Drummerrobin

Surely there is no answer to this thread other than In The Mood!

Underrated: Open Secrets Overrated: Losing It

This album is a true masterpiece imo. It takes the best elements from Porcupine Tree and his previous solo work, plus some new musical territories and the results are just spectacular! I not only rate it far above the other Steven Wilson solo work, I think it's better than all of Porcupine Tree's albums bar The Sky Moves Sideways. I urge anyone who hasn't heard the album yet to check it out, I REALLY doubt you'll be disappointed. And as a bonus, the riff in 3 Years Older sounds like the lovechild of Xanadu and The Wreckers - that can't be a bad thing right!?

CTTC by a country mile for me. I nominate Losing It as the most overrated Rush song...

My favourite Rush song, so yes absolutely!

I guess that makes Hemispheres "The Phantom Menace." :P I'd say... Presto is The Phantom Menace Roll the Bones is Attack of the Clones Counterparts is Revenge of the Sith Presto being the disappointment when compared to previous work, Roll the Bones being the even worse sequel and Counterparts being the one that's better than the last two but still not as strong as the earlier material. But yeah, I'd definitely take Permanent Waves over Signals for playing a whole album live. Really doubt it's going to happen though. There's just so much material from all their eras to get through that it wouldn't make any sense focusing on one album. They did it on the Time Machine tour, seems very unlikely they'd repeat that formula at this point.

It's Stewart Copeland's kit. His studio as well.

Soz. I was only using it as an example. I just don't like that song very much. But hey, I love Tai Shan! Can we consider that a fair trade?

Cut to the Chase is the only one I particularly want to hear from this album because it's a very good song that's never been done live before. Everything else from it I'll take or leave live. Don't get me wrong, I think as a whole Counterparts a strong album but that's more because of its constancy than any particular songs standing up as really great by themselves. For me, Presto is the pretty much the opposite with some really amazing songs like The Pass and Available Light but also some real clunkers such as Anagram and Superconductor.

Well he is in this video anyway...

In my mind, no way could Presto and Roll the Bones be considered to be part of "the best Rush" and no way could 2112, A Farewell to Kings and Hemispheres not be considered part of it. So I'd adjust it to being 1976-1988 - from the release of 2112 to the end of the Hold Your Fire tour. Those 9 albums are my top 9 Rush albums with Clockwork Angels coming in 10th.

Presto, Halo Effect and The Body Electric are songs that immediately spring to mind. The live versions of those songs from the last two tours completely trump their studio counterparts imo.

I'm calling Toronto. They've booked 2 dates which always makes filming easier and it makes a lot of sense if this is their last tour.

I went for... Open Secrets Second Nature Available Light Cut To The Chase Different Strings Please not Losing It

Face Up for me - just plain uninspired. How that song made the cut I do not know but I'm just going to blame Rupert Hine. Getting him back to produce RTB has got to be up there as one of the worst decisions made in the band's history I think.

Hold Your Fire is a masterpiece and the most underrated Rush album by a long way imo. Hell I'd be happy to see them play it in its entirety (yes... even Tai Shan!). Though I feel my opinion is probably not shared by many. I can see that, speaking from quite an objective point of view, how many of the other albums could be viewed as "stronger". But there's just something about this one that connected to me on a higher personal level than any of the others. Kinda hard to explain but for whatever reason, I love this album.

I'll second your recommendation of S&A's. I also agree with most of the rest of your comments about the DVDs except for CA which IMO looks like it was edited by a drunk monkey. Yeah fair enough, I agree it's not very well edited. The fact that I loved that tour so much in general is really the main reason as to why I rated it so highly.

1. Snakes & Arrows Live (Blu-ray) - Imo this is one of the best concert films ever made. The sound is fantastic, the quality of the images are flawless, the camera angles are the best I've ever seen on a live release, the choice of setlist is great and of course the performances are spot on. It's just brilliant on every level! 10/10 2. Rush in Rio (DVD) - Although the production values (the sound in particular) may not be the best, that is more than made up for by the energy from the audience and band alike and the sheer scale of the event! I think out of all the setlists from the more recent tours, this one has the best "flow" to it which I think really helps to bring the whole experience together. A really great release that imo is only marred slightly by the audio quality. 9/10 3. Clockwork Angels Tour (Blu-ray) - Another very strong release with again an excellent performance from the guys. I also love the choice of songs (though was slightly disappointed that for some reason they chose to swap Manhattan Project for Dreamline that night) and the general presentation of the show as a whole is outstanding. My only real gripe is that it doesn't seem quite as polished as some of the other releases - almost seems like they could have mixed and edited it better but they just ran out of time. Still a really enjoyable film though! 8/10 4. Time Machine 2011: Live in Cleveland (Blu-ray) - Instrumentally, I think they're absolutely burning all cylinders in this gig - truly epic stuff, especially in Working Man! I think again it's the production that lets this one down a bit. The guitar sounds are wayy too thin at times I feel. Just compare the version of Limelight on here to the S&A Live one and you'll see what I mean. Also, I wasn't too thrilled with the setlist on this tour - a bit too much filler in the first half, though I think that's almost made up for by Marathon alone! Overall though, another really good release. 8/10 5. R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour (Blu-ray) - Not the band's best performance imo. There's a real energy and spark in the other shows that seems to be missing from this one a bit. However, the production values are great here with excellent sound and video quality - second only to S&A Live I think. The setlist is also really good, though I wish there were less covers. 2/3 of the encores are covers?? I mean come on! Anyway, I'm probably being quite picky here as I still think it's a very enjoyable watch. 8/10 6. A Show Of Hands (DVD) - Strong performance and as a big fan of mid-late 80s rush, I really dig the song selection here! Like the other Replay X 3 shows, I have to knock a couple of points off for not giving us the full show. Really is a shame songs were cut, though this one is the least guilty out of the Replay films. Also interesting that the mix on the DVD is not as good as the original laserdisk version of the show which can be found on youtube. Anyway, still a good show! 7/10 7. Exit Stage Left (DVD) - Brilliant and inspired performances here! Just too bad how much is cut out. I can't believe they actually had the interviews playing over Neil's drum solo - almost disrespectful to me! Hope one day the footage gets released in full. 7/10 8. Grace Under Pressure Tour (DVD) - Yet again too much is cut out for it to be rated amongst some of the other shows. Still a very good film that maybe just lacks the urgency of the other shows. But I think again, choosing not to include staples such as the drum solo is the main reason for this. 7/10

He only gone and done it!!

Test for Echo for me. I like the song but I think it's maybe bit lacklustre when compared to the other songs here.

Hold Your Fire wins for me with Vapor Trails and Presto also being strong contenders in that department. I think Neil is in his element as a lyric writer the most when he's being more introspective and personal which I don't think he had the confidence to really do until Hold Your Fire. A lot of his lyrics pre Permanent Waves don't do a lot for me - they just feel a bit too cold and impersonal for my liking and are often hard to relate to. I think it's kind of a shame that he's known best for writing sci-fi style lyrics when actually his strongest work imo tends to be on the other end of the scale.

I'm sorry but this beats all...

Sounded very tight to me! Have to say I'm surprised at some of the negativity here towards them covering the song. Ok so the singer has to falsetto to reach the high notes - so would like 95% of male vocalists that aren't Geddy. Hell, even Geddy doesn't even really try to hit those notes anymore. And yes of course it doesn't sound quite like the original, they're Imagine Dragons not Rush. That's part of the point of playing a cover isn't it? My point is that a band that is currently going through huge levels of commercial success is actually going out there and presenting Rush's music to a whole new audience. How could that possibly be a bad thing?? I think playing that kind of song (i.e. quite complex and less known by your average audience) was a really ballsy thing to do and imo they did a very good job. Like some of you, I don't particularly like what I've heard of Imagine Dragons' own music so far but with this case I don't see how that's relevant. They've certainly gained some respect from me for this.

But you, along with other people who bash Freddie Gruber are forgetting something vital. There's more to it than Neil just going to see Freddie to become more "jazzy". By the mid-90s his technique had indeed become stiff - dangerously stiff. As a drummer who has studied the Moeller technique (pretty much what Freddie taught Neil) in depth, I can say it's very likely that if Neil had kept going the way he was, he would have started developing some serious problems with the likes of carpal tunnel syndrome. This would have severely limited his ability to play and could have even been a career ender. Has anyone else been impressed with how age doesn't appear to be having any real effect on Neil's speed and technique? Just look at his playing across the last 10 years - if anything he's still getting better I think. Most other rock drummers 60+ would have real trouble doing anything close to what Neil does every night and I very much doubt that would be the case if it wasn't for him improving his technical foundation. Whether you like Neil's post Gruber playing or not, you should still remember that Neil probably wouldn't be able to play at the standard he does at his age without the technique boost that he got through studying with Gruber.

Yeah I know. But look at the description - the audio's from a 1981 Moving Pictures tour bootleg.