maxdistortion

First post in a long, long while. I was so excited about this release, but I'm disappointed as hell that its gonna be the same concert as Disc 3 of Different Stages. I guess it might be cool to hear Closer To The Heart, 2112 and the drum solo , but Ged's voice was pretty f***ed that night. Heres hoping the 40th Aniversary of Hemispheres has more rarities next year.

I donno about you guys, but to me, I've been "bracing myself" for Rush retiring since about the Time Machine Tour, at the very least. I made sure to see rush multiple times each tour since they reunited in 2002, because its just one of those things where you gotta see them while they're around, and they wont be around forever. And hearing Ray Danniels say "its somewhere between possibly and probably" that it would be Rush's last tour, pretty much sealed the deal for me. its not news to us that Neil just doesn't like the grind of touring. So hearing him develop chronic pain issues from all the years of playing, and generally he's in a good place in his life where he wants to enjoy family more, its not entirely out of the question, and he deserves it , epecailly after what he experienced already once in his life in '97-98 that nobody would wish on their worst enemy, and especially after giving us so much joy. We got what was, in my humble opinion, their best tour, they went through it with minor hiccups but proved on many a night that they still had it, and are going out on a high note. My biggest thing i can relate this all to , personally, is Lemmy from Motorhead. God bless him, I love him to bits, and I've been a fan for a long time, but it absolutely DESTROYS me, seeing him struggle up there on stage 50% of the time. I would die on the inside, seeing Geddy, Alex or Neil bow down to the struggles of old age. They've been DEFYING their age for years. Its inspiring to see them kick so much ass well into their 60's. I'm completely at peace with them choosing to bow out right at around their age, because usually once your north of your 60's, especially if you're a heavily touring drummer or vocalist, it gets alot harder on them, and it shows. They can do whatever they want. The boys did good. Its been a wonderful half-decade or so to be a Rush fan. We dutifully listened and celebrated Snakes and Arrows and Clockwork Angels, they recieved their dues by getting their own documentary, countless endorsement and praises from many respected musicians and talent worldwide, FINALLY got into the hall of fame, and in the end , thanked and rewarded us by indulging our insatiable appetite for the back catalogue this past year. Well done. If this is the end, they couldn't close it off any better.

You are so sweet! I am flattered! Could you imagine drummer tryouts for Rush? There are so many better drummers in the world than me! That being said I better hit my drum room!! Time for some Hemispheres in your honor!! :) So yes mission accomplished. Strangely enough I must have some "bad wood" or your motivation made me hit the skins harder! I broke a NP 747 on "Book 2" and then cracked the other one in half on "La Villa!" RUSH ON! Well, gee, Earl, I'm sorry. :( It's ok! It happens!!! I love helping to keep Promark in business. I've been used the Promark 747 since they were created. Way before Neil's sig was on them! Just saying that I just don't use his sticks to be trendy. I love the Japanese oak over American hickory! It's just me! Promark is the worst... Vater all the way ;)

the only song on the DVD I have kind of a hard time listening to would probably be YYZ.

why do I have this sinking feeling that Dave Grohls gonna be knocking on Alex/Geddy's door..

I thought they were on fire that night in Toronto. But I watched the Las Vegas and Denver bootlegs and my jaw is on the ground. Ged sounds unbelievable.

I had friends over to watch this thing last night. Few glasses of wine and a joint. Overall impression: - this video... this tour... goes without saying, that it was a GIFT. Neil went above and beyond to play through his various issues (chronic tendonitis I believe), Alex battles psoriasis and sore joints all the time, and Ged - who we've all slagged from about 2007 to 2012-13 as being shsaky vocally - Whatever diet he's on (avoiding dairy, red meat, and alcohol among others) is really working for him, as he actually sounds very good. Geeky analysis: David Bottril did an admirable job mixing. My few critisisms are that I find it a little too "subsonic" heavy. Ged's busy basslines don't suit that very deep range. the drums could be alot louder, but thats been a frequent problem on every release since around R30. Alex's sound is all over the place, sometimes good sometimes bad (the verses in Camera Eye are CRINGE-inducing... that "piezo" pickup sound... other than that it ranges from tolerable to great). As far as mixes go, I noticed on the Blu-Ray its slightly better, especially if one uses "DTS" setting. And I agree the iTunes version is slightly lacking compared to the Blu-Ray audio. **AND YES, ITS NOT THE BITRATE DIFFERENCE, ITS THE ACTUAL MIX THAT MATTERS**. At the end of the day, Rush gave us their all for this tour, and I'm so glad we experienced it, and we have a good representation of the fantastic tour that this was :)

t4e was the closest rush ever got to sounding alternative-grunge in the 90s. i can see how alot of people wouldn't really like that. i personally i loved that stage but thats beacuse I grew up in that time, and i was listening to alot of Silverchair, Our Lady Peace and the like. so it made sense especially as an impressionable youth.

All throughout the tour he couldn't nail that solo! I was sitting there wondering how it sounds so good on the single... that explains it, lol.

Just like the tour ;) :( Down with geoblocking ! At first I tried Amazon.com (where the sample was originally posted) but couldn't download it there, because I'm from Canada. Thankfully it was up on iTunes though so I just downloaded it from there. Odd that they dont have it more available worldwide...

I love it. Its everything I thought it'd be! Can't wait to hear Xanadu / Hemispheres and all that ... 2 more months till we get the whole show!

Interesting...I've always thought that there was a very stark shift in the way drums were generally produced to sound between the '70s and '80s. In the '70s, I hear much more reverb or resonance associated with the bass drum, and almost none from the snare- the smack on a snare sounds extremely short and crisp, and the bass drum kicks are booming. And then in the '80s, with the elements of new wave that bled over into rock and pop, it was exactly the opposite- much more resonance or reverb on the snare hits, and little to none on the bass drum. Maybe that's going off on too much of a tangent, but your comment got me thinking about it. Oh whoops I meant like... 80s circa permanent waves through signals . drums were mostly still dead-ish sounding throughout the 80s but they just splashed it in artificial reverbs and whatnot .

Yep i was there :) I was 12 at the time. I remember the show being flawless. I've seen fan-shot videos on youtube over the years, and thusly I dont think the set was very edited on the DVD. Rush back then were just able to easily churn out perfect shows back in those days. It wasn't until about Snakes and Arrows era that you could see age catching up to them. I wasn't paying too close of attention to how the crowd was, but it was a very polarizing setlist (kind of a prelude to what the S&A tour and C/A tour became). The crowd were completely dead to all of the newer material, yet erupted when they played Red Barchetta, Natural Science, and of course all of 2112. I had just bought Test For Echo about 6 months earlier, and knew it start to finish. So i recall being the only person practically in the entire place air drumming to the T4E songs. Every single one of them :)

I'm 99 percent sure that on recent live releases, they re-sampled the drums altogether. If you listen to YouTube fan-filmed videos of the concerts, or of course if you attend the shows live, Neils drums are always punchy as hell, and they roar while also having tonality and they're super resonant (how he DEMANDS that his drumsets are now, in stark contrast to that 70s'80s crisp but quick and sharp attack) The sound is completely changed on the live albums. Neil likes his drums deeper and super resonant. On S/A, T/M and C/A live, the engineering team tended to make them sound higher pitched and have a very short decay, and a very soft tone. Completely different. It's actually much easier as an engineer to have a drumkit stand out when it's dead and has no ring/resonance. Thats part of why it was all the rage in the 70s/80s. So on those recent live releases, the tom tom tones were so diminished so that theyre not dominating. Which... Is blasphemy cus I'm used to Neils tom-fills being like sonic "events" that are very loud and in your face . As far as this year goes, I have to admit when I was there live, I did NOT like how Neils 80s replica kit sounded . just tuned way too low. Just was all "thud". It'd be interesting to hear what they do with that.

I'm pretty sure the same guy mixes everything. The audio should be much crisp and cleaner on DVD and BluRay than it is on CD. It's too bad the sample on Amazon is super low quality because I want to hear the full quality of the mix. The fact that its a very low quality mp3, and the mix STILL has punch and cuts through, is very promising :) Our prayers have been answered it seems!

I'll be eagerly awaiting the single. The fact that theres a possibility that David Bottril is mixing this thing gives me SOME degree of hope, after the massive disappointments that were the Time Machine Live and Clockwork Angels Live DVD. I haven't liked Rush's live releases since Rio, the most tolerable mix of the bunch probably was R30. I'm so stoked about this DVD. Glad to see it coming out this year rather than next. I was at both Toronto shows. Going full circle it seems like. I was at the 1997 Molson Amphitheatre show when I was 12, and ran across my house hooting and hollering when I heard it was gonna be released even in partial form on last year's R40 package

R40 all the way. Seeing these songs live was incredible!! And the presentation of it all too

I downloaded the entire Sector box set on a torrent once. BUT -- I have bought and owned ALL of Rush's albums seperately. (The entire 1997 Rush Remasters series). I only downloaded Sectors because i was curious about the mixing. I wasn't impressed, so I didn't bother. Happier with my '97s. Once I buy a hi-res player and a capable pair of headphones, I will probably be buying at least a handful of the 2015 hi-res remasters.

Nevermind, I found a thread on the stevehoffman forum discussing the 2015 vinyl imperfections in ridiculous detail, and more importantly the hi-res audio files. Poor quality control in the vinyl aside, the hi-res files are getting rave reviews. I'm pretty eager to check them out once I eventually take the plunge and invest in a quality set of speakers or headphones.

I read on rushisaband.com that they played the song in soundcheck in Montreal today. Which means they could potentialy play it again at somepoint. Your guess is as good as mine as to when that would be.

It was also pleasantly suprising because that was the 3rd show I went to this tour, and that was by far the best. They had something to prove that night, and I got kinda choked up thinking it had alot to do with, this is their hometown, and our hometown, and they're our favourite sons (rather, grandpappies? lol)

Yeah I agree. It was very well done. Too bad Ged's voice wasn't the best that night. On R30? I think it's fine. R30 is an excellent DVD if we're talking vocals, imo. Listen to Ged on Red Barchetta for example. R30 was a great performance overall. It was just mixed a little odd. They added a "delay" effect to ged's vocals to kinda simulate it being a live, big venue and all. It made his voice sound a bit overpowering. Compared to Rio where it was faint.

I'm not a fan of the frames per second effect they used on R30/S&A/Time Machine. It was made to resemble a "movie". something like 24fps or maybe less it seemed like. Rio and CA had a faster framerate, so the motion and movement looked more "lifelike" instead of like a "film", if that makes any sense. Something comparable would be like what Sylvester Stallone did on Rocky Balboa (aka Rocky 6). The movie was filmed in 24fps, and when they got to the fight, he wanted it to resemble a live event, so he used high shutter speeds and a faster framerate. I prefer concerts to have that feel rather than to have a dreamy movie type feel.

Well they have hi resolution downloads available so I was more interested in those but ... Are these remasters predominantly vinyl based then? I know there are hi-res versions of the remasters but maybe they were "optimized" for vinyl if that makes any sense.

I can't wait either . unlikely it'd be out for this upcoming holiday season, so likely next year. That frantic style of editing has become all the rage since about the mid 2000s. And I really can't. Stand how they're taking this mixing approach where everything is compressed, gedddys bass has no midrange tonal character (mostly deep low end and crisp clarity but without much fundamental tone). and Neils drums, with all of his air-drummable composition (not JUST drumfills), reduced to mere delicate subdued "taps" rather than the thunderous EVENTS like on r30/ different stages / exit stage left.