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Most Underrated Rush Album


ANTHEM75
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Going by decade...

 

70s - Caress of Steel

80s - Grace Under Pressure

90s - Test For Echo

00s - Vapor Trails

Someone has some common sense here…

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Counterparts

 

This is where they shake off the dry synthy sounds of the mid late 80s and get back to rocking it. Considering that they were close to hanging it up after A Show of Hands, CP was an important album for getting back on the right track.

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"amongst rush fan circles, pretty much anything after 1982 is underrated I think. the synth era as a whole is especially underrated - I get it, I love loud guitars too, and I love the 70s stuff, but I think their synth era stuff is almost as good as the 70s/early 80s stuff. not as heavy of course, but it's great music anyway. there seems to be a sentiment among lots of rush fans that anything the band did between signals and counterparts didn't even happen, but I think if you really pay attention to some of those records you'll hear some fantastic shit. at my last rush show, me and my friend were the only people who stood in our section during the synth-era part of the set. I don't get it - what's wrong with synthesizers?"

 

I don't think it's an anti-synth thing per se (maybe for some but not for many), but more the style and weight (or lack of) of those albums. I love a lot of synth music and appreciate many synth bands, but synth Rush just sounds so white bread bland to me that there's little appealing about it. It's like music you hear in the mall. Blondie and The Cars make good pop IMO, Rush not so much; they've made many good pop songs over the nineteen albums, but it's not their strength. That said, I get it when people say PoW and HYF are great albums; they just don't appeal to me personally.I do like High Water though. Go figure.

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Test for Echo. The first five songs are pretty solid, along with another couple of the rest. That's batting over .500, which is a lot better then the three albums before it.

 

I was going to say VT but that has a lot of strong support, so that would get most divisive.

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Caress, Presto, HYF, GUP and VT. All in my top seven (alongside AFTK and MP).

 

If I had to pick the mast severely underrated, I would have to go for HYF (actually, add PoW as well, as even I have completely forgotten that one!).

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Caress of Steel or Test For Echo. The former is routinely dismissed as the band's worst prog/hard rock efforts, despite being fascinating and engaging, and the latter has a slew of very strong songs with clever lyrics and was a real bounce back album for the band.
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Grace Under Pressure and Signals deserve more love. Grace Under Pressure is one of their strongest 80's efforts by a long shot, and yes there is quite a bit of synth which alienates the older fans, but those songs still rock hard. Signals is just too good to hate.

 

Counterparts is getting divided results on here, people either love it or hate it.

 

Test For Echo, Vapor Trails, and Snakes And Arrows all need more love as well. Rutlefan gave a very good description of Test For Echo. Vapor Trails is a few notches better. Secret Touch is among their finest work IMO. Snakes And Arrows has some very inventive playing and atmospheric things about its songs, and is one of my favorite albums when I want some good bass playing from Geddy. His bass playing is my favorite part about this album.

Edited by BowlCity
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Test for Echo. The first five songs are pretty solid, along with another couple of the rest. That's batting over .500, which is a lot better then the three albums before it.

 

I was going to say VT but that has a lot of strong support, so that would get most divisive.

 

:yes:

Edited by BowlCity
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Test for Echo. The first five songs are pretty solid, along with another couple of the rest. That's batting over .500, which is a lot better then the three albums before it.

 

I was going to say VT but that has a lot of strong support, so that would get most divisive.

 

:yes:

 

I'm glad that we agree that over 50% of Counterparts is garbage.

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Test for Echo. The first five songs are pretty solid, along with another couple of the rest. That's batting over .500, which is a lot better then the three albums before it.

 

I was going to say VT but that has a lot of strong support, so that would get most divisive.

 

:yes:

 

I'm glad that we agree that over 50% of Counterparts is garbage.

 

My :yes: was for T4E batting over .500.

 

Tit. :moon:

Edited by BowlCity
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I'm going to say Hold Your Fire.

 

Everyone gives it shit for Tai Shan and High Water (which honestly isn't as atrocious as it's made out to be), but this album more than any other Rush album has the highest number of standout songs that could easily be called my favorite from that album. Force Ten, Time Stand Still, Open Secrets, Prime Mover, Lock And Key, Mission, and Turn The Page are seriously awesome songs. They're all standouts. Second Nature is a little goofy lyrically, and the piano sounds really schmaltzy but it's still a decent song. Tai Shan isn't offensive, but more just completely boring. I'd say the same goes for High Water, but Neil's drum pattern is pretty interesting and seemed to usher in his capabilities in world-music drumming that would appear more prominently on the next few albums.

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Snakes & Arrows. I know folks here hate it, but for me it's a solid album which is much more listenable than VT. It showed that post-2000 Rush was still relevant, something I'm not sure VT did (I would have been happy with anything getting the guys back together after Neil's tragedies, whereas S&A is a good album regardless).
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Snakes & Arrows. I know folks here hate it, but for me it's a solid album which is much more listenable than VT. It showed that post-2000 Rush was still relevant, something I'm not sure VT did (I would have been happy with anything getting the guys back together after Neil's tragedies, whereas S&A is a good album regardless).

 

this too......i love Snakes. so underrated.

 

Mick

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