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Clockwork Angels Epiphany


tks95747
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Counterparts (lyrics aside) wasn't a great sounding album to you?

Someone schedule this fella an ear doctor appointment!

;-)

 

That's the last one that sounded awesome. Every album after was either too fuzzy/distorted/layered/compressed

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Counterparts (lyrics aside) wasn't a great sounding album to you?

Someone schedule this fella an ear doctor appointment!

;-)

 

That's the last one that sounded awesome. Every album after was either too fuzzy/distorted/layered/compressed

 

I’d say that T4E was the last one that sounded awesome. Sure, it’s in my bottom 3 Rush albums but sound-wise it was fine to me.

I agree about the lower quality sound of the last 3 studio albums though.

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I've had a Snakes & Arrows epiphany a while ago. My appreciation for S&A keeps growing, I now consider it one of their finest albums. Great production, great songs. Alex sounds great throughout S&A.

Alex is on fire throughout the album. :yes:

 

But tempo and Neil's generally pissy attitude drag the album down a bit over the long haul, for me.

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Can't even remember the names of most of the songs, or even what they sound like...that says it all really.

Any chance of you starting a thrash metal band?

 

I'd love to, believe me.....

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Can't even remember the names of most of the songs, or even what they sound like...that says it all really.

Any chance of you starting a thrash metal band?

 

I'd love to, believe me.....

What's stopping you? No good drummers?

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CA is the third part of their excellent 21st century trilogy. It did take a little time for me to get fully into it because it came at the end of a huge Rush saturation period for me. I was still so into S&A, it kinda had to take a back seat for awhile.
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I got into rush late. Ca was the one that did it!. I also think VT is top shelf and I believe the early albums are the best of the lot.i love all their music but if I was listing my top 5 today it would be aftk, gup mp 2112 and hemisphere. In the top 10 I would say signals vt ca cos pw .
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Of the "newer" albums;

 

Vapor Trails had some moments, but it's not the first one I grab....

 

I like MOST of Snakes and Arrows, It took me seeing some of the songs live a few times before they really caught on with me..but maybe like two or three don't sit well. Armour and Sword is one of my favorites... although a lot of people seem to not like that one?!?

 

At first I wasn't thrilled with Clockwork Angels, but the more I heard it (and experiencing it live several times) I REALLY started to like it a lot!

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I've had a Snakes & Arrows epiphany a while ago. My appreciation for S&A keeps growing, I now consider it one of their finest albums. Great production, great songs. Alex sounds great throughout S&A.

Alex is on fire throughout the album. :yes:

 

But tempo and Neil's generally pissy attitude drag the album down a bit over the long haul, for me.

 

Yes. Alex shines especially the acoustic stuff.

 

All the instrumentals are a highlight

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They really went back to the seventies on Clockwork Angels, They kind of modernized their original sound from the first albums. It has that same crazy energy they had on songs like Bastille Day and albums like 2112, but it also has the maturity of later albums like Counterparts, Vapor Trails, and Snakes & Arrows. Great album.
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I like Headlong Flight and Caravan, but the rest of it is just bland, boring drivel.

Headlong Flight is my favorite track on the album. That upwardly bent note at the very end of Alex's solo is so cool...
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I consider myself to be an old-school Rush fanatic, that is, I absolutely love their first 8 albums...Excellent material. (I am sure there are some of you that will consider an "old-school" love of their music to encompass, perhaps, less or more than their first 8 albums). In any event, I consider the next grouping of albums through CP to be great material (with the exception of Presto/RTB... just good material).

 

After CP, it my personal opinion that Test4Music is passable at best and that VT and S&A are detritus (except for maybe one or two songs between the two of them).

 

My real point is that when I first heard CA, I lumped it in with VT and S&A. I know that prior to first hearing it, I had pre-judged the album. Subsequently, I forced myself to listen to CA again and again with no more than a tepid reaction. However, after a few recent spins of CA, I have come to believe that it is a super album. I think my epiphany stems from the fact that I had a closed mind going in to each listen of the album.

 

For what it's worth, I now love CA and consider it to be one of their great works, although I still cannot stomach T4Music (except for Virtuality) and I run from VT or S&A.

 

What was your first reaction to CA?

Clockwork Angels is truly a masterpiece. It is a story laid out in the form of an album that takes us through a young man's journey through life...It is very universal...It is perfect ending catalog piece to Rush's discography.
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I listened to it today too. I would agree it's their strongest album since Power Windows.

I've made a similar statement in the past. With the caveat that I don't think that means much. HYF was the beginning of mostly yawner albums. I'm thoroughly convinced that if I had not been a Rush freak, I would have never listened to them. That would have been quite regrettable as there is something great in all of them, except Snakes, which should be stricken from the catalog and never mentioned again.

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I listened to it today too. I would agree it's their strongest album since Power Windows.

I've made a similar statement in the past. With the caveat that I don't think that means much. HYF was the beginning of mostly yawner albums. I'm thoroughly convinced that if I had not been a Rush freak, I would have never listened to them. That would have been quite regrettable as there is something great in all of them, except Snakes, which should be stricken from the catalog and never mentioned again.

 

for me the boring stuff started in the 90's. with the exception of counterparts but even that's a mixed bag album for me. rhey could pull out tunes here and there but their albums in the 90's on become a chore man. although. i kinda like Snakes and Arrows.

 

Mick

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It was their best album in over 25 years when it was released.

 

It ranks among their best. It tells an overall story, so the album as a whole stands well. Similar in theme to Fountain but less structured into distinctive elements of a human life but more a charting of a life through story form.

 

People say it isn't a concept album, but it clearly is. I have always seen it as a prog epic, a great way to end the band.

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I never expected Rush to record a concept album ever again, that really took me by surprise. One could say Clockwork Angels is actually the only real concept album, where every song on the record is part of the story, they ever made. I also never expected them to go back to their heavy seventies roots, that was another surprise.

 

Lyrically, this is a very interesting album as well. I think there are three novels on which Neil based much of his story (while it's obviously the story of his own life as well):

  • Candide by Voltaire
  • The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth
  • A World Lit Only By Fire by Williams Manchester.

Clockwork Angels is an album that gets better the more you listen to it. There are many layers in the music and in the story, that only reveal themselves after repeated listening. Great album.

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I never expected Rush to record a concept album ever again, that really took me by surprise. One could say Clockwork Angels is actually the only real concept album, where every song on the record is part of the story, they ever made. I also never expected them to go back to their heavy seventies roots, that was another surprise.

 

Lyrically, this is a very interesting album as well. I think there are three novels on which Neil based much of his story (while it's obviously the story of his own life as well):

  • Candide by Voltaire
  • The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth
  • A World Lit Only By Fire by Williams Manchester.

Clockwork Angels is an album that gets better the more you listen to it. There are many layers in the music and in the story, that only reveal themselves after repeated listening. Great album.

 

The Wreckers was partially inspired by Jamaica Inn by Daphne de Maurier.

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