Natural Scientist in 2112

Haven’t logged into this site in damn near 4 years - as a teen finishing up high school, heading into my adult life, and developing more and more music interests, my obsession with Rush long since passed me by. Even still, my respect for the band’s place in my life stands very strongly and that’s always been the case in part due to the drummer. Neil holds a status in modern music history that can’t be understated. I always knew I wanted to be a drummer at some point or another, but it was only after having listened to Tom Sawyer and several other seminal Rush tunes that I knew I wanted to buy my first kit. So many others have a very similar story, and it’s all attributable to Neil’s skill and influence. Here’s to a man that, in my view, lived a great, full, rich life as not only a musician, but also a father, writer, thinker, and friend. I hope Geddy, Alex, and Neil’s family find comfort and solace going forward.

Ghost Of A Chance. Best song the band made in the 90s, IMO.

I don't really consider many Rush songs to be "terrible", save a few (looking at you, Dog Years); but some of the more mediocre ones, in my opinion, are: -Before And After -Rivendell -Tears -Cinderella Man -Witch Hunt -Chemistry -Red Lenses -Manhattan Project -Available Light Just to name a few.

One of my favorites is the one from Natural Science, about 2:20 into the song. So good. I also love the one he does in Ghost Of A Chance after Geddy sings "and make it last". Very atmospheric-sounding, I would say.

Same here, except for me it's the smell of mold. Of all the nasty things I've had the misfortune of smelling, mold growing on aging food is the only one that makes me retch. Ugh, I hate just thinking about how bad it is.

Free Bird. The instrumentals and guitar solo outro sound darn near perfect to my ears.

1) 2001: A Space Odyssey ( Lucas ) 2) Three Colors Trilogy: Blue, White and Red, by Krzysztof Kieslowski. ( Rhyv ) 3) Dumb and Dumber (ReRushed) 4) Schindler's List (Segue Myles) 5) Saving Private Ryan (Bigbobby10) 6) Billy Madison (Super25Smasher) 7) Jurassic Park (Ken Jennings) 8) The Godfather (thesweetscience) 9) Blue Velvet (vaportrailer) 10) Full Metal Jacket (NS 2112) 11) Ben-Hur (1959) (Lorraine) 12) Goodfellas (1990) (blueschica) 13) Chinatown (ReRushed) 14.) Airplane! (ILSnwdog) 15) The Big Lebowski (a rocket that ignites itself) 16) Rear Window (Lucas) 17) Ferris Bueller's Day Off (Mayra) 18) Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (NS 2112) Ah, why not. It's a classic.

Haven't seen many a movie so far in my life, but I'll go ahead and chime in here: 1) 2001: A Space Odyssey ( Lucas ) 2) Three Colors Trilogy: Blue, White and Red, by Krzysztof Kieslowski. ( Rhyv ) 3) Dumb and Dumber (ReRushed) 4) Schindler's List (Segue Myles) 5) Saving Private Ryan (Bigbobby10) 6) Billy Madison (Super25Smasher) 7) Jurassic Park (Ken Jennings) 8) The Godfather (thesweetscience) 9) Blue Velvet (vaportrailer) 10) Full Metal Jacket (NS 2112) I know I'm probably "too young" for this movie, sure. But still, it's one of the best war movies ever and I very much enjoyed watching it. And while it is heavy on the profanity, it does add to how realistic it is in its depiction of the Marine Corps and Vietnam. Another well-done Kubrick film. I'll have to check out the movies listed above in the future as well.

Jimi Hendrix ZZ Top and, of course, Primus. The Chicago-based band RLYR are extremely good as well. I also really like Cream, for good measure.

I've said this before, but Def Leppard was the band that got me into rock. Never was into it, never understood it before I heard a CD of their greatest hits on a road trip about 2 years ago. I liked Def Leppard for a long while and still do, but the main thing is that they got me out of the generic pop music I had previously listened to. There's nothing wrong with liking current pop music, but I'm never ever going back to it. Led Zeppelin made me truly appreciate a specific era of rock, the 1970s. Albums like LZ IV and Physical Graffiti opened me up to the power of raw, unbridled rock music. Still a favorite band of mine. Of course, they also inspired the most meaningful band to me out of all rock bands that I've listened to, and that is the trio out of Toronto, Ontario. Rush opened me up to music's fullest capabilities. The complexities and technicalities of their songs has been so inspiring to me; so much so that Rush are the band that made me want to play instruments myself. I picked up a bass because of those bass lines in Tom Sawyer and in Xanadu. I wanted to drum because of songs like La Villa and By-Tor. I wanted to play guitar because of songs like TSOR and Limelight. Not only that, the three have proven to be some of the most upstanding people in the world of rock. They're classy and mature, and it's hard not to appreciate that when so many of their fellow rock musicians don't fit that bill. I only discovered them in October of last year and I wish I had been born so much earlier than I was, if anything just to see them live. So meaningful to me and so meaningful to many others here on this forum. Another band I would want to thank is Lynyrd Skynyrd. Pre-crash Skynyrd were absolutely awesome. Primus as well; I love their quirkiness and Les Claypool is my 2nd favorite bassist behind Geddy.

This is a lot of songs to choose from (once again), so I'm just going to pick my favorite song from each album. PeW - Natural Science MP - Limelight Signals - Digital Man P/G - Between The Wheels PoW - Marathon HYF - Lock And Key But if I had to do the ten best songs from this period of albums... 1. Natural Science 2. Freewill 3. Limelight 4. The Spirit Of Radio 5. Tom Sawyer 6. Digital Man 7. YYZ 8. Between The Wheels 9. Jacob's Ladder 10. Distant Early Warning

I'm happy to see someone include Territories on their list. It's a great song that gets little love around here. Agreed, and I was also glad to see a couple of RTB tracks on there. Seems like RTB songs are very seldom featured on these lists and it's becoming one of my favorite albums the more I listen to it. Ghost Of A Chance is the best Rush song of the '90s, IMO.

1) Xanadu. It'll always be #1 for me. 2) 2112 (entire 20 minute track) 3) La Villa Strangiato 4) Natural Science 5) Working Man 6) Limelight 7) Freewill 8) The Trees 9) By-Tor And The Snow Dog 10) Digital Man Just missed the cut: Fly By Night, The Necromancer (very, VERY nearly put it in my top ten), Lessons, TSOR, Tom Sawyer, YYZ, Vital Signs, Subdivisions, Between The Wheels, Ghost Of A Chance, Animate, One Little Victory So many good songs and only ten spaces to put them in.

1. Geddy Lee (undoubtedly my favorite bassist, as he made me want to pick up a bass myself) 2. Les Claypool 3. John Entwistle 4. Chris Squire 5. Cliff Burton (was hard to decide between him and Geezer Butler for this spot)

Obviously YYZ. (But seriously, my favorite to sing along to is Limelight.)

Best I Can (misheard) Got to eat sh*t to rock, a hate for small talk I'm funny that way Best I Can (actual) Got an itchin' to rock, a hate for small talk I'm funny that way

In retrospect, the three most important rock bands to me are: 1. Rush - I have never heard musical virtuosity and perfection like Rush. If I had to construct a dream band, it would already be complete with Geddy, Alex and Neil. That's how much they've meant to me in such a short time span of listening to them. 2. Led Zeppelin - These guys really turned me on to the true essence of rock for the first time. Physical Graffiti was the album that really pulled me in, and Zeppelin were the band that eventually led to my discovery of Rush. I'll always be grateful for their contributions. 3. Def Leppard - This band were the first one to really coerce me into liking rock. Before Leppard, I only listened to generic pop stuff, which (thankfully) seems like an eternity ago. Photograph was one of my absolute favorite songs for a while. Eventually, I discovered harder rock, so I haven't listened to Def Leppard much recently, but they're still very important to me regardless.

Weezer, Radiohead, Collective Soul... Just trying to think of some as the 90's is a decade I'm not musically familiar with, really. Not nearly as much as the 70's.

The final results for the rankings have now been calculated after about 90 hours. Thanks to the 40 users that ranked. (Average placements in parentheses) 1. Natural Science (2.14285) 2. The Spirit Of Radio (2.65062) 3. Freewill (3.05000) 4. Jacob's Ladder (3.55000) 5. Entre Nous (4.57500) 6. Different Strings (5.80000) Final anecdotes: -Different Strings. Poor, poor Different Strings. The song had an average placement of 5.5 midway through the polls, and that number only sank to 5.8. In fact, it was ranked #6 an astonishing 11 consecutive times at one point. Still a great song nonetheless. -Jacob's Ladder managed to stay away from the bottom quite well, being ranked sixth only once in 40 polls. Again, thanks to everyone who took their time to vote. In the end, Natural Science did indeed survive annihilation.

Literally sounds exactly like my little sister, ha. Then again, she's a big fan of One Direction and "artists" of that nature. Also, she despises virtually everything I like, so.

The Necromancer. Especially the middle sections. GREAT metal there.

Alright, we're twelve hours into the rankings and so far 26 users have ranked. If they were to end now, the final standings would look like this, with average rankings in parentheses: 1. Natural Science (2.11538) 2. The Spirit Of Radio (2.57692) 3. Freewill (2.88461) 4. Jacob's Ladder (3.46153) 5. Entre Nous (4.23076) 6. Different Strings (5.5000) Some anecdotes: -Different Strings was voted 6th a whopping 21 times out of 26, with the highest rank for the song being 2. -Jacob's Ladder was the only song not to be voted last, but was only ranked in the top 3 ten times total. 78 hours left. Keep ranking.

It'll be fine. I'll just be paying attention to the rankings. I would prefer things to not stray too far off the topic, though.

That's the thing about these albums that are so good front-to-back, like PeW and MP. For example, I'd love to put a song like Jacob's Ladder at #1 because I find it absolutely terrific, but it's hard to when weighing it up against such tracks as Natural Science, Freewill, and TSOR. Just like on MP, I think a song like The Camera Eye could be worthy of the top spot if there weren't songs like Limelight, YYZ, and Red Barchetta in contention. Moral of the story: Rush are freaking amazeballs.

I'm not touching Permanent Waves because you assholes won't shut up about whether it's a 70s or 80s album! ;) Someone else can do the other albums. Basically, I just wanted to show that a REAL way to rank CAN be done for certain things. I actually went ahead and posted one for Permanent Waves. I know it seems hasty, but it might be my all-time favorite Rush album and I felt like putting it up. By the way, terrific job with these Moving Pictures rankings.