jnoble

I can't think of any classic rock double album that didn't have it's share of filler songs that could've easily been tossed away... Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and Blue Moves records, the Beatles White Album, the aforementioned Use Your Illusions. They are always bloated and indulgent.

That's a very valid point about Use Your Illusion. ..There are some good songs on those albums but also a lot of filler and it really would have made a much better single album if they edited it down to only the best songs on a single disc. I'm also not one to throw around PC terms, but if the shoe fits... that album(s) is the most misogynistic one I've ever heard by any band. Almost every single song is a angry screed against a woman... "Bitch" this, "bitch" that. Axl was working out some inner turmoil during that era. Also the the song order didn't make any sense. A rock album always wants to start off with a bang with the best song so why You Could Be Mine was buried deep on the second side of the album where the weaker songs are usually placed made no sense to me. It should have been the first one out of the gate.

Turn The Page should've been the last song on HYF and it would've been a perfect ending with the song pointing towards the band taking a new musical direction with the next album. But nooooo......They just had to tack on Tail Shan and High Water, two mediocre songs that don't really fit with the lyrical themes of the rest of the album

I can't listen to Clockwork Angels as an album because the songs are too long & too dense with no breathing room and the mix sucks not to mention Geddy's late era weak straining cracking vocals but I like a lot of the riffs and "parts" in many of the heavier songs. If there was a way to edit out the vocals and remix each song into a shorter instrumental I'd actually enjoy it much more. Similar to my comment last year on how Spindrift starts off well and then after a minute or so I get bored with it and skip to the next song

I don't know but both Neil and Geddy were both openly big fans of that album in the many years after it came out. I'm pretty positive Alex felt differently because his guitar playing was restrained during that era of the band. And as I previously mentioned Geddy up until Clockwork Angels had always claimed roll the bones as his personal favorite album as far as quality songwriting but not it's wimpy soft soundscape

Superconductor & Half The World

I've noticed my other fav bands seemed to play everything super fast on concert in the early '80s...The Police, Elton John, others

You Bet Your Life from RTB was never played live either

HYF is one of my favs too. I think it gets unfairly overlooked by some fans.

Neil said in a pre-tour interview (I think it was the Time Machine tour?) in one of the magazines that he was interested in performing Hand Over Fist live but I guess it didn't make it past rehearsals

I'm going to say they never performed the song live ever and this is just rumor and speculation

Kid Gloves was played on several dates during the GUP tour

I can't understand 80% of what he's singing on The Clockwork Angels album... it's like he's singing in a different language on a lot of the songs

The official video was edited...the intro was shortened, some of the repeats are slimmed down. It's subtle but the studio version runs at least 30 or 45 seconds longer I think

When they performed Tom Sawyer on Colbert's show years ago I remember him sounding particularly bad

Hate is not the right word, too strong of a term but I really didn't enjoy Ged's vocals past Vapor Trails or R30 and I don't listen to most of the live concerts from their late era tours. It's not just his range but he also lost a lot of expression. His 70's voice circa 1975-'79 was phenomenal and what I enjoyed the most. I know he was older and doing the best he could but his strain and yodeling was just cringy to listen to on the final few tours

I remember reading a review for the then-new Roll The Bones album in People magazine and it was obvious the reviewer didn't even bother to listen to the album because he criticized Lee "screeching voice" and the sci-fi theme songs neither of which are anywhere to be found on that particular album LOL

I've always thought Everyday Glory sounded out of place on Counterparts... the lyrical theme and the guitar sound seems to have come from a different album. I'm not bashing it, I like the song but it just seems to stick out like a sore thumb on that one for me especially as the closing tune.

Seems like most message boards for hardcore fans of what or whoever eventually self-destruct

I relistened to disc 3 today for the first time in a long time. As much as I love the seventies era of the band it's really not a great recording mostly because of Geddy's thin nasal sounding squeaky voice since he was sick that night

I'm normally skeptical about most Rush covers because the vocals are usually terrible but those sounded great!!! Good job! And choosing less obvious tracks like Force Ten & WMT? instead of songs that have been beaten to death like TSawyer or Spirit was a good idea as well Thumbs up from me!

I also enjoy the HYF-RTB era. It didn't rock as hard as the 70s prog days and Lee couldn't shriek anymore but I liked most of the songwriting and melodies and their foray into pop-funk

'70s era Rush

The end of Grand Designs

I never warmed up to disc 1 & 2 much because I thought their live sound from '94 on was too muddy and distorted sounding