epic video/topic. Rush, some of the most sacred musical ground for many including myself. I've never done a detailed marathon of their catalog like this, but have been thinking about it.
Yeah, they were always kind of the big whale for this channel both because I love them so much and their catalog is so big. I felt they deserved a real deep dive and that why I did the multiple vids. Appreciate you taking time to comment and hoped you enjoyed them.
Before and After on the first album shows a little glimpse of their future prog path. Although it really only has 1 major switch, it shows that the prog elements were there even before Peart. Based on a chat between Lifeson and Lee promoting Lee's book, early on after Peart joined and they barely knew him he presented them with the lyrics to Beneath, Between and Behind and they both thought 'great, now we dont have to bother with that part anymore'. I think you underrate BBandB, the drums are fantastic in that. By-Tor at 100......well done. Caress is very underrated, and I'm with you on the ratings here, even if not the popular belief. Their least commercially successful album, it's one of my favs. I might drop Bastille Day a little, it's a little 'basic rock song' for me. My Uncle gave me Chronicles when I was 13 and Fountain just blew me away. A Tolkien and fantasy nerd, I had no idea a rock band could do something like this. This epic tale where the music matched the moods. No One At The Bridge is amazing. 2112 itself is amazing, but side 2 of 2112 is just ok, imo. Passage to Bangkok, Tears, meh (I have this one as the lowest rated Rush song). I was in the Columbia Record club as well. Back then you had to find music, unlike the ease of the internet era. I stray from the norm on Farewell. I know I'm in the minority here but songs like Madrigal and Cinderella Man are ones I often skip in a playlist. Xanadu is one of their all-time songs, the title track is good but I dont love the tin-y guitar sound as much as others, I'd go 80 myself. Cygnus is great, but before I put it together with Hemispheres I thought it was just a bit too overpowered. I would drop that to 80 as well (just my opinion, respect yours as well) Hemispheres is my favorite as well, without hesitation. The answer to Fallon's "if you could only listen to one song for the rest of your life...." question, La Villa Strangiato is that song for me. You rate each song exactly as I would. Circumstances is the weak link musically but the lyrics are outstanding. I'm also in the minority concerning Natural Science. It's a bit more repetitive than many of their longer songs and it reminds me a little of Cygnus, just a bit overpowered. There is a special place in my heart for Different Strings. Just a beautiful song both lyrically and musically. I would overrate this at 100 because of how it resonates. Same with Losing It from Signals. Moving Pictures tour was the first (of 5) times I saw them live. I was 15. We had tickets to see Zeppelin (advanced tickets) when Bonham died so I convinced my friend to switch the deposit to Rush tickets. He ended up being the 2nd biggest Rush fan I know. I grew to love Signals but when it first came out I was a bit disappointed. New World Man was the first I heard and I thought WTF? I love all three guys but I'm an Alex man and he was pushed back in this and several following albums. I would personally swap the 60 to New World Man and put countdown as the 100. I love countdown, the way it builds to the crescendo. We part paths a bit on this one. Grace was the first time I was front row, chest to the stage. Was a strange show, I was in the Army and was stationed in Augusta, Georgia. Nobody big plays Augusta, ever. They di and to add to it Blue Oyster Cult opened for them, a band I had already seen and loved, very fun band in concert. The venue was half empty, it was crazy. Their tour buses had their destination placard switched to say "why are we here?" and the other said "Never Again". Gen admission, we showed up 3 hours early expecting a long line already. There was one guy in line holding a pair of drumsticks, lol. I was so close I could have untied Geddy's shoelace. EDIT: It was actually the Power Windows tour. I remembered wrong. The concert was April 23rd 1986 We really split on Power Windows. That's when I started checking out. I came back later and listen to it all, but this album caused me to drift. Sorry for the ridiculously long post but the comments are a little sparse for a really good video.
Sorry? Are you kidding! Fantastic comments! Appreciate you taking time to contribute. Sounds like we’re pretty similar, though maybe diverge a bit on some of the keyboard-heavy stuff. Getting to see both Rush and BOC (I have a video on them too) from such close range had to be amazing. Once I saw Rush up close on MP tour it was really difficult to not be near the band. You can literally FEEL athe power and seeing those guys at such a young age was revelatory. Thanks again! I just posted pt 2 which isn’t as enthusiastic but, so be it.
@@therockrollsoapbox6075 It was so great, the front row BOC/Rush concert. I'm a big guy, 6'7" and I was also in the Army so I was pretty buff at the time (that physique is LONG gone, haha) so I stood out significantly to both bands. I remember Geddy kept laughing at my 'enthusiasm' for the show and at one point, mid-song, Alex came over, gestured towards me and I swear he mouthed 'watch out for this guy' and they both laughed. I havent watched the BOC video but it's on my list. Love those guys. They used to play gigs in LA at small clubs under the pseudonym Soft White Underbelly. I saw them several times in that way and its so different to watch a band in a 50 seat venue than in a 20000+ seat arena. They are a tough band to classify, but my friends and I used to call them Monster-Billy. They really have several elements of a rock-a-billy band, like the Stray Cats, only considerably heavy and darker. The funniest way I've heard them described was: They are the band playing at the last stop bar before crossing the river Styx. I really love the older stuff, Secret Treaties, Agents of Fortune, Tyranny and Mutation, etc. (7 Screaming Diz-Busters is really underrated, Buck Dharma absolutely goes off on the guitar in that one)
@@Heathcoatman "They are the band playing at the last stop bar before crossing the river Styx" HAHA. That's about as good as any description I've heard. They really are hard to classify. You'd think with all the sci-fi and song names like Don't Fear the Reaper, Dominance and Submission, Flaming Telepaths they'd be these overly serious guys or a complete cartoon...and yet they somehow pull it off while winking and letting you know it's all good fun. That's a very fine line to walk and they did it beautifully. I also had opportunity to catch them twice in 80/81 and they were amazing. Got very close and Buck Dharma was so cool; throwing out picks endlessly to make sure anyone who wanted one got one. While also playing some of the best lead guitar you'll ever hear. Very cool band.
Strange, I always assumed the voice at the finale of 2112 were the priests speaking, stating things resumed back to their "normal" and the Protagonist's discovery was only a speed bump in their master plan. I guess I'm a pessimistic kind of guy, never considering the priests had been overtaken. Nice breakdown of everything Rush, by the way.
Thanks! And you might be right about 2112. I read where Neil said it was left open to the listener's interpretation on purpose. So there's no "right" answer.
The title track isnt great, imo. It's a little too "should we try to make a radio song on this album?" I love Tolkien but Rivendell is a throwaway song.
Interesting comments on Signals. No Peart crazy drumming? Subdivisions is full of it. Most of the songs are still very guitar driven. Not synth driven. Only one truly synth driven is Subdivisions. Even Losing it is more about Ben Mink's Electric Violin than synths. I think you are confusing later albums with Signals. There was a progression away from the guitars that reached its zenith on Hold your Fire. This one and Grace Under Pressure were still very rocking. I would suggest that you listen to Signals again. Interesting you like Power Windows which is much more synth heavy than Signals or Grace under Pressure. I like it but it is so much colder and thin I do not like the production at all. What I do not like about PW is that the raw rock sound is placed by a thin cold production. It sounds much better live.
Perhaps calling them synth driven is an overstatement, but I dont think it's in dispute that the guitar takes a step back and synths a step forward. Chemistry is another song from signals that has a lot of synth. People at the time could all tell the difference instantly. Still some great hooks and solos. I would argue that although Rush always tweaked their style from album to album, the tweak between Moving Pictures and Signals is one of the biggest changes.
@@Heathcoatman I can agree that there is much more synth on Signals than Moving Pictures. Signals was a large step from Moving Pictures to a more synth heavy sound. From MP to Signals was one of the bigger transitions of their career but I do not think it was the biggest even in regard to synths. But it was a progression. I think you agree. They changed their sound from album to album with some being more drastic. Like the huge difference between Hemispheres and Permanent Waves. I do think Signals is mostly still a guitar driven album. That was my contention or disagreement. I think the sound of Signals is closer to Moving Pictures and Hold your Fire. At least in the sense that guitars still drive most songs (not so much Subdivisions or Losing it (although the electric Violin largely takes the place of the guitar on the latter). Chemistry and the Weapon (maybe even more) has a good amount of synths. I do think the synths are still play more of the filler role than the guitar except maybe in the chorus of The Weapon that seems particularly synth heavy. I love Signals. It was the first Rush album I bought for myself. Not the first I heard but the first I bought. To me the classic Rush albums are Fly by Night, 2112 - Grace under Pressure, and Counterparts. Clockwork Angels is really good and so are some of the other albums I did not name. The very low point is Hold your Fire which has some of the only Rush music I have never liked at all. It still has a few good songs especially when performed live. But Counterparts is the only Rush album after Grace Under Pressure that is a true classic album to me. Caress if Steel is a good album but they were not ready for the true prog epic. Not yet. Albums like Power Windows, Presto, Roll the Bones, and Test for Echo suffer from production. Cold or thin sounding music. No grit. I really like Power Windows but it seems such a huge jump away from rock then Hold Your Fire became a tonal mess.
@@carlpeterson8182 Yeah, further proof that music is subjective. Other than the Debut album to FBN, I think the MP to signals jump is the biggest. Just my opinion. I also thought it was odd that you compared MP to Hold your Fire. I dont see the similarity at all. MP is an all-time iconic album and Hold Your Fire is my least favorite Rush album. Also on Chemistry, and not just the heavy synth intro, there are huge sections where Alex is just doing a muted 3 chord almost reggae part, almost like he's just accenting Neil. It's a simple melody during this part, but it's a synth melody....it leads. Again, important to understand that I'm not saying it's a synth album, I agree that there is Alex, playing lots of solos and leading the tune here and there, it's just s step back. If you listen to everything from Rush to Hemispheres, this is a lead guitar driven band. The melodies, the whole structure of their music is based on Alex. Geddy shreds, he leads here and there, his fills are epic. Neil is always just driving the song in all of it's directions, but the absolute core of these songs is Alex and his guitar. Look at By-Tor or Necromancer or the entire Fountain of Lamneth. 2112 is a song about a guitarist, there's the huge section where the lead is learning to play the guitar in his cave. The reason the went from a gymnasium band in Toronto to touring with groups like Kiss or Aerosmith (et al) is because some DJ in Cleveland heard Working Man, basically a 7 minute song with a 5 minute guitar solo. That was their break. Jump to Signals......where did Alex go? (exaggeration) What I have noticed is that in many cases older Rush fans, those that listened in the early days (dont mean this in any elitist way) are more likely to say 'starting with Signals Alex takes a step back' and younger fans or people who discovered them in a later part of their career are less likely to say or think that. It often depends on where they were in their catalog when you first started loving them.
@@carlpeterson8182 Of course I had to go listen to Signals after this discussion, haha. Another song that may even be the best example of what I was talking about is Analog Kid. While Alex has a really cool hook in this song, there are huge sections where he is just playing very basic chords in the background. You can barely even hear him during the chorus. Great hook, amazing solo, huge sections of studio musician caliber backing guitar. Sorry to ramble.
@@Heathcoatman I will attempt to reply to both your replies here. First I was not comparing MP to HyF. I was arguing that Signals sounds more like MP than HyF. There is a progression from album to album and Signals sounds much more like its predecessor than what they would become. Second, there is a difference between being guitar and synth driven and not having a good or complex guitar part. For instance I do not think the guitars on Def Leppard's Pyromania are that complex and sometimes they seem somewhat sparse. But I would still say that album is a guitar led album. I do believe there is a big difference between Signals and MP when it comes to synths and guitars. Much more synths on Signals that were part of MP but not as prevalent. Signals had a much more 80's sound with it love of the new synths. Also the guitars are less complicated. Alex started changing his style. I do not like it as much even though I love Signals and Grace Under Pressure. I do not think I am a new Rush fan at all. I was born in 1972 but they have been my favorite band since 1980 or 81 and I heard them before then. I know a lot about the progression of their music from a bluesy style to more progressive, to shorter popular songs, to synths, and then back to the 3-piece rock band, etc. I personally think the biggest jump is from Hemispheres to Permanent Waves. They stepped down the prog a lot and went for songs that had more regular running times. Even the longer songs they did on PW and MP were not as complex as on a Farewell to Kings or Hemispheres. Huge change. A close second is the change from Rush to Fly by Night. Peart changed a lot. Very early on Rush's songs featured the guitar more than later ones. But that really started to change on Fly by Night. Rush to me has always been led by the mixture of all three since Fly by Night. I guess one could say that the rhythm section (bass and drums) leads more on some pieces but that is true on YYZ so it did not just happen in the synth era. But Lifeson did start playing less. And I know 2112 is about a guitarist but that does not mean the guitar is the main driver of all the songs. Look aT Tom Sawyer. Often the bass is leading as much as the guitar on that song. Often they are playing similar parts or one picks up the same part from the other. That is what Geddy does during the guitar solo on Tom Sawyer. Anything on the first album is very different. It was mostly guitar. Rush was not much unlike Led Zeppelin and many other bands that featured almost exclusively a guitar only or mostly lead. That might be an overstatement but after the first album Geddy and the drums were much more. That is one reason why I always liked Rush. They were not like Van Halen or AC DC. Those bands rhythm sections were their almost just to set up the lead guitar. There are times on some VH albums and especially one Metallica album in which you cannot hear or have trouble hearing the bass and even the drums besides just a mess of sound. The bass especially gets drowned out. I love when all parts are heard. Like The soloing on Freewill. Or the great intro of Anthem. I think I responded to your points. Sure, Signals was a change and I did not like the overall point it took the band. I just think those early album (Signals and Grace Under Pressure) are still classic albums and do not take the synths too far. The sound starting on Power Windows through really Roll the Bones and Test for Eacho (although maybe for a slightly different reason) was not the best Rush. I like it better than Vapor Trails and Snakes and Arrows for the most part. Maybe only Nostalgia but those albums are good live. The studio recordings are just not always that great. But Rush has always sounded better live. The studio recordings just do not sound as thin and cold/ mechanical as they did during that time.
love your channel!
Thank you for taking time to comment!
epic video/topic.
Rush, some of the most sacred musical ground for many including myself. I've never done a detailed marathon of their catalog like this, but have been thinking about it.
Yeah, they were always kind of the big whale for this channel both because I love them so much and their catalog is so big. I felt they deserved a real deep dive and that why I did the multiple vids. Appreciate you taking time to comment and hoped you enjoyed them.
Before and After on the first album shows a little glimpse of their future prog path. Although it really only has 1 major switch, it shows that the prog elements were there even before Peart.
Based on a chat between Lifeson and Lee promoting Lee's book, early on after Peart joined and they barely knew him he presented them with the lyrics to Beneath, Between and Behind and they both thought 'great, now we dont have to bother with that part anymore'. I think you underrate BBandB, the drums are fantastic in that. By-Tor at 100......well done.
Caress is very underrated, and I'm with you on the ratings here, even if not the popular belief. Their least commercially successful album, it's one of my favs. I might drop Bastille Day a little, it's a little 'basic rock song' for me. My Uncle gave me Chronicles when I was 13 and Fountain just blew me away. A Tolkien and fantasy nerd, I had no idea a rock band could do something like this. This epic tale where the music matched the moods. No One At The Bridge is amazing.
2112 itself is amazing, but side 2 of 2112 is just ok, imo. Passage to Bangkok, Tears, meh (I have this one as the lowest rated Rush song). I was in the Columbia Record club as well. Back then you had to find music, unlike the ease of the internet era.
I stray from the norm on Farewell. I know I'm in the minority here but songs like Madrigal and Cinderella Man are ones I often skip in a playlist. Xanadu is one of their all-time songs, the title track is good but I dont love the tin-y guitar sound as much as others, I'd go 80 myself. Cygnus is great, but before I put it together with Hemispheres I thought it was just a bit too overpowered. I would drop that to 80 as well (just my opinion, respect yours as well)
Hemispheres is my favorite as well, without hesitation. The answer to Fallon's "if you could only listen to one song for the rest of your life...." question, La Villa Strangiato is that song for me. You rate each song exactly as I would. Circumstances is the weak link musically but the lyrics are outstanding.
I'm also in the minority concerning Natural Science. It's a bit more repetitive than many of their longer songs and it reminds me a little of Cygnus, just a bit overpowered. There is a special place in my heart for Different Strings. Just a beautiful song both lyrically and musically. I would overrate this at 100 because of how it resonates. Same with Losing It from Signals.
Moving Pictures tour was the first (of 5) times I saw them live. I was 15. We had tickets to see Zeppelin (advanced tickets) when Bonham died so I convinced my friend to switch the deposit to Rush tickets. He ended up being the 2nd biggest Rush fan I know.
I grew to love Signals but when it first came out I was a bit disappointed. New World Man was the first I heard and I thought WTF? I love all three guys but I'm an Alex man and he was pushed back in this and several following albums. I would personally swap the 60 to New World Man and put countdown as the 100. I love countdown, the way it builds to the crescendo. We part paths a bit on this one.
Grace was the first time I was front row, chest to the stage. Was a strange show, I was in the Army and was stationed in Augusta, Georgia. Nobody big plays Augusta, ever. They di and to add to it Blue Oyster Cult opened for them, a band I had already seen and loved, very fun band in concert. The venue was half empty, it was crazy. Their tour buses had their destination placard switched to say "why are we here?" and the other said "Never Again". Gen admission, we showed up 3 hours early expecting a long line already. There was one guy in line holding a pair of drumsticks, lol. I was so close I could have untied Geddy's shoelace. EDIT: It was actually the Power Windows tour. I remembered wrong. The concert was April 23rd 1986
We really split on Power Windows. That's when I started checking out. I came back later and listen to it all, but this album caused me to drift.
Sorry for the ridiculously long post but the comments are a little sparse for a really good video.
Sorry? Are you kidding! Fantastic comments! Appreciate you taking time to contribute. Sounds like we’re pretty similar, though maybe diverge a bit on some of the keyboard-heavy stuff. Getting to see both Rush and BOC (I have a video on them too) from such close range had to be amazing.
Once I saw Rush up close on MP tour it was really difficult to not be near the band. You can literally FEEL athe power and seeing those guys at such a young age was revelatory.
Thanks again! I just posted pt 2 which isn’t as enthusiastic but, so be it.
@@therockrollsoapbox6075 It was so great, the front row BOC/Rush concert. I'm a big guy, 6'7" and I was also in the Army so I was pretty buff at the time (that physique is LONG gone, haha) so I stood out significantly to both bands. I remember Geddy kept laughing at my 'enthusiasm' for the show and at one point, mid-song, Alex came over, gestured towards me and I swear he mouthed 'watch out for this guy' and they both laughed.
I havent watched the BOC video but it's on my list. Love those guys. They used to play gigs in LA at small clubs under the pseudonym Soft White Underbelly. I saw them several times in that way and its so different to watch a band in a 50 seat venue than in a 20000+ seat arena. They are a tough band to classify, but my friends and I used to call them Monster-Billy. They really have several elements of a rock-a-billy band, like the Stray Cats, only considerably heavy and darker. The funniest way I've heard them described was: They are the band playing at the last stop bar before crossing the river Styx. I really love the older stuff, Secret Treaties, Agents of Fortune, Tyranny and Mutation, etc. (7 Screaming Diz-Busters is really underrated, Buck Dharma absolutely goes off on the guitar in that one)
@@Heathcoatman "They are the band playing at the last stop bar before crossing the river Styx" HAHA. That's about as good as any description I've heard. They really are hard to classify. You'd think with all the sci-fi and song names like Don't Fear the Reaper, Dominance and Submission, Flaming Telepaths they'd be these overly serious guys or a complete cartoon...and yet they somehow pull it off while winking and letting you know it's all good fun. That's a very fine line to walk and they did it beautifully.
I also had opportunity to catch them twice in 80/81 and they were amazing. Got very close and Buck Dharma was so cool; throwing out picks endlessly to make sure anyone who wanted one got one. While also playing some of the best lead guitar you'll ever hear. Very cool band.
@@therockrollsoapbox6075 Yep, and they just seem like they are having fun. Like they are just jamming in a garage and you got to sit in and watch.
Strange, I always assumed the voice at the finale of 2112 were the priests speaking, stating things resumed back to their "normal" and the Protagonist's discovery was only a speed bump in their master plan. I guess I'm a pessimistic kind of guy, never considering the priests had been overtaken.
Nice breakdown of everything Rush, by the way.
Thanks! And you might be right about 2112. I read where Neil said it was left open to the listener's interpretation on purpose. So there's no "right" answer.
Fly by Night a only a 74?
Your mileage may vary! 😀
The title track isnt great, imo. It's a little too "should we try to make a radio song on this album?"
I love Tolkien but Rivendell is a throwaway song.
Interesting comments on Signals. No Peart crazy drumming? Subdivisions is full of it. Most of the songs are still very guitar driven. Not synth driven. Only one truly synth driven is Subdivisions. Even Losing it is more about Ben Mink's Electric Violin than synths. I think you are confusing later albums with Signals. There was a progression away from the guitars that reached its zenith on Hold your Fire. This one and Grace Under Pressure were still very rocking. I would suggest that you listen to Signals again.
Interesting you like Power Windows which is much more synth heavy than Signals or Grace under Pressure. I like it but it is so much colder and thin I do not like the production at all. What I do not like about PW is that the raw rock sound is placed by a thin cold production. It sounds much better live.
Perhaps calling them synth driven is an overstatement, but I dont think it's in dispute that the guitar takes a step back and synths a step forward. Chemistry is another song from signals that has a lot of synth. People at the time could all tell the difference instantly. Still some great hooks and solos. I would argue that although Rush always tweaked their style from album to album, the tweak between Moving Pictures and Signals is one of the biggest changes.
@@Heathcoatman I can agree that there is much more synth on Signals than Moving Pictures. Signals was a large step from Moving Pictures to a more synth heavy sound. From MP to Signals was one of the bigger transitions of their career but I do not think it was the biggest even in regard to synths. But it was a progression. I think you agree. They changed their sound from album to album with some being more drastic. Like the huge difference between Hemispheres and Permanent Waves.
I do think Signals is mostly still a guitar driven album. That was my contention or disagreement. I think the sound of Signals is closer to Moving Pictures and Hold your Fire. At least in the sense that guitars still drive most songs (not so much Subdivisions or Losing it (although the electric Violin largely takes the place of the guitar on the latter). Chemistry and the Weapon (maybe even more) has a good amount of synths. I do think the synths are still play more of the filler role than the guitar except maybe in the chorus of The Weapon that seems particularly synth heavy.
I love Signals. It was the first Rush album I bought for myself. Not the first I heard but the first I bought. To me the classic Rush albums are Fly by Night, 2112 - Grace under Pressure, and Counterparts. Clockwork Angels is really good and so are some of the other albums I did not name.
The very low point is Hold your Fire which has some of the only Rush music I have never liked at all. It still has a few good songs especially when performed live. But Counterparts is the only Rush album after Grace Under Pressure that is a true classic album to me. Caress if Steel is a good album but they were not ready for the true prog epic. Not yet. Albums like Power Windows, Presto, Roll the Bones, and Test for Echo suffer from production. Cold or thin sounding music. No grit. I really like Power Windows but it seems such a huge jump away from rock then Hold Your Fire became a tonal mess.
@@carlpeterson8182 Yeah, further proof that music is subjective. Other than the Debut album to FBN, I think the MP to signals jump is the biggest. Just my opinion. I also thought it was odd that you compared MP to Hold your Fire. I dont see the similarity at all. MP is an all-time iconic album and Hold Your Fire is my least favorite Rush album.
Also on Chemistry, and not just the heavy synth intro, there are huge sections where Alex is just doing a muted 3 chord almost reggae part, almost like he's just accenting Neil. It's a simple melody during this part, but it's a synth melody....it leads.
Again, important to understand that I'm not saying it's a synth album, I agree that there is Alex, playing lots of solos and leading the tune here and there, it's just s step back.
If you listen to everything from Rush to Hemispheres, this is a lead guitar driven band. The melodies, the whole structure of their music is based on Alex. Geddy shreds, he leads here and there, his fills are epic. Neil is always just driving the song in all of it's directions, but the absolute core of these songs is Alex and his guitar. Look at By-Tor or Necromancer or the entire Fountain of Lamneth. 2112 is a song about a guitarist, there's the huge section where the lead is learning to play the guitar in his cave. The reason the went from a gymnasium band in Toronto to touring with groups like Kiss or Aerosmith (et al) is because some DJ in Cleveland heard Working Man, basically a 7 minute song with a 5 minute guitar solo. That was their break. Jump to Signals......where did Alex go? (exaggeration)
What I have noticed is that in many cases older Rush fans, those that listened in the early days (dont mean this in any elitist way) are more likely to say 'starting with Signals Alex takes a step back' and younger fans or people who discovered them in a later part of their career are less likely to say or think that. It often depends on where they were in their catalog when you first started loving them.
@@carlpeterson8182 Of course I had to go listen to Signals after this discussion, haha. Another song that may even be the best example of what I was talking about is Analog Kid. While Alex has a really cool hook in this song, there are huge sections where he is just playing very basic chords in the background. You can barely even hear him during the chorus. Great hook, amazing solo, huge sections of studio musician caliber backing guitar.
Sorry to ramble.
@@Heathcoatman I will attempt to reply to both your replies here. First I was not comparing MP to HyF. I was arguing that Signals sounds more like MP than HyF. There is a progression from album to album and Signals sounds much more like its predecessor than what they would become.
Second, there is a difference between being guitar and synth driven and not having a good or complex guitar part. For instance I do not think the guitars on Def Leppard's Pyromania are that complex and sometimes they seem somewhat sparse. But I would still say that album is a guitar led album.
I do believe there is a big difference between Signals and MP when it comes to synths and guitars. Much more synths on Signals that were part of MP but not as prevalent. Signals had a much more 80's sound with it love of the new synths. Also the guitars are less complicated. Alex started changing his style. I do not like it as much even though I love Signals and Grace Under Pressure.
I do not think I am a new Rush fan at all. I was born in 1972 but they have been my favorite band since 1980 or 81 and I heard them before then. I know a lot about the progression of their music from a bluesy style to more progressive, to shorter popular songs, to synths, and then back to the 3-piece rock band, etc. I personally think the biggest jump is from Hemispheres to Permanent Waves. They stepped down the prog a lot and went for songs that had more regular running times. Even the longer songs they did on PW and MP were not as complex as on a Farewell to Kings or Hemispheres. Huge change. A close second is the change from Rush to Fly by Night. Peart changed a lot.
Very early on Rush's songs featured the guitar more than later ones. But that really started to change on Fly by Night. Rush to me has always been led by the mixture of all three since Fly by Night. I guess one could say that the rhythm section (bass and drums) leads more on some pieces but that is true on YYZ so it did not just happen in the synth era. But Lifeson did start playing less. And I know 2112 is about a guitarist but that does not mean the guitar is the main driver of all the songs. Look aT Tom Sawyer. Often the bass is leading as much as the guitar on that song. Often they are playing similar parts or one picks up the same part from the other. That is what Geddy does during the guitar solo on Tom Sawyer. Anything on the first album is very different. It was mostly guitar. Rush was not much unlike Led Zeppelin and many other bands that featured almost exclusively a guitar only or mostly lead. That might be an overstatement but after the first album Geddy and the drums were much more. That is one reason why I always liked Rush. They were not like Van Halen or AC DC. Those bands rhythm sections were their almost just to set up the lead guitar. There are times on some VH albums and especially one Metallica album in which you cannot hear or have trouble hearing the bass and even the drums besides just a mess of sound. The bass especially gets drowned out. I love when all parts are heard. Like The soloing on Freewill. Or the great intro of Anthem.
I think I responded to your points. Sure, Signals was a change and I did not like the overall point it took the band. I just think those early album (Signals and Grace Under Pressure) are still classic albums and do not take the synths too far. The sound starting on Power Windows through really Roll the Bones and Test for Eacho (although maybe for a slightly different reason) was not the best Rush. I like it better than Vapor Trails and Snakes and Arrows for the most part. Maybe only Nostalgia but those albums are good live. The studio recordings are just not always that great. But Rush has always sounded better live. The studio recordings just do not sound as thin and cold/ mechanical as they did during that time.