Would Rush have "made it" if they had never met Neil?

[ThinkingBig]

Rush may have been another Triumph w/o Neil.

[GeddysMullet]

In this one of many possible worlds...

It is what it is...

 

All I really know is that it is, and always has been, about the power of the trio. It took Neil, Geddy and Alex to write CoS to put them "down the tubes" and force Rush's last stand of 2112. Rutsey's last stand was the debut album. FBN had an old song (In the End) where Neil has no songwriting credit, so presumably it was an old riff Geddy and Alex had been kicking around for a while. Without Neil, we'd have some great riffs with poorer drumming and lyrics (like Chemistry...ewww....Geddy, please give the pen back to Neil, your hands are full enough).

 

At this point in their career, they are all irreplaceable. I don't think they could tolerate another new guy.

 

Geddy didn't write the lyrics to Chemistry, did he?

 

Meanwhile, watch this interview for some indirect insights into how Geddy would probably answer this question:

http://www.cbc.ca/thenational/blog/2012/06/interview-with-geddy-lee.html

[fonzbear2000]

Considering that all Neil wrote were the lyrics and they lyrics from Geddy's solo album are pretty good, we would have had pretty much the same music, but with different lyrics so Rush would have been just as popular without Neil.

[CygnusGal]

In this one of many possible worlds...

It is what it is...

 

All I really know is that it is, and always has been, about the power of the trio. It took Neil, Geddy and Alex to write CoS to put them "down the tubes" and force Rush's last stand of 2112. Rutsey's last stand was the debut album. FBN had an old song (In the End) where Neil has no songwriting credit, so presumably it was an old riff Geddy and Alex had been kicking around for a while. Without Neil, we'd have some great riffs with poorer drumming and lyrics (like Chemistry...ewww....Geddy, please give the pen back to Neil, your hands are full enough).

 

At this point in their career, they are all irreplaceable. I don't think they could tolerate another new guy.

 

Geddy didn't write the lyrics to Chemistry, did he?

 

Meanwhile, watch this interview for some indirect insights into how Geddy would probably answer this question:

http://www.cbc.ca/th...-geddy-lee.html

Nice interview, GM. I pulled out the liner notes because I knew there was something peculiar about the lyrics on this song. I see credit is to Lee, Lifeson and Peart - certainly an anomaly. They say that memory is the first to go and it has been 30 years.

 

:)

[JohnnyBlaze]

Considering that all Neil wrote were the lyrics and they lyrics from Geddy's solo album are pretty good, we would have had pretty much the same music, but with different lyrics so Rush would have been just as popular without Neil.

 

Lee and Lifeson have stated many times before that Neil's musicality pushed them to write more complicated compositions.

 

Plus, the lyrics on MFH are from a older, wiser, more experienced Geddy who had had a quarter of a century of Peart lyrics influencing him. SURELY, singing Peart's lyrics for all those years affected Geddy's word choice and phrasing when he sat down to write MFH

[Atomic]

I think with Rutsy (or someone else) that Rush would indeed have been another Zepplin-esque band like Triumph or Max Webster and run their time with Ged and Alex moving on to other projects (Alex in The Spoons or Platinum Blonde? LOL).

 

I wonder if Neil hadn't gotten the gig with Rush (or didn't audition) if his then current band would have gotten anywhere? True he said he was ready to work at Dalzeil but still... once being a musician on stage is in your blood, it never leaves. I would bet he'd have been picked up by another band and contributed to them moving on to something big.

 

But I think also that the stars aligned perfectly because I can't think of any other band that's a trio who's not had a staffing change in 39 years and been together for um,... 39 years. (obviously more than 39 but 39 without a member change). Clearly the guys mesh well enough together to get along as friends, collaborators, business partners and probably family. And THOSE things are damn near impossible under normal circumstances, let alone throwing in fame and fortune.

[fonzbear2000]

Considering that all Neil wrote were the lyrics and they lyrics from Geddy's solo album are pretty good, we would have had pretty much the same music, but with different lyrics so Rush would have been just as popular without Neil.

 

Lee and Lifeson have stated many times before that Neil's musicality pushed them to write more complicated compositions.

 

Plus, the lyrics on MFH are from a older, wiser, more experienced Geddy who had had a quarter of a century of Peart lyrics influencing him. SURELY, singing Peart's lyrics for all those years affected Geddy's word choice and phrasing when he sat down to write MFH

Ah, those are some great points you made there. In that case. It's very hard to say how far they would have gone without Neil then. I bet they wouldn't have been as big as they got.