion.

 

In The End from FBN is another that comes to mind. I think it's awesome, though I've never been entirely sure what it's supposed to be about (Neil didn't write the lyrics).

 

Another underrated one IMHO is Witch Hunt.

 

Most overrated? Two great songs which I nevertheless think are overrated are Tom Sawyer and Limelight. Don't get me wrong; I love them both. But I think they're overrated.

Rush are done.

 

Lifeson and Lee maybe not.

 

End of.

 

Probably.

 

I think the most likely possibility is that they make some new material to release either as singles and/or include on one of their numerous compilations.

 

I don't expect another album of all new material but don't think it's necesarily an impossibility.

 

They have ostensibly written off the possibility of another full scale tour, but haven't really given us any idea of what a less than full blown 'tour' might be. A one night show? A handful of shows at select venues? Fans would love it of course but I suspect it wouldn't be feasible from a costs/benefits analysis.

 

It would be nice if the boys could give us a firmer sense of what if anything we can reasonably expect but I imagine they don't know themselves.

 

The ambiguity as to their status as a band is somewhat frustrating but I don't fault them for it.

 

If we've seen the last of them R40 was certainly ending on a high note.

 

I am skeptical of the prospects of a scaled down tour, since it typically takes several shows before they hit their stride and I'm not sure they ever would on a significantly scaled back tour. We need to be careful what we wish for.

 

They could of course do what a lot of other iconic bands have done late in their careers and fill the stage with a dozen or so session musicians but that wouldn't be a very dignified exit.

Don't share your preferences but love the information. Always interesting to hear new insights as to why their sound changed so radically after MP.