Timbale

Yeah, no live material is a big no for me...at some point I'd listen to remixes/masters, but not shelling out box set prices for it. And....I know others feel differently....but I really don't like ANY of Hugh Syme's digital artwork for any of these projects. It is cold, sterile, cutsy and childish. Doesn't represent Rush to me at all. I remember some re-release of Dark Side Of The Moon (maybe in a box set?) where the cover was rendered in some kind of mosaic tile...and maybe another one where it was actually a photograph of light passing though a prism. These are cool choices. All the Rush ones seem embarrassingly lame to me.

A few of these artists, Gabriel, Mann and Townshend in particular, would have multiple entries, but that didn't seem sporting... All Things Must Pass - George Harrison Melt (III) - Peter Gabriel Bachelor No. 2 - Aimee Mann Ram - Paul McCartney Empty Glass - Pete Townshend Robbie Robertson - Robbie Robertson Try Whistling This - Neil Finn Plastic Ono Band - John Lennon Heartbreaker - Ryan Adams The Soul Cages - Sting

Love seeing Robbie Robertson's 1st record on there - such a great one!

It's a real eye opener for me - I didn't know he had that kind of small combo thing going on back then. I'd always heard good things about his drummer, but never paid that much attention. I wish there was more live stuff from that era!

Early Elton John. I found a live record on spotify that is I think 1970 - Burn Down the Mission, Take Me To the Pilot etc... at that point, he was just playing with a bassist and a drummer, and man, it sounds good. Amazing harmonies. He made so much schlock later on, but Tumbleweed Connection and Honky Chateau are really the s**t.

This response wins the internet today.

Gorgeous. Thanks for sharing.

I sure wish they would release the Rainbow '73 show as a stand alone album - I'm annoyed they expect me to re-purchase 3 other live albums, 2 of them doubles, to get it.

Michael Penn - A Revival. Penn hasn't released a proper album in 15 or so years...but he dropped this song in 2020. I adore it...and the video is really great, too.

I shot a scene in a film where I was drumming to playback. They used the PA in the club and turned one of the main speakers (not in the shot) so it was facing the band, playing the track loud enough that it was heard over my live drums. I don’t hit like Neil…but it was still super loud.

Future Shop!! RIP indeed... It's funny you had experiences with 8 track! I must be 13 years older than you...and I actually had a really old hand me down stereo that had an 8 track player on it...but it NEVER occurred to me to seek out a Rush record on that format! I had a couple random 8 tracks that I didn't really like, and because the system kinda confused me, I just never engaged with it. Thinking about the different records coming at you at different times...I knew both ATWAS and Exit backwards and forwards before I ever really sat and listened to 2112. Even to this day, the studio recordings of the main piece and Bangkok both sound wrong to me...way too timid, haha...

Rush was around me from an early age because of my older brother. I don't exactly remember Signals coming out (I would have been 10), but I remember it being their newest album when I started really loving them. I can also remember some guys in the 8th grade saying that Rush sucks now because they'd "gone disco". I guess this was a reference to the 4 on the floor beat in The Weapon...but this seems like an obscure tune to form an insult around, even if it was on the new record. So I remember that feeling of rocker guys starting to leave the band behind...but I was an age where the direction they were going was totally fine by me - I wasn't married to some idea of what Rush had to be, because I was discovering their music all at the same time. It's weird to think of that time now...of course there was no internet, but there was also not a ton of info out there about the band - especially if you're a young kid who's not buying rock magazines. I remember one flimsy little book about them. And my brother had a mishmash of the albums - some on vinyl and some taped from his friends....We had a tape with A Farewell To Kings on side A and Moving Pictures on side B, with Permanent Waves on another tape, but the vinyl of Hemispheres. We had Archives on record - but no copy of 2112 at all. When you're 10 or 11 and that's what you have, you're not really piecing together the discography in a chronology that makes sense. It's all just hitting you as one thing. I actually remember getting the vinyl of All The World's A Stage for my 12th birthday...and being disappointed when I looked at the track listing that there was no drum solo...because YYZ wasn't on there! I just had no concept of what happened when. But I'm glad for how and when I became a fan, because I wasn't burdened with some sense that Rush was a heavy metal band and that was all. Grace Under Pressure was the first record that came out that I was waiting for - that I taped the lead off single off the radio, that I waited to see the new videos for, that I got on vinyl as soon as I could. And I loved it. I loved that they sounded modern. Led Zep was like 4 years gone at that point, and to me, that was old fashioned music. The Police, Talking Heads, Big Country...this was what was happening for me..and Rush fit right in with it all.

I have always wondered about those p/g opening slots and whether Jeff's connection to the band was acknowledged. The first show I ever saw was the September 21st '84 gig where they opened (the one that's filmed), but I couldn't remember if Geddy had maybe mentioned something onstage or not. Would have been fun if he did.

He is definitely up there for me, but not necessarily #1. For me, he is competing with John Entwistle (an amazing mix of virtuosity and melody), Pete Thomas from Elvis Costello and the Attractions, Paul McCartney (can't remember where he's from), Pino Palladino and I suppose Jaco, although my days of listening to Weather Report are over. (I do adore his playing on Joni Mitchell's work, however...) Geddy's playing has been consistently inventive and good. I'm not crazy about all of his sonic choices...I think he lost his way in the mid 80s, but I think sonically most rock music did, haha. I'm also not the biggest fan of his later, more strummy - chordy style, nor his slightly over-driven tone. I think he went a little too far with it at times. Near the end of his life, Entwistle went for this really over driven tone...it was like he knew he couldn't get that little bit of distortion from playing super loud, like in the old days, so he put a bunch of processing on his rig to kind of emulate it. But to me it sounds like a distortion pedal instead of an amp being over driven, and although Geddy wasn't as extreme as that, there's something in his later tone that has a hint of that. For me, is Moving Pictures and Signals tone is just perfection.

An offshoot trivial little thing that I noticed by watching this moment over and over (I wish I was tech savvy enough to post a link to the exact moment...) is that because the guitar dies out faster than usual, with Alex making that change, you can hear what I am certain is a moog/synth pedal holding down the last note of Overture. I am almost certain this is not Geddy's bass ringing out - it is a much lower, slightly synthetic bottom end note. I just had never noticed or thought about the fact that they were using synth on 2112 to fatten it up circa '88.

And also good eyes! I just don't see a broken string, or hear the tell tale sign, which is often that the other strings go out of tune. I also find it strange (having watched that moment a few times now, haha) that you see Lifeson play the last 2 chords of the song at his mic position...like, he's not side stage getting ready to switch, and doesn't seem to be reacting to a broken string at all.

Wow, you’ve got good ears…or I’m going deaf from all the loud music over the tears…I cannot hear that.

I was looking at the encore section of A Show Of Hands - had not watched it in many a moon - and remembered something I've always wondered about. You can tell, as I think was the general practise in shooting shows back then, that they have used one night in the venue to shoot the far away, full scope shots and another night to shoot the close-ups on stage, which is the performance we're hearing. It's usually pretty seamless, but there are, I believe, a couple moments that give it away on ASOH...including during 2112, when you can see that Alex has a white guitar in the long shots, and a black guitar in the close ups. BUT, what's interesting to me is that between Overture and Temples, Alex takes a moment ( a moment too long, as far as Geddy is clearly concerned, haha) to switch his guitar to the white from the black. Is this a coincidence do you think? It doesn't seem like he has broken a string...but it also doesn't look like roadies/techs are motioning to him to make the change. I've always been curious about this moment...but have never seen it discussed. Thoughts?

Hey - thought it might be fun to pick 5 sleeve designs that you like and 5 that you don't! Here are mine. Top 5 Signals - A very simple, strong, striking image. Love the hand drawn "font" of the name. The spacing on it, the framing around the photo...it's just a perfect piece of design. It's, like, Pink Floyd level good (and for me, the only one that reaches that height.) Exit...Stage Left - I feel like the idea is just really really clever, and it's pulled off very well. I also really like the typeface design for the band's name. Presto - I'm not sure why, but for some reason the black and white image, the shape of the hill...I don't know, it just works well for me, despite not REALLY knowing why that's the image for the record. I only ever owned Presto on CD, so maybe I would feel different holding the lp in my hand...but that image with the red RUSH (and another good font) is striking in a positive way to me. Grace Under Pressure - The cover of p/g really captures the feel of the album to me, which makes it a success. It's actually kinda busy and maybe not in a good way...but it really says something metaphorically about the contents of the songs themselves, that cold, brooding and pessimistic 80s thing. I also am always a fan of artwork breaking the rules of a form it set up (like the burn mark at the edge of the "frame" on Wish You Were Here), and the false framing becoming the water drips is a cool touch. Rush - I actually find it hard to pick a fifth that I really like...but the debut is very immediate and striking... and you can't deny that "Rush" script is pretty perfect, as their long term use of it has shown. It is not in my top 5 records by them...but I think the cover is very simple and strong. Bottom 5 Rush In Rio - f**k off with that garbage. What am I, an 8-year old?! God awful. Snakes & Arrows - busy in a bad way. All of a sudden, we're going literal, with snakes and arrows on the cover? It's ugly and really forgettable. Test For Echo - it is a simple and clear image..but I just loathe that kind of digital art. The lean into realism makes it look more fake to me. It's like seeing a movie with CGI from the late 90s. A Show Of Hands - Ugh. The colour palette is SO of its time, of course...and I just don't know why these are the image representations of the band. I just find it childish and ugly. The typeface is terrible, too. (I always thought it would have been funny - like maybe, not as the cover but as an inner sleeve design - to use the ESL art, but do a Monty Python - Gilliam-style thing where the other characters from the next 4 albums had been cut out and sort of badly added to the original image...) Clockwork Angels - again, it's a little too literal for me..although, I don't hate the idea of a clock being incorporated. But I do find it to be ugly...I guess it's the digital thing...and that red is off-putting to me. Maybe if it had been a photo of an actual clock with the indices digitally altered to be sort of melting into the steampunk icons, I don't know. The thing is it's NOT an image of a clock...it's a digitally created set of hands/indices superimposed over clouds. So it's representational...but not (to me) very artful. I wish someone had told Syme to either get Dimo Safari on the blower and tell him to bring his camera over...or get your damn paint brushes out and make something that actually reflects steampunk aesthetics better. So those are mine...the rest of the record covers fall in the middle for me. Most of them are "fine". I was going to put Moving Pictures in the top 5...but I think it's just too much of a Rush icon for me to be objective about. I'm not sure if it's great...or just the cover of a really great record. A few others, Permanent Waves and Power Windows are similar for me, I like them a lot, but I don't know if that makes them "good". Top 5 Bottom 5 - go!

His voice is the perfect vehicle for Peart's lyrics. Peart used a lot of words that many lyric writers would stay away from, I think - "microcosmic" for example - and somehow, Geddy's very enunciated style (at least in the height of his career) was perfectly suited to that stuff. His voice is unique...and I think from MP on he is kind of underrated as a singer. Rush is not overly emotional music... but he does have moments where he connects that way. It's so hard to think of his voice as separate from Rush, which is why I voted that maybe he's in my top 10 - he just IS Rush. I particularly enjoyed when he dropped down into his less shrieky register. His singing on Signals is probably my fave.

I went for Tai Shan! It is not a great song...but it is more interesting than the other two. And better sung. I had to listen to both Dog Years and Bald to assess them - it's been a long while. Dog Years is somewhat interesting musically - and the chorus is kinda catchy. But of course the lyrics are dreadful. This is where Neil had gone so far beyond scraping the bottom of the barrel that he removed the bottom of the barrel, dug straight down to China, passed by the Tai Shan mountain on his way, and kept going until he found the Dog Years lyrics... I Think I'm Going Bald, as has been mentioned elsewhere, starts off as a rip off of In The Mood, which, if you're gonna steal from yourself, jesus christ, pick a good song at least. Then it goes on to be a kinda non-song to me. The solo is ok. The vocal has always been one of my least favourite things ever. I mean, I don't know how one could deliver the titular line without sounding like an idiot - maybe Paul Rodgers or someone could - but Geddy just sounds...ugh. I can't believe I just listened to it so I could vote. Damn you.

I went with Time Stand Still. For me, it's a song that resonates...and although Anthem is a great little rocker that is fundamental to the creation of the Rush, it is kind of like a museum piece to me now. I would never listen to it as a stand alone song. If I feel like some old school hard rock Rush, and am playing All The World's... I will listen to it, but I would never seek it out as a song. TSS is a proper song in a way that Anthem isn't for me - even though it's cool in it's way. I think a lot of it has to do with the lyrics - a big part of what I like about Rush. Anthem is just this antiquated, Randian thing that, if it was a new song, I would not tolerate at all. Like, if someone was playing me a song by a new band that they wanted me to check out and "begging hands and bleeding hearts will only cry out for more" jumped out at me, I'd move along. I know some people don't care about lyrics that much, but I do, and I grimace whenever I hear Peart's early dabblings with objectivism.

It seems like there are people who find Red Lenses "weird" and unlikeable. I have always dug this tune...and the drumming in the verses - "it's the colour of your heartbeat..." is the kind of stuff that, for me, sets Neil Peart apart from other good rock drummers. He was just making such interesting, "non rock" choices around that time - it's actually progressive. I often think of Mike Portney in the Rush doc praising La Villa and and saying some thing about when they went to the shorter songs, I lost interest...and I think, dude, did you listen to the inventive shit he was doing on those recrods?! Pull your rocker head out of your ass....

Damn.

I think of Alex, maybe more than the other two guys, as indistinguishable from Rush itself. Like, I don't tend to consider him as a player outside of the band - his basically IS Rush to me. Given that, and given how much I love the band, he is among my favourites...but he doesn't "stand out" like other players for me. Like, I love Pink Floyd...but I also think of Dave Gilmour as his own entity - I don't mean because he makes solo records, just that he is a stand out of that band. I don't think Alex stands out in the world of the hard rock riff gods - the Jimmy Pages of the world - but I think where he is unique and very cool is where the melding of the less hard rock stuff entered his playing. The era where he was still ripping crazy solos, but bringing that Alan Holdsworth, Andy Summers thing to it was for me the coolest era of his playing...although the least "guitar god" part of his career.