New World Kid

I think it's a very polite, uncontroversial list from a very polite, courteous Canadian.

I've got a lot of Rush CDs, but I ripped the music off of them before I moved out of my parents' place years ago. They're all over there, so I can't go grab them and see what I've got.

I think you miss the mark here, perhaps projecting your own preferences of literature with Neil's reading habits and how they influenced his work. :cheers: You're probably right. I can only stomach so many "O gentle whatevers with your adjective nouns" before my eyes glaze over.

Out of the Cradle Rank: 134 out of 165 Overall Score: 2/10 (relative to the entire Rush catalog) Category scores out of 10: Historical Significance: 4 Fan Favoritism: 3 Lyrics: 6 Music: 6 Uniqueness: 6 Extra Credit: 7 You might expect me to reference the Walt Whitman poem in this review. The poem exists, go look it up. It’s the kind of mid 1800’s poetry that always feel more like a reading assignment than something worth consuming. Something a pseudo-intellectual will champion when I’ve always been more for the straight forward words of Kurt Vonnegut or Ernest Hemmingway. That’s my opinion on literature though, and I’m not really here to critique that. Maybe another time. But ever the dedicated reader, Neil Part must have come across the lines “Endlessly Rocking” and written this. Though the poem itself chronicles life to death, and is simply named for the first line, Peart only bothered to take most from the first few lines. I agree, it’s hard to get too deep into it Neil. It’s very ornate. But hey, you could make a pun out of this! Endlessly rocking and all that. After reading Ghost Rider, I think there’s another connection here, often overlooked, to Neil specifically. Often times int he novel, he’ll refer to his “little baby soul.” His more impulsive and easily impressed side. Something new and vulnerable that needed to be nurtured inside of him. Something seeking newness and novelty. So I think this song explores not only being that, experiencing that feeling… but also protecting it, nurturing it. Mixing this new soul with years of experience. Madness with method, smiles and sadness. Energy, inspiration. Musically, for Rush, this is a very moody and groovy piece at the beginning. I can’t ever remember the band including a shaker in their instrumentation, but it sounds nice and works great here. The upbeat tone in the lyrics is complimented with some frantic guitar and, particularly, bass work. Soaring Geddy Lee vocals reach the highest highs on the song. A middle section with some softer tones and “doo-doo-doos” is nice, but already done a few times on Vapor Trails. There is a background noise during the softer section that, I don’t know what it is or how to describe it. I’d have thought it was a keyboard, save for Vapor Trails not having any. It’s a nice effect. This is a solid song, but it’s honestly unremarkable in anything but the lyrics. Nothing particularly fresh, on the last track of an album that can be criticized as being “samey.” I love the optimism though. Neil once spoke about writing songs that were “optimism with a bloody nose,” and this is a good entry into that category. I just wish the guitar work could’ve gone somewhere. I don't particularly have a lot to say about this one, if I'm being honest. It's not a skip, but it's not a song I go out of my way to listen to. Previous Reviews: #39 Working Man #62 Caravan #88 Time and Motion #99 Nocturne #125 Between Sun and Moon #132 Making Memories #134 Out of the Cradle #136 Neurotica #139 Lessons #153 Dog Years #164 Rivendell #165 Anagram (for Mongo)

Caress of Steel is a necessary stepping stone. It is not a masterpiece. Vapor Trails is better.

My favorite Rush album. OLV and Secret Touch.

I assume you mean either Show Don't Tell, Scars, or Superconductor Don't ask me. Can't you see I radiate more heat than light? Are you talking about Rush song off Presto, or just in general? The song Presto. It's usually in a tie with Secret Touch for my favorite Rush song.

I assume you mean either Show Don't Tell, Scars, or Superconductor Don't ask me. Can't you see I radiate more heat than light?

Either Presto or Secret Touch is my favorite Rush song.

What if you own all of these albums digitally?

I've had this with other bands. Took a pretty hard break from Dream Theater after Systematic Chaos, but not Rush.

This needs explaining? It's my favorite Rush album.

Should I cut this person out of my life? He did officiate my wedding. There's only one reason to cut someone out of your life, that's not it, but you know what it is. Blackhawks fan? :P Cowboys fan Oh, God no. I'd rather eat what New Yorkers refer to as pizza (with enough liquid to swallow it without having to taste it.) What if I like New York and Chicago style? But St. Louis is obviously better than both.

Neurotica Rank: 136 out of 165 Overall Score: 2/10 (relative to the entire Rush catalog) Category scores out of 10: Historical Significance: 4 Fan Favoritism: 4 Lyrics: 4 Music: 6 Uniqueness: 6 Extra Credit: 7 One of the most frustrating songs in the Rush discography. Neurotica starts brilliantly. A anacrusis of spooky synthesizer is interrupted by a drop-kick into a moody-as-hell verse. Subtle guitar chords, off-beat drums that are actually much trickier to play than you’d think, and a subdued, maybe brooding, Geddy Lee almost speaks the opening verse. Those first 32 seconds are really something. I’m not sure Rush has ever played with that exact tonal style before. There’s so much space in that opening verse, and it’s there for good reason. I’m certainly not in the camp that “synths are bad”, and this synth is bone-chilling, yet subtle. But as with all good things, those opening 30 seconds come to an end. And then we’re greeted with some of the most generic, mid-tempo, Rush-in-the-90’s stuff ever. It’s hard not to call the 2nd verse style in this song filler. The part starting “life is a diamond we turn into dust” is where I’m focusing right now. The riff Alex Lifeson is playing sounds very much like either a left-over, or precursor, to the stuff on his solo album, Victor. But it’s slow, predictable. Hummable, jangly, but not adding anything. Then we hit the chorus. We double time, lose every sense of mood we had, and enter, musically, a very, very generic chorus. With some very humdrum Neil Peart wordplay that's better done on tracks like Animate. We head back into the 1st verse style, and that moody synth comes back. But now Alex is over-playing it, and Neil adds in a snare int he back half. We lose that pensive mood. If the opening verse has tension from the openness, the agoraphobia of it all - then the second time around on that first verse style, the band covers up the unknown areas in a detrimental way. Back to the generic 2nd verse, then back to the humdrum Chorus. One of the things that is criticized about this song, is the Geddy Lee moaning in the choruses. But I actually don’t mind it so much. It’s the only different thing going on. The only signature to the song. And with a different treatment, it could have fit a very spooky mood. And I do think the band was going for a spooky vibe on this one. Sometimes I wonder how much influence the album covers have on me. Test for Echo always feels chilled, Vapor Trails hot, Hold Your Fire simple. But no, on Neurotica’s second verses, there’s a synthisizer that sounds like its straight out of phantom of the opera back there. After the second chorus, we come to another highlight, and no coincidence, it captures the mood of the opening. This comes in around 2:47. There’s some held-out chords over top of another mysterious synthesizer. This instrumental section lasts about 15 seconds. And it’s beautiful. Give me a song with the tone of the first 30 seconds, and these 15 seconds, and this would be one of the most underrated gems in the catalog. But no, after those 15 seconds, we go to a bridge section, “Snap - hide in your shell, let the world go to hell.” And again, the band in the background is just coasting through the song. Where’s the spooky synths! Where’s the moodiness! C’mon, give me some Pink Floyd, some Porcupine Tree, some… thing! We get a fairly average Alex Lifeson guitar solo (average meaning technically impressive, but nothing that stands out among Alex Lifeson solos), and then we get dumped into that walking-paced chorus again. This is frustrating. The band stumbled on some great moods, sounds, themes, textures, tones… and then abandoned them for the majority of the song. It’s okay to be atmospheric guys. You don’t have to always be a powerful power trio. And considering this isn’t even powerful, you’re not even striving for that here. But the listener will be okay if you don’t outline every track with a bass/snare groove and safe guitar riff. Previous Reviews: #39 Working Man #62 Caravan #88 Time and Motion #99 Nocturne #125 Between Sun and Moon #132 Making Memories #136 Neurotica #139 Lessons #153 Dog Years #164 Rivendell #165 Anagram (for Mongo)

The Stars Look Down, with its fatalistic quasi-spiritualistic outlook, probably belongs thematically on Snakes and Arrows. Along with the fact that musically, it's a mid-tempo slog lol