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COME ON PEEPS TIME TO LIIIIIST

What are your favourite albums of the year? These are mine: 1. Fleet Foxes- Shores 2. Taylor Swift- Folklore 3. Biffy Clyro- A Celebration Of Endings 4. Bruce Springsteen- Letters To You 5. Taylor Swift- Evermore 6. Trivium- What The Dead Men Say 7. Rina Sawayama- Sawayama- 8. The Killers- Imploding The Mirage 9. Eleine- Dancing In Hell 10. Nightwish- Human Nature

I am currently on a chronological revisit of one of my favourite bands of the last couple of years, and by now, of all time. With every revisit, more songs jump out at me as being magnificent. Now I thought it could be fun to open discussion about Judas Priest and their songs, as we often love to debate about albums and rankings and polls. But what are your favourite songs? Of the early albums, my favourite songs are: Rock A Rolla Cheater Victim Of Changes Deceiver Diamonds And Rust Last Rose Of Summer (omg I bloody worship this song) Exciter Better By You, Better Than Me Beyond The Realms Of Death And you know what song really, truly stands out to me? The Stained Class bonus track Fire Burns Below. Bloody love that one! Of course I love plenty more, this list only covers the first four albums! And you?

A Facebook page I follow (Worship Metal) has a new feature for 2020. One album they deem to be classic every day. So far: 1/1/2020: Black Sabbath- Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (1973) Really enjoyed this. 2/1/20: Death Angel- Darkness Descends (1986) I enjoyed this even more! A sublime thrash metal album! 3/1/20: Entombed- Left Hand Path (1990) Another absolutely magnificent metal album! 4/1/20: Metal Church- Metal Church (1984) Again, I enjoyed this one immensely. 5/1/20: Candlemass- Epicus Doomicus Metalicus (1986) My favourite so far! Have you guys any interest in following? I've loved discovering some new albums, it's been great so far. I've enjoyed them all, especially Entombed and Candlemass.

I really want these sets. I here these are the best sounding CD remasters and I would love to have a tidier Rush collection. But I also know there are reported faults in some of these discs. Do any of you guys know how to identify a good edition from a bad edition (barcodes etc)? I know initial pressings of the first and second Sectors had faults with the Fly By Night CD and the AFTK DVD. Some have complained about the harsh sound of ATWAS too. Are they bad, or worthy replacements for my current 1997 remasters (which take up a fair amount of room!).

I would love to read more about Rush- The band, their music and more. Are their any good choices?

A Review From A Former MCU Hater: Minor spoilers. I have seen this movie before (around 2009 in fact) and I liked it. For a few short years I casually watched a few more of the Marvel films here and there. But by the time Winter Soldier came out, I was sick to death of the MCU, the rabid fans, the media hype, the constant advertising, so much so thay I decided to just cut these movies out for good! Well, it's now 2018 (barely, I know, but still) and I've avoided nearly every MCU movie released so far. And yet, for several months now a desire to finally catch up with this franchise has grown. I have seen (by choice) trailers for recent movies, admired the really awesome poster art, been mesmerized and stunned by images and screenshots from a few of the movies I have missed (Ragnorok in particular took my breath away from the stills I saw), and now I just feel so ready to start over with this beloved franchise. So, a few days before Christmas, I treated myself to the recent Phase One and Phase Two box sets (on Bluray) and have made it my goal to watch every single MCU movie in the run up to Infinity War: Endgame (totally aware that I am one of only three people in history to have never Infinity War). So, naturally, I begin my journey with Iron Man. Like I said, I remember enjoying this one a fair bit, but it has been so long since I last saw it (and I think I only watched this twice), that watching it again this evening felt like the first time. And it was EXCELLENT! Perfect casting, terrific plot, great character depth (Downey and Paltrow really have great chemistry), and the action sequences were really effective. What surprised me was the attention to small nuances of personality and body language, as I was happy to note that Iron Man was a far more character driven affair than I remembered. Also, to my delight, the action scenes were not dramatically OTT (at least not until the end), which is particularly noteworthy considering I recall the first Avengers movie to be crowded with noisy scenes (by that point I was sick of the whole MCU concept). But with all the praise I am giving this, was it the greatest movie I have ever seen? Well, no. For starters I noticed a few strange mistakes. When Stark is messing around with the suit, it shoots up and he slams into a wall. No injuries. No helmet. It works because it's funny but...yeah, it did slightly jar with the often more serious tone (but the comedic moments do shine in this film, I must say). Then, towards the end in the climactic battle between two suits- both of which are supposed to be pretty close to indestructible- each falls from the sky only to crash land and find themselves in a state of very little real damage. Only then do we see the strongest suit pick up a piece of the smaller suit and crush it in his hand like cardboard. Really? But this is a movie. These aren't terrible moments, just little forgivable goofs. Also, at times the pacing seemed a little off. I did find my mind wondering a little around the middle but by the end of the movie I was absolutely engrossed and enthralled. Overall, this is one of the finest Hollywood action movies I have ever seen. I am so glad I have given Iron Man and the MCU another shot, and am even more eager now to continue. Up next: I have never seen The Incredible Hulk before. Wish me luck! Now as my memory serves me, I loathed Iron Man 2, but I really loved Captain America: The First Avenger (currently my absolute favourite) and I enjoyed Thor. As for Avengers Assemble...I got bored of the franchise hype by that point (as I said before) and it really jaded me to whatever value that movie has. I hated it when it came out but I am ready to try it again. So yeah, Phase One has started and I am one movie down! I am trying hard to rate this movie correctly. It's either an 8 or a 9/10. It is so strong but it's not quite the perfect movie. I will be kind and give it: 8/10 My profile on Letterboxd https://letterboxd.com/SegueMyles

The eighties is definitely a patchy decade for Rush. But for the most part, it was A great era for them. But Power Windows was an enigma. An album with a lot of fine moments, but little impact. Hold Your Fire on the other hand is an album I have loved unquestionably since the day I first bought it (coincidentally, it was also the last studio album I bought). So how highly do I rate this album? Find out!

Now onto one of the albums that nearly killed all interest I would ever have in continuing my Rush journey! I bought this album in 2012, about a year after I got into them, and for want of a better word, HATED it. Even when I joined this forum, I hated it. It was synthy and bland and just HORRIBLE. But like I normally do, I replay it to see if it gets better. For a short while I loved this. Nowadays I rarely play it. So how do I view it now? Let's find out!

After the mediocre, but not without merit, Signals, I come now to one of my all time favourite albums: 1984's cold, serious (but not too serious) and surprisingly bleak Grace Under Pressure. Arguably my favourite artwork, favourite songs, favourite lyrics and favourite melodies of the entire synth era. Here we go!

Ok...now onto the third era, and an album I normally don't like at all. Will his change? 1982's Signals. I have held off long enough!

So I continue my marathon with the final album of the second stage. Honestly have no expectations. This is a live album, cool setlist, and to be honest absolutely no hype. Is this a good one? Will I enjoy it? Live albums are very hit or miss for me, with All The World's A Stage proving to be a major hit. But I will just enjoy this for what it is, and leave my thoughts below.

Album number eight, and my first Rush album ever, is without any hesitation to admit, a masterpiece. I don't have the most exciting story in the world, but around 2010/11 two bands came into my life and helped me escape falling into boredom musically. Bruce Springsteen and The Beatles. In a short space of time, I became obsessed with both and I was really excited by the prospect of finally loving music that was older than I was used too. I had fallen into listening almost exclusively to modern rock bands, and as time wore on, I felt bored and limited as they were all starting to sound the same. So one day I went on Amazon and bought a tonne of albums in one go, all records I knew to be highly acclaimed. One of them was Rumours by Fleetwood Mac, the other, Moving Pictures. The latter I remember a neighbour I grew up with (only a year or two older than me) loved, because he wore a Rush shirt everywhere with this album cover on it. Metal magazines mentioned Rush often around that time (2011) and bands I love LOVED Rush. So without any prior knowledge of the band or their songs, I put the disc in and I remember distinctly being impressed by the opening seconds of Tom Sawyer. Whatever I had been expecting, it was not something so fresh and still so modern sounding as that. 1981? At that point the album had turned 20. It blew me away! So here we go:

After the absolutely breathtaking voyage of rediscovery I had journeying through the waters of Rush's undisputed legendary prog metal years, we now come to the second half of the second stage of my Rush marathon. Which is in itself a very interesting time period for the band. Many may disagree, but for me Permanent Waves is arguably a bit of a disappointing release. Now don't get me wrong, it is a great achievement but at the same time for an album I rate so highly, this is nevertheless one of the very few Rush albums that I have never at any point been addicted too. Why? I cannot say. But even when I disliked Hemispheres, I still found this a less than exciting release. Is that about to change? As we enter a new decade (with arguably the last album of the seventies), we embark upon the opening of a new chapter for Rush: their commercial breakthrough.

http://www.classicrockreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/1978_Rush-Hemispheres.jpg An album so complex, intricate and profound it took me nearly eight years to digest. I have had a strange relationship with this record, but it finally clicked with me this year and I must say, it went from near the bottom of the pile to a contender for the very top! I don't really know how to write about this album, because I am fully aware that the majority of this forum reveres it highly. But that hasn't stopped me so far!

So now I am through with the first batch of albums, which I am happy to say were all a lot better than I recalled (even my beloved Caress Of Steel), I am onto the second stage of Rush albums. How am I organising this marathon? For the most part, via the release of live albums (normally released with four albums between each one). Once we get to the Millennium, I will likely review the studio albums alone and the live separately as there was an extraordinary number of live releases! Now back to the topic at hand: A Farewell To Kings. This 1977 release has the honour of being cited for several years as my very favourite Rush album. It is an extraordinary work, and I did for the longest time voice the opinion that it was the only truly great seventies Rush album from start to finish. As you can see, recently I have come to revaluate that opinion, because each release building up to AFTK is superb, to a surprisingly high level of consistency. I know that Caress Of Steel and 2112 got very high scores, and the second side of 2112 especially stood out on my recent listening experience. So much so that I wonder if, now that I am once again very familiar with deeper cuts like Before And After, Tears, In The End, and The Twilight Zone, will songs such as Closer To The Heart, Cinderella Man and Madrigal still cast a spell over me? Only one way to find out!

I have a confession to make: I have played hardly any of the live Rush albums. For a fact I can tell you, I started this album once and skipped loads of tracks. It isn't unique to Rush: I tend to find live albums boring. When I started this little review project, I had in mind only the studio albums. But I am loving my marathon so much, I decided to continue my progress in chronological order by listening to all the live albums as well. If I miss any, please let me know!

Is this one of the bands finest albums, or is it iconic only for two aspects: that gamechanging title track and that unforgettable front cover?

Arguably the bands most divisive album, where do I stand with this record?

Time for this little gem! What are your thoughts?

I haven't done this for a while! TIME FOR 2007!

Well I have decided to revisit probably my favourite band of the sixties/seventies/eighties. The band that I continually underrate and overlook when talking about "MY VERY FAVOURITE BANDS!" on a far too regular basis (they are without a doubt in my top four). Rush mean the world to me. I cannot think of a single band that has changed my life so much. Their music opened me to a whole new world that I had only glimpsed at before. Through Rush I discovered a real admiration for "classic" rock. Because of Rush I learned about bands like Kansas, Styx, Yes, ELP, Jethro Tull, Saga, Toto and I went through a couple of years listening to nothing else! Bands like Nightwish and Mastodon had already introduced me to epic sounds and journeys through sound, but there is something to be said about Rush that I cannot say about any other band in quite the same way. They sound like NO ONE ELSE! The only band to ever come truly close to sounding like Rush to my ears is YYNot. And that should come as no surprise, as they are highly talented musicians who made their name covering Rush to perfection. But even their debut has its own soul. Every other band I find to have a unique feel have at least in many ways been copied to the extent I could potentially listen to another band and mistake then for my favourite band. But I digress. I have never truly listened to the studio work of Rush from start to finish in chronological order. I shall start with the debut and work forward. Let's use these threads to talk about each album and our opinions! Today I start with the album I have never played in its entirety more than five times: Rush (1974)

This is my favourite year in music: 1. Lacuna Coil- Karmacode 2. Mastodon- Blood Mountain 3. Khoma- The Second Wave 4. All That Remains- The Fall Of Ideals 5. Fightstar- Grand Unification Albums that totally are worthy of the top five spot, every one of these is a VERY honourable mention: KillSwitch Engage- As Daylight Dies Trivium- The Crusade In Flames- Come Clarity Matchbook Romance- Voices Toto- Falling In Between Placebo- Meds boysetsfire- The Misery Index: Notes from the Plague Years Rihanna- A Girl Like Me Taking Back Sunday- Louder Now Pearl Jam- Pearl Jam Wolfmother- Wolfmother AFI- decemberunderground Muse- Black Holes And Revelations Stone Sour- Come What(ever) May Alexisonfire- Crisis Iron Maiden- A Matter Of Life And Death Beyonce- B'day Evanescence- The Open Door mewithoutyou- Brother/Sister Saosin- Saosin My Chemical Romance- The Black Parade Taylor Swift- Taylor Swift Brand New- The Devil And God Are Raging Inside Me Deftones- Saturday Night Wrist Threat Signal- Under Reprisal The Killers- Sam's Town