Happy 30th Anniversary Test for Echo!

[JCW555VT]

On this day in September 10th, 1996,  Rush released their sixteenth studio album, Test for Echo! The last album released before Neil's tragedies, the album spawned four singles, "Driven", "Half the World", "Test for Echo" and "Virtuality". The Test for Echo Tour marked the first time Rush played the entirety of 2112 live, something they wouldn't repeat until the Fifty Something Tour. I love every Rush album and that includes Test for Echo but I acknowledge its faults and I get why Geddy doesn't really like this album.

 

Songs from this album played live:
Test for Echo
Driven
Half the World
Time and Motion
Virtuality
Resist
Limbo

[TheGhostRider]

Just now, JCW555VT said:

On this day in September 10th, 1996,  Rush released their sixteenth studio album, Test for Echo! The last album released before Neil's tragedies, the album spawned four singles, "Driven", "Half the World", "Test for Echo" and "Virtuality". The Test for Echo Tour marked the first time Rush played the entirety of 2112 live, something they wouldn't repeat until the Fifty Something Tour. I love every Rush album and that includes Test for Echo but I acknowledge its faults and I get why Geddy doesn't really like this album.

 

Songs from this album played live:
Test for Echo
Driven
Half the World
Time and Motion
Virtuality
Resist
Limbo

It's a solid album minus Dog Years, that song is pretty trash. I know its cheesy but Virtuality is one of my favorite songs on the album, and Limbo is a super cool instrumental. 

[Juan L. Victory]

Yeah I like Virtuality, Driven, and Test for Echo.

 

Dog Years may be a candidate for the worst Rush song ever. 
 

Oh…and that was a great tour.

Edited September 10 by Juan L. Victory

[Nova Carmina]

The nadir.

[_hi_water._]

While it's my least favorite Rush album, it's still a fun listening front to back.

Some of the music and especially the lyrics are not even close to being as nearly inspired as most of their other albums, but the musicianship alone saves this album.

"Test for Echo", "Driven" and "Resist" remain top-tier Rush in my book

[zepphead]

Pretty low in my rankings - There are an awful lot of better albums but also a couple of worse ones (but not many!)

[PurpleHayes]

Oh yeah, what's so happy about it? 

 

Driven is the only track I really like, and almost sounds like a holdover from the CP sessions.

 

The slide started with HYF, Presto, and RTB...temporarily arrested by CP in '93. HYF started the trend of too many songs on the album, and TFE definitely suffers from that problem too.

 

Definitely a letdown after the energy they rediscovered on CP.

[Timbale]

I always think of Test For Echo as the only non-essential album in their discography (Feedback not withstanding).  I'm not even saying it's the worst in the collection (although it might be), but in a discography where almost every album feels like an important step in their journey, T4E kinda just feels like some more content.  Like, Roll The Bones to Counterparts is a step on the journey for sure - both essential to the progression.  But Counterparts to T4E?  Not really.  If the run went from Counterparts to Vapor Trails, I don't think it makes much of a difference.  T4E could disappear down the memory hole and it wouldn't have much of an effect on the arch of the band...and I don't think there are any other records you can really say that about.

[BastillePark]

One of the ones I listen to more often.

[invisible airwave]

I remember MTV playing Driven and Half the World a few times in my sophomore year of high school but not much until I got into them over a decade later.  Every other video was either No Doubt or Bush back then.

[XanaD.E.W.]

I don't mind t4e, in fact, I actually enjoy it. The title track, Driven, Virtuality (cool heavy riff!), Resist & Carve Away The Stone are my jams from this one. 

 

Plus good & bad memories are elicited from a strange period in my life when I hear this in full. 

[78jazz]

Hot take: Limbo is an excellent instrumental. I wish they played that on the R40 tour instead of TMMB (even if that track sounded better on the R40 tour than it did on the S&A tour).

[ZachenFoot]

My favorite of the albums fans tend to think are "bad." I think they were running in circles trying to recapture a more hard rock oriented sound from Presto through Counterparts, but they just couldn't break old habits or tendencies. Test For Echo is a very straightforward album and I'm endeared by its fundamental nature; between getting a lot of rest in late 1994 through 1995, Alex getting to do Victor and Neil relearning how to play drums, I feel like this is (and was intended to be) the reboot they were always looking for and the foundation they were going to build off of if the events of Neil's life didn't happen.

 

I am in full agreement that Dog Years stinks, a total miss lyrically and musically (I don't care if it's heavy, it feels erratic and sloppy), and while the title track is awesome musically I don't think Neil gets enough heat for those lyrics; he sounds like an old Facebook crank, it's very weird given how positive and optimistic his work usually is, even on the rest of this album! I find the song off-putting, which is a shame.

 

But man I love the rest. Driven is Driven, Time And Motion is one of their weirdest and most interesting songs, Resist is thoughtful and nice (was kind of hoping we'd get a full band version this tour, oh well), Limbo is fun. I even like Virtuality which I know is a hot take, but man that song is loose and fun.

[BlairC45]

On 9/10/2026 at 12:18 PM, JCW555VT said:

On this day in September 10th, 1996,  Rush released their sixteenth studio album, Test for Echo! The last album released before Neil's tragedies, the album spawned four singles, "Driven", "Half the World", "Test for Echo" and "Virtuality". The Test for Echo Tour marked the first time Rush played the entirety of 2112 live, something they wouldn't repeat until the Fifty Something Tour. I love every Rush album and that includes Test for Echo but I acknowledge its faults and I get why Geddy doesn't really like this album.

 

Songs from this album played live:
Test for Echo
Driven
Half the World
Time and Motion
Virtuality
Resist
Limbo

All these years I did't relized there's 3 people hanging off the stone thing! 😲

[ytserush]

Love this album. Least favorites are probably the opener and closer. Love the acoustic return.

[ozzy85]

I put T4E in rotation in my Explorer a couple of weeks ago...forgot this album is 30 years old. Damn. It's a good album and a natural progression from CP. Great tour, I saw them at the Gorge. One of the times the weather was pretty good. They played the 2112 Overture in its entirety. It's like Vapor Trails in that it seems to be less popular in general but it's one I play often. Lots of Alex all over the album. Good stuff.