grasbo Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 (edited) The 80s saw a big change in Rush and mostly its the music that gets dissed here,synths ,shorter more compact songs,shorter haircuts.But Neal abandoned the Dungeons and Dragons/Star Trek lyrics as well.Never were we to see the likes of Hemispheres again.Red Barchetta is a classic example of what would once take twenty minutes of music and lyrics honed down to about five minutes.His lyrics were becoming economical with out extended need for excessive description.Also he came out of the clouds and hit earth with Spirit of Radio and Subdivisions,lyrics to which the average listener could fathom rather than sailing a spaceship through a black hole.So along with the naysayers who felt that it was all downhill after Signals ,was Neil's lyrics a part in their downfall as he became more topical and ultimately a bit preachey (against preachers).Did Neil throw out his copies of Dune and Lord of the Rings and hopped on a bike and looked at life in the avaidable light.Or did he smoke less weed. :smoke: He may have got back on it for Clockwork Angels.(as did Nick RzynSymzyck or whatever his name his) Edited December 6, 2018 by grasbo 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J2112YYZ Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 I think it was just him maturing and outgrowing the sci-fi stuff. He was a MUCH better lyricist in the 80s. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MalformedEarthborn Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 I think the 80s saw Neil falling in love with words instead of fantasy. He gets into a lot of wordplay, complex rhymes and alliteration. There's almost no 70s lyrics that make me sit back and go "wow" but the 80s albums are full of them. Anagram is always a standout 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grasbo Posted December 6, 2018 Author Share Posted December 6, 2018 Ultimately was there a cut off point in Neil's lyrics for you?Personally i don't careI think it was just him maturing and outgrowing the sci-fi stuff. He was a MUCH better lyricist in the 80s.I agree.But some people don't like the music that goes with it.Is it the whole band maturing.If it is they left a few fans behind.They must be immature and we have become boring old farts,lol.What i am interested in did he change his reading subjects from Dune ,Ayn Rand to Time magazine and Business Review Weekly. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grasbo Posted December 6, 2018 Author Share Posted December 6, 2018 I think the 80s saw Neil falling in love with words instead of fantasy. He gets into a lot of wordplay, complex rhymes and alliteration. There's almost no 70s lyrics that make me sit back and go "wow" but the 80s albums are full of them. Anagram is always a standoutJust wish the music was a bit better on Anagram,lovely instrumental section though. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tks95747 Posted December 6, 2018 Share Posted December 6, 2018 The 80s saw a big change in Rush and mostly its the music that gets dissed here,synths ,shorter more compact songs,shorter haircuts.But Neal abandoned the Dungeons and Dragons/Star Trek lyrics as well.Never were we to see the likes of Hemispheres again.Red Barchetta is a classic example of what would once take twenty minutes of music and lyrics honed down to about five minutes.His lyrics were becoming economical with out extended need for excessive description.Also he came out of the clouds and hit earth with Spirit of Radio and Subdivisions,lyrics to which the average listener could fathom rather than sailing a spaceship through a black hole.So along with the naysayers who felt that it was all downhill after Signals ,was Neil's lyrics a part in their downfall as he became more topical and ultimately a bit preachey (against preachers).Did Neil throw out his copies of Dune and Lord of the Rings and hopped on a bike and looked at life in the avaidable light.Or did he smoke less weed. :smoke: He may have got back on it for Clockwork Angels.(as did Nick RzynSymzyck or whatever his name his)Personally, I didn't mind so much the fact that Neil's lyrics took on a different, more serious, existential tone as time went by as I did the "preachy", almost condescending at times, tone that resulted from the change. I consider Pratt to be almost nigh a misanthrope or, at least, a closet misanthrope. His disdain for adulation and fan-contact has often been dismissed by many Rush fans as a quirk in his character, or something he is unable to control (i.e. shyness). However, in my estimation, there is a wide chasm between shyness and veiled cynicism. His distrust of, and brackishness towards, others necessarily caused his move away from fantasy into reality. It was a natural progression in his lyrical growth. He is an unparalleled drummer, a matchless lyricist, however, as a human being, he leaves a great deal to be desired... All IMO, of course... 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jnoble Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guess 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mithrandir Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tks95747 Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessFor me, at least, I can recite the lyrics to literally every song through Power Windows. For the life of me, I couldn't recite a single song's lyrics after that if my life depended on it (except for Virtuality). I completely lost interest in Neil's lyrics after PoW.... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
New World Kid Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Or did he smoke less weed. :smoke: More weed, less acid. I think it's just a natural progression in anyone. As we get older, the significance of all of our fairy tales dims, no matter how grand and intelligent those fairy tales are. They give way to the concerns of the real world, real people, and real problems. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tks95747 Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Or did he smoke less weed. :smoke: More weed, less acid. I think it's just a natural progression in anyone. As we get older, the significance of all of our fairy tales dims, no matter how grand and intelligent those fairy tales are. They give way to the concerns of the real world, real people, and real problems.I would agree to a point. That point being that although one naturally sheds many childish notions and ways as they age, unlike Pratt, shedding childish tendencies does not require one to replace them with equally as absurd trenchant and bitter inclinations. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
New World Kid Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Or did he smoke less weed. :smoke: More weed, less acid. I think it's just a natural progression in anyone. As we get older, the significance of all of our fairy tales dims, no matter how grand and intelligent those fairy tales are. They give way to the concerns of the real world, real people, and real problems.I would agree to a point. That point being that although one naturally sheds many childish notions and ways as they age, unlike Pratt, shedding childish tendencies does not require one to replace them with equally as absurd trenchant and bitter inclinations. I don't think Peart's lyrics are particularly bitter. I think at one point someone, maybe even Peart himself, said his lyrics are, "optimism with a bloody nose." And that's exactly what I see in them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thizzellewashington Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 By far Neil's best decade as a lyricist was the 1980s. Counterparts is pretty awful lyrically, Vapor Trails is great. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tks95747 Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Or did he smoke less weed. :smoke: More weed, less acid. I think it's just a natural progression in anyone. As we get older, the significance of all of our fairy tales dims, no matter how grand and intelligent those fairy tales are. They give way to the concerns of the real world, real people, and real problems.I would agree to a point. That point being that although one naturally sheds many childish notions and ways as they age, unlike Pratt, shedding childish tendencies does not require one to replace them with equally as absurd trenchant and bitter inclinations. I don't think Peart's lyrics are particularly bitter. I think at one point someone, maybe even Peart himself, said his lyrics are, "optimism with a bloody nose." And that's exactly what I see in them.You know what they say..... One man's "bitter" is another man's "bloody nose"... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edhunter Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tks95747 Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo.Ed Hunter, sir, you are a gentleman and a scholar~ 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planet X-1 Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. No kidding, you could have crammed that right into "I'd rather be a tortoise from Galapagos, when we got to unconditional love""It was long after midnight, Or a span of geological time" Take that Pert! :P 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tks95747 Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. No kidding, you could have crammed that right into "I'd rather be a tortoise from Galapagos, when we got to unconditional love""It was long after midnight, Or a span of geological time" Take that Pert! :Plmfao Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thunder Bay Rush Posted December 7, 2018 Share Posted December 7, 2018 (edited) I remember back in high school showing off that I could write the lyrics from every song, from every album in order, from Fly By Night through Permanent Waves. No wonder I got a 51% - 52% average all the time... Edited December 7, 2018 by Thunder Bay Rush 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alien Girl Posted December 8, 2018 Share Posted December 8, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. That's not even the worst line! She said just don't disappoint me,You know how complex women are. or It was just before sunrise when we started our traditional roles Oh Neil, please shut up. It's all just so cringeably bad. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tas7 Posted December 8, 2018 Share Posted December 8, 2018 Dodgy lyrics stated on HYF. Kept expecting Second Nature to go, "You can thank your lucky star that we're not as smart as we'd like to think we are." 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MalformedEarthborn Posted December 8, 2018 Share Posted December 8, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. That's not even the worst line! She said just don't disappoint me,You know how complex women are. or It was just before sunrise when we started our traditional roles Oh Neil, please shut up. It's all just so cringeably bad. That song always felt like Neil trying to get away with Leonard Cohen-type blunt sex stuff 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnnyBlaze Posted December 8, 2018 Share Posted December 8, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. That's not even the worst line! She said just don't disappoint me,You know how complex women are. or It was just before sunrise when we started our traditional roles Oh Neil, please shut up. It's all just so cringeably bad. Those lyrics sounded like Peart was trying too hard...trying too hard to do what I’ve got no idea 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShowMeDontTell Posted December 8, 2018 Share Posted December 8, 2018 Neil has always been a writer, first, and then a drummer. That surprised me, of course, but given the complexity and brilliance of his lyrics, it should be obvious. As a teen discovering this amazing band, I couldn't stop reading along with every song. I was never disappointed. I'm drawn to great lyrics, analogies, metaphors. The Sci-Fi stuff only heightened my excitement for the band. Even The Body Electric which is a tiny wisp of the Sci-Fi and fantastical magnum-opi he wrote in the past... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mithrandir Posted December 8, 2018 Share Posted December 8, 2018 Counterparts was the first album where I started to not care for some of his lyrics and it got worse with each album after. Vapor Trails however had more I liked than disliked but that fell back to "ugh" with Snakes. Far Cry was the only song that I liked lyrically. Nothing on Clockwork stuck with me either. The chorus of Anarchist I guessCounterparts is lyrically fantastic to me. Especially CTTC, Double Agent and Cold Fire Cold Fire?? Holy hell. It's putrid. "It was long after midnight, when we got to unconditional love" So bad it should've been on Test For Echo. That's not even the worst line! She said just don't disappoint me,You know how complex women are. or It was just before sunrise when we started our traditional roles Oh Neil, please shut up. It's all just so cringeably bad. No it's not :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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