Tag: Rush

Yes — Talk (1994) ★★★★★

On By Time LordIn progressive rock music10 Comments

Yes - Talk

Let me write from experience about what it is to be a Yes fan. Sometimes, “Yes Derangement Syndrome” (YDS) can take hold.

This happens when a new Yes album comes out and it’s like your beloved spouse coming home with a wildly different pair of glasses, or a radically different hairdo, or a crazily different wardrobe theme. Your first reaction is you know you don’t like it. But this reaction is way more emotional than rational, and it’s almost entirely subjective in that it is mostly founded on very deep mental patterns of subjectively-cultivated habituation. You have created a vast mental universe of inner love, and suddenly reality is asking you to consider radically new data.

It’s been really interesting to read about the reactions of Brad and Erik, both today and back in the day, to Yes’ Talk. For me this is one of my Top Ten Yes Albums, but it took me a long time to assign it that five-star ranking.

Incidentally, I challenge all Progarchists to list their Top Ten Yes Albums, an exercise like the Top Ten Rush ranking we did recently. Yes has 20 studio albums (I am counting Keystudio as one), or 21 if you want to include Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe (ABWH) — as I do. So, it’s an interesting mental exercise to divide the oeuvre into two playlists: a Top Ten and a Bottom Ten.

However that may be, let me tell you about my three cases of YDS.

The first was Talk. I remember when I first bought this CD. I listened to it once, found myself hating everything except “The Calling,” and then used the excuse that its bundled software didn’t work on my Windows PC (anybody remember that?) as the way for me to return it to the record store and to get my money back! Yep, I got my money back. Only years later, upon hearing “The Calling” again (an overwhelming nostalgic experience which instantly melted my heart), did I break down and buy the whole album once again. After many listens, I now really love everything about it and rank it in the upper echelon. But note my initial crazy reaction. I mean, how many albums have you ever tried to return to the record store in your life?! And, how many did you succeed in getting your money back for?!?! I marched this one back without even making a cassette recording of it. Crazy! YDS, indeed.

The second case of YDS was when ABWH came out. After three listens, I launched into a vicious diatribe against it that melted the ears of my Yes-loving best friend. I still remember his face. He was visibly wincing at my hatred for the album. Then, weeks later, I had completely reversed my opinion about the album, and I endlessly praised it to him. To the skies. He looked at me like I was a crazy person; I remember that look too. Sound familiar? Yes, fans, we may call it YDS. Thank God there was no bundled software on this CD, otherwise the record store may have seen me arguing on a technicality again.

“We don’t accept returns of opened products.”

“But I haven’t been able to open it. The software won’t launch properly on my PC. So, virtually, it hasn’t been opened.”

The third case of YDS is with the new Heaven & Earth. We know what that looks like, and it ain’t pretty. I had an extreme critical reaction to this disc, but over time I have to admit that it is steadily ascending in my mental universe. So far it’s gone from one star to four stars in my hidden mind drive. Who knows where it will stop? More on that later. But the point is this: I have learned from my previous two cases of YDS. And I have wisely resolved not to repeat it a third time.

So, back to Talk. There is much to love about this album, infused as it is with so much Rabin-era goodness. Like all the best Yes, it is magically positive and spiritually uplifting. The opening track is pure awesomeness, and I love how Erik describes it as a perfect meld of 90125 and the 70s.

But I don’t want to go over every track in detail right now, because I think it is more important to answer the five YDS-tinged complaints from Brad. Let me conclude with my rejoinders to his all-too-familiar YDS insanity:

1. The title is brilliant. 90125 is inarguably one of the stupidest titles ever, but Talk is most definitely wonderful. Like the band’s name, it is one syllable. Perfect. Further, it subtly references a subsection of the epic track “Endless Dream.” So, it pulls the listener into acquiring a deeper familiarity with, and appreciation of, the hidden dimensions of the album. It invites the prospective listener into the magical depths of prog. And what will the listener find in this magical place? Only one of Jon’s most beautiful Yes melodies ever. So, I refute this first point by directing you to the epic “Endless Dream,” beginning at 3:48 with all its titular glory.

2. I love the colors on the cover. It’s a beautiful spectrum, symbolic of the dazzling musical palette of the inimitable Yes. The point that it looks like emergent writing seems to be lost on the haters who liken it to a child’s scrawl. Obviously, that is the entirely deliberate point of the art design. It depicts the beginning stages of the acquisition of linguistic communication. The emergence of the Word is pregnant with all the possibilities of communicative color. The album title is thus iconically represented in this picture and it all ties in perfectly with the first words of the album:

Feel the calling of a miracle

In the presence of the word

The awakening of communication in a child’s word and in the non-verbal space of music is invoked by the album image. So, I slay the objection by replying with the opening lines of “The Calling.”

3. YDS can fixate on entire albums, or it can suddenly scapegoat a single song. There’s no arguing with such craziness. I can only say that I really love the two tracks Brad excoriates. They are excellent and I can’t comprehend the haters, except to say that I have been there once too. I even got my money back! But now, I have seen the light.

For what it’s worth, if I had to scapegoat a least favorite track on Talk, it would be the loopy “Where Will You Be.” However, I would rather choose to view it in context instead, as a refreshing pause before the epic finale track.

4. The album integration is cohesive as it is, pace YDS. The favorite fantasy that a Yes fan can indulge in is: “How I could make this awesome album even more awesome.” (Another guitar lick in this empty space here. A little more cowbell there. And so on.) It’s crazy! Give it up! In this case, the YDS fantasy is simply fueled by Yes’ own auto-suggestion in the third line of the opening track, “The Calling”:

Now we hold the right to rearrange

Yeah, sure you do. And you have the right to return your album too. Whatever! Let it be, my friend.

5. Create your own playlist if you want to monkey with track order. Or do a remix or mashup with 90125 if you are serious about the fevered suggestions you make. But the album is awesome as it stands, no matter how many imaginary universes we can conceive of where it qualitatively “goes to 11” and is “just that much” better.

Talk begins with all guns blazing (“The Calling”) and ends with an epic assault of sonic awesomeness (“Endless Dream”). A strong beginning and a strong ending! Totally brilliant — and a contrast with 90125, I would opine, which I always thought kind of peters out with its last two or three tracks. (“Two Hearts”? If you want to be a hater, throw your “sap” and “boredom” here! But then you may as well as give up on Jon Anderson entirely.)

Hey, these are my favorite kinds of arguments. Arguments reserved for we few, we happy few, we band of brothers. He that wigs out today on Yes with me shall be my brother, be his criticism n’er so vile!

Preview: Clockwork Angels #4 (Comic)

On By bradbirzerIn progressive rock musicLeave a comment

If you’re into Rush or comics, you should check this out.  If you’re into Rush and comics, you must check this out.

A nice five-page preview of the fourth (of six) issue.  Story by Neil Peart and Kevin J. Anderson, artwork by Nick Robles (and Hugh Syme).

ClockworkAngels04-COVER-A-6cd95

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=preview&id=22851

 

On Going to 11

On By Time LordIn Progarchy1 Comment

You have experienced this during your own listening:

Music released today typically has a dynamic range only a fourth to an eighth as wide as that of the 1990s. That means if you play a newly released CD right after one that’s 15 years old, leaving the volume knob untouched, the new one is likely to sound four to eight times as loud.

As Ethan Smith has written, the problem is with us all over the place:

Over the years, rock and pop artists have increasingly sought to make their recordings sound louder to stand out on the radio, jukeboxes and, especially, iPods.

But audiophiles, recording professionals and some ordinary fans say the extra sonic wallop comes at a steep price. To make recorded music seem louder, engineers must reduce the “dynamic range,” minimizing the difference between the soft and loud parts and creating a tidal wave of aural blandness.

“When there’s no quiet, there can be no loud,” said Matt Mayfield, a Minnesota electronic-music teacher, in a YouTube video that sketched out the battle lines of the loudness war. A recording’s dynamic range can be measured by calculating the variation between its average sound level and its maximum, and can be visually expressed through wave forms. Louder recordings, with higher average sound levels, leave less room for such variation than quieter ones.

The problem even extends to vinyl releases, as Angry Metal Guy chronicles:

Labels are also looking to cash in on vinyl’s new found popularity, and so there’s plenty of lazily produced, poor sounding special edition reissues out there. And even with new vinyl, there’s never a guarantee of a dedicated, dynamic master, only the possibility. If the vinyl is sourced from the CD, it will sound every bit as bad.

In short, the problem here is that the ability to turn the music up to 11 should reside with the listener, not the mastering engineer:

There is a major difference between manipulating the recorded volume versus the playback one. When a mastering engineer artificially pushes the volume higher by applying massive amounts of DRC, he or she is changing the recorded volume by squashing the high and low ends of the frequency spectrum. This process has the nasty byproduct of causing transients and imaging to substantially degrade, making the music sound lifeless and dull.

Loudness Wars

The are many reasons why this huge problem persists today.

But one of the big myths (“metal should go to 11”) can be debunked quantitatively:

One of the most pervasive myths in metal production today is that because metal is supposed to be played loud, it has to be recorded loud. This could not be further from the truth. Some of the most popular metal albums in history are also some of the most dynamic. Master of Puppets: DR12. Rust In Peace: DR13. Painkiller: DR11. Reign In Blood: D14. Notice anything similar about these albums? They were all released prior to 1992, which is roughly the start of the Loudness War. From that year onward, the entire music industry began to engage in constant one-upmanship. Not only did every new album have to be louder than the one that preceded it, but louder than the other guy’s new album as well. By the late ‘90s everyone began to settle around DR6, which is where we are now. Why DR6? Because that’s as loud as you can possibly go while still attempting to hold on to some semblance of fidelity. DR6 is far from ideal, but for every point of dynamic range lost below that mark, you begin to do exponentially more damage to the sound.

A big problem with the industry today is that if you’re on a major label, chances are they won’t let you release an album with high levels of dynamics even if you wanted too. If you send them a fully dynamic master, they’ll think there’s something wrong with it and hire an engineer to smash it down to DR6 before sending it off to the CD pressing plant. …

The truth is that most bands simply have no idea that the DR5 and DR6 masters used on the vast majority of new CD releases are not something people actually want. I know that it’s going to be a long and uphill battle to change the minds of the executives at the major labels, but most bands on small labels generally have a fair amount of creative freedom in terms of what they can do with their masters. So if enough of you let them know that you want them to release albums with proper dynamics, they will listen.

Prog should definitely lead the way out of this morass. Why shouldn’t every self-respecting prog artist proudly and prominently place a DR number on the back of every CD they produce? It could be a way of self-identifying yourself as a serious prog artist committed to only the best sonic experience.

If not, maybe the DR Database needs to be in every reviewer’s toolkit. But keep in mind this caveat that the Dynamic Range number is just the beginning of a discussion about an artist’s musical release, and not the final word on its evaluation:

DR6 is now the industry average and already considered by most sane engineers as too compressed. The recommended level by most industry experts is DR8 or higher. A bit of a fair warning though, a higher number doesn’t necessarily mean its sounds better, but in the overwhelming majority of cases, it usually does. And applying DRC is not evil in itself either, provided it’s done judiciously. The fact is DRC is an invaluable tool that can make a good sounding record sound great. I highly encourage you to read some of our in-depth articles about dynamic range and why it’s not about the numbers, but about the sound.

So I’m sure you’re wondering though, why sacrifice the music’s fidelity just to make it sound artificially loud?

It stems from the fact that at least initially, our ears perceive louder as sounding better, and labels and artists try to leverage that fact in order to gain market share. The idea is simple, if a label’s roster sounds louder than its competitor, you, the listener, will tend to gravitate toward that label’s louder tracks than the other guy’s softer ones.

Perhaps the Priests of the Temples of Syrinx were objecting to the acoustic guitar because of its magnificent dynamic range.

Attention all planets of the Prog Federation: DR6 has assumed control…

The University of Rush

On By Time LordIn Progarchy1 Comment

Take off, eh! It’s a beauty way to go (to school):

Rush 101: Canadian Prog-Rockers Are Now A University Course
It only took 40 years, but this fall the notoriously complex prog-rock of Canadian legends Rush will the subject of a course at Tiffin University in Ohio.

Rush 40: Happy Anniversary RUSH!

On By Time LordIn Prog1 Comment

In case you didn’t know, 40 years ago today:

On this day in history 40 years ago, a young drummer from St. Catharines named Neil Peart officially joined Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee in RUSH… which is the line-up that has remained the same for the last four decades.

Happy Anniversary RUSH!

Virtual high-fives to all the fans for the last 40 years!

Son of Aurelius — Under a Western Sun ★★★★★ @SonofAurelius

On By Time LordIn Progarchy2 Comments

It is with great pleasure that I share with you a truly excellent prog metal album. Between July 1 and July 4, I selected my four favorite releases of the year thus far; over the past few days, I have been sharing them with you. I conclude that series of posts now with the album that I suspect will end up being ranked by me as Album of the Year when December rolls around.

Son of Aurelius was a technical death metal band that has now grown into an innovative and unique prog metal band. Actually, what they do defies genre categorization. They even engage in a critique of the entire notion of “prog” here in the lyrics to track six, “Attack on Prague” (a clever variant spelling of “Prog”):

Freedom from impulse
has never been required more
than it is in relation to the state we’re in,
and it will take so much more
than progressive metal can hope to achieve
With all of its intention and spacey themes.

The band’s first release, The Farthest Reaches (2010), stuck solely with the genre’s usual monochromatic death metal vocals over top of technically accomplished metal. Now on this sophomore release, they have evolved musically and exited from the sub-sub-genre ghetto of death metal but incorporated the best of those sub-sub-genre tropes into a much, much greater musical accomplishment. I am struck by the level of transformation here, and to use an analogy that Progarchy readers will understand, it seems to me something like the difference between Rush’s first album and their second album. Under a Western Sun (2014) appears to be Son of Aurelius’ Fly by Night. In case you miss my point: with this release, we are now in the presence of true musical greatness.

There are fifteen tracks on this entirely independently-produced release. The old death metal screams and growls are incorporated here only as a smaller part of the full palette of an astonishingly dynamic range of vocals. Rather than death metal vocals for the sake of death metal vocals, Riley McShane’s screaming here is intelligently deployed simply as part of the emotional variation within the songs. The impact is incredibly effective and gives the sonic experience a unique range and power.

I think of the album’s fifteen tracks in three groups of five. First, there are five lengthy, mind-blowingly epic prog metal tracks:
2. Chorus of the Earth (7:11)
3. The Weary Wheel (6:46)
6. Attack on Prague (6:03)
13. Long Ago (6:53)
14. Under a Western Sun (7:15)
The technical virtuosity is amazing on every one of these tracks. If you want to have an experience similar to being a teenager listening to Neil Peart for the first time, listen to what Spencer Edwards does with his drumming: you will be astonished to discover that a human being is capable of making sounds like this on a drum kit. It is hard to pick a favorite track, because everything here is truly superb. Cary Geare on guitar and Max Zigman on bass will blow your mind with their unbridled excellence. There are even acoustic guitars and keyboards here and there, which showcases the musical intelligence and compositional skill of the band as they create prog soundscapes on an epic scale.

If I had to single out a favorite moment and a favorite track, it would be track 13, “Long Ago,” where Riley McShane at 4:09 holds the last syllable of the last word he sings in the chorus in an extended rock and roll yell over top of the blistering guitar power chords and the enfilading fire of the drum kit. It’s a truly transcendent moment, because it takes a few seconds for you to realize that Riley is not letting go of that note… and then he just keeps on going and going, for a whole twenty seconds! Unlike Roger Daltrey’s famous yell in “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” which telegraphs what it is about to do, this yell sneaks up on you instead. But it too delivers a truly great rock and roll moment that is no less classic.

Every one of these five lengthier tracks is a mini-masterpiece, and together they actually add up to the length of a regular vinyl album of five-star rank. But the band is kind enough to share more music with us, and so we get a CD that is 72:15 in total length. Let me tell you about the rest of it, which is like having ten bonus tracks added on to an already five-star classic prog metal album.

The second group of five tracks includes four instrumentals, and one more track, “The Prison Walls,” which, unlike the other vocal tracks on this release, is nothing but growling death metal vocals, and hence it harkens back to the old style of their first album:
1. Return to Arms (2:42)
7. Flailing Saints (1:19)
11. The Prison Walls (5:55)
12. Submerge & Surface (3:03)
15. Strange Aeons (2:29)
Personally, I find these exclusively growling death metal vocals completely boring and I can barely stand listening to track eleven. I feel my I.Q. dropping as the dumb growls plod on and on — although the demented riffing on the track does make for some great crazy metal music. There is an excellent instrumental break at about the three-minute mark, and so usually I just fast-forward to that, if I don’t skip the song entirely. I guess this track is a sop to the fans who loved their first album, but I just think it is time to grow and move on and leave this sort of thing behind. It works when it is deployed in very small doses as part of an escalating dynamic range, as within the five epic prog-length tracks, but on its own it is musically very dull.

“Flailing Saints” and “Strange Aeons” are brief fade-in and fade-out instrumental outtakes, but “Return to Arms” and “Submerge & Surface” are fully coherent instrumental wholes that are very, very impressive. If you want a quick sample of the band’s virtuosity, try out those two tracks. I especially love the bass solo on “Submerge & Surface,” because it explodes into an unexpected burst of feedback at the end. The instrumentation and arrangement is top-notch on these purely musical tracks. They work well in bringing variation and interest to an already stellar album.

The last group of five tracks consists of carefully-crafted songs that are shorter in length, but still packed with the musical virtuosity that is the hallmark of Son of Aurelius:
4. Coloring the Soul (3:56)
5. The Stoic Speaks (4:46)
8. A Great Liberation (5:27)
9. Clouded Panes (4:28)
10. Blinding Light (4:15)
“Coloring the Soul” and “The Stoic Speaks” give us lyrics sung from the perspective of a Marcus Aurelius character who seems to be standing outside of time. “Coloring the Soul” even sings at the end a quote from the Emperor’s actual Meditations:

The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.

The band gets its name from the successor Emperor, Commodus, who on their first release was changed by the lyrics into a fictional, super-powered lunatic. But on this release, the “son” of Marcus Aurelius could be anyone listening to the album who is spiritually attuned to what the lyrics are singing about — a “spiritual son” of Marcus Aurelius, in other words. Perhaps something of that vision even informs the lyrics to the epic track “Long Ago,” which could be giving voice to the album’s Marcus Aurelius character, standing outside of time, viewing the trajectory of the Roman Empire, and lamenting the way the world has gone.

Tracks eight, nine, and ten are all very different, but yet each one finishes up with a highly creative outro. Each outro is very satisfying and unexpected and impressive. “A Great Liberation” has screaming death metal vocals throughout, but while the growling ones on track eleven, “The Prison Walls,” are boring, these screaming ones at least have an interesting expressive dimension, and they actually work very well with the incredible music that comprises “A Great Liberation.”

The track “Clouded Panes” is a good short introduction if you can only play one short song for someone to show the truly amazing range of which Son of Aurelius is musically capable. Again, it’s hard to pick any favorites, but one of mine is “Blinding Light,” which for the first few minutes sounds exactly like it could be a Big Big Train song! But then, at the transition into the outro, power chords come ripping in unexpectedly, and Big Big Train turns into… Son of Aurelius! It’s an awesome moment. The vocals by Riley McShane are really great here, especially his quiet clean vocals which then erupt into rock singing. This is the stuff of greatness.

Son of Aurelius are the real deal. Don’t miss this album. It’s a special accomplishment and will doubtless be our Prog Metal Album of the Year.

Son of Aurelius — Under a Western Sun

Max Zigman – Bass
Spencer Edwards – Drums
Cary Geare – Lead Guitar
Riley McShane – Vocals

Progarchist Rating: 10/10 ★★★★★

Time Warp in Boulder and Clockwork Angels

On By bradbirzerIn progressive rock music1 Comment

Clockwork_Angels_01_Cover_BAfter spending my first afternoon at the University of Colorado, I stopped by Time Warp Comics (http://www.time-warp.com).  As it turns out, Neil Peart, Kevin J. Anderson, and Nick Robles have been producing a six-part comic book series of Clockwork Angels.

The first three issues are out, and I was even able to purchase a signed (by Anderson) copy of issue 1.

And, equally important, I found out that several of the guys working at Time Warp are proggers.  They were also just–not surprisingly–fantastic guys (and a gal).  So, a huge thanks to Clayton, Garrett, Michael, and Georgia!

What a store.  I’ll certainly be stopping by again.

If you’re in Boulder, make sure you check out Time Warp.

Time Warp Comics, 3105 28th Street, Boulder, CO 80301.
Time Warp Comics, 3105 28th Street, Boulder, CO 80301.

Vanden Plas — Chronicles Of The Immortals: Netherworld (Path 1) ★★★★★

On By Time LordIn Progarchy2 Comments

Thanks, Gianna! You have saved me a bit of time by introducing the new Vanden Plas. Allow me to add my track-by-track impressions to your superb set-up.

I really like this disc a lot and have selected it as one of my star-spangled picks for this July 4. Chronicles Of The Immortals is an excellent album, destined for the year-end Top Ten. It’s definitely one of my mid-year five-star picks.

Track one (3:52) starts off with a spoken-word introduction that together with the background music and a bit of singing builds a sense of anticipation. Then track two “The Black Knight” (8:29) lets us know we are unquestionably in excellently epic prog-metal territory. By the time track three “Godmaker” (5:24) kicks in, any doubts about whether or not the listener is in the presence of something extraordinary will have been removed. Clearly, this is an organically coherent compositional tour-de-force.

Track four (1:39) is a bit of a prelude that lets us catch our breath. But then track five “A Ghost’s Requiem” (3:56) is a completely surprising and unexpected transmogrification of sacred music tropes. This brilliant track cements the disc’s five-star status and forms a musical launch pad for the mind-blowing tracks that follow. Track six “New Vampyre” (6:16) and track seven “The King and the Children of Lost World” (7:52) continue to elevate the disc to new heights, which is quite astonishing, because standard practice is to lead an album with your finest material but here we have an unfolding organic whole and its accelerating excellence becomes more and more manifest.

Track eight “Misery Affection” (5:08) mellows out a bit and displays another side of the band’s remarkable skills. But just when we have been soothed by the stunning beauty of that brief pause in the intense metallic action, we are overwhelmed by track nine “Soul Alliance” (6:39), which together with its successor, track ten “Inside” (6:42), are my favorite parts the album, because their instrumentation and composition is sheer perfection. Together they tie together the entire album and bring things to conclusion in a brilliant way.

The final track, in fact, is absolutely the most satisfying conclusion to an epic concept album whole that I have heard in a long time. Really, I can’t recall feeling such excitement, other than with the similar way it feels to listen to the end of “2112” by Rush. The last two minutes of Chronicles Of The Immortals are pure dopamine-infused prog bliss. As those gigantic concluding waves of chords wash over us in the last two minutes, I am even reminded of some Rush tropes from the first half of the eighties.

Thanks, Vanden Plas. You have given us one of the greatest, most essential prog albums I have ever heard. What an amazing gift you have shared with us.

Vanden Plas — Chronicles Of The Immortals: Netherworld (Path 1)

Progarchist Rating: ★★★★★

Happy Dominion Day (July 1) from the Great White North — home of RUSH!

On By Time LordIn Progarchy3 Comments

Happy Dominion Day from the Great White North — a.k.a., the home of RUSH!

“Et dominabitur a mari usque ad mare, et a flumine usque ad terminos terrae” (Ps 72:8)

Citizens of Progarchy have been celebrating by drafting lists of their Top Ten Rush Albums EVER.

We have heard from Erik, Kevin, Brad, RJP, and Drew.

Et moi:

1. Moving Pictures 1981

2. Permanent Waves 1980

3. A Farewell To Kings 1977

4. Hemispheres 1978

5. 2112 1976

6. Signals 1982

7. Grace Under Pressure 1984

8. Power Windows 1985

9. Counterparts 1993

10. Fly By Night 1975

Next, to rock in a truly star-spangled Fourth, stay tuned to Progarchy.com …

… because over the next couple of days I will be revealing — halfway through the year — some of the utterly essential five-star albums of upper-echelon excellence already released in 2014, clearly destined for my end-of-year Top Ten.

Who needs to wait for the end of the year? It seems the best prog is already here!

So, prepare to celebrate …

If I Can Only Pick Ten, Well Then …

On By Erik HeterIn progressive rock music5 Comments

 

rushat40

Ok, so I’m sitting at work today just minding my own business and getting things done when an email comes in from WordPress. It asks me to approve a couple of pingbacks to a piece I had written about the incredible Rush album, Moving Pictures. Well, the next thing you know, I’m seeing several posts about Rush’s top 10 albums, as well as a few regarding top prog albums or top long-form prog pieces. So now, instead of working, I’m spending at least an hour reading Progarchy posts instead of working. You guys are destroyers of discipline!!!
😉
Although I’m usually not one for lists that require ranking, the invitation to rank the top 10 Rush albums has proven to be irresistible to me. So, without further ado, here we go:

1) Moving Pictures: I’ve written extensively about this one, so I’ll just add the link here.

2) Grace Under Pressure: When this album came out, I was a few months shy of 20 years old, and in the Navy. At the time, I was stationed in Newport News, VA, as the submarine upon which I would serve, the USS Olympia, SSN 717 (Este Paratus) was under construction in the docks at Newport News Shipbuilding. While an attack submarine and not a ballistic missile sub, the Olympia would be configured to carry Tomahawk land attack missiles with nuclear warheads. The Cold War was heating up, and our main adversaries, the Soviet Union, had three submarines for every one of ours. And my job, as a sonar technician, was going to be to find theirs before they found us. In short, there was a certain “heaviness” in my life at the time. That made the timing of this album absolutely perfect. Lyrically, this is the heaviest album Rush has ever done. The pressures of life, both great and small, weave their way through this album. Indeed, like many of my shipmates, I felt like “the world weighs on my shoulders” at that time. This album resonated. It also has some outstanding music on it, and like Moving Pictures, it has an almost perfect balance between guitars and keyboards.

3) 2112: The theme of resonating continues here. There are a number Rush albums other than those listed that I like better than this from a musical perspective. But this one resonates on a different level and thus gets a high ranking on this list. As I recounted here, around the same time I first heard this album, I had numerous conversations with my maternal grandmother, who along with the rest my mother’s immediate family, was a refugee from what was then communist East Germany. The individual vs. the state, freedom vs. tyranny, individualism vs. collectivism – all those themes of the conversations with my grandmother were echoed in the lyrics of the title suite. This was the first time I had really contemplated lyrics that were about larger things in the world. And because of this, I always paid more attention to Rush lyrics than I would with other bands, always looking for deeper meaning and larger truths. This carried over to side 2 of the album, as the messages contained within Lessons and Something for Nothing led me to realize that while I was fortunate enough to have been born in a relatively free country, it was my own responsibility to make the most, and best, of that freedom.

4) Clockwork Angels: I am simply gobsmacked that a band that has been around as long as Rush can be this creative this late in their career. My first true prog love, Yes, was a great band for a while, but they haven’t been creatively great in decades, instead mostly living off of past glories (although what incredible glories they were). Rush on the other hand, despite having some incredibly glorious moments in their own musical past, has never rested on them. Instead, they pushed themselves forward and continued to create great music, and really hit a home run here. I love the lyrics in this album, which open themselves to a number of interpretations. Whereas Brad has found themes of small-r republican liberty and individualism within them, I have found a lot of Stoic wisdom weaving its way through Neil’s words, particularly in the latter half of the album as the protagonist starts to have one epiphany after another. I have little doubt that Epictetus or Marcus Aurelius would readily understand messages contained within The Garden. Throw in some great guitar work, the excellent bass work, and the always stellar drums, and you’ve got a recipe for greatness, age of the cooks be damned.

5) Power Windows: Controversial to some because of the keyboards, but not to these ears. This is a great collection of songs. With all of the malfeasance in the financial markets and corruption of the political system, The Big Money seems even more relevant today than when it was released. Middletown Dreams is a great meditation on the quiet desperation of some ordinary lives. I loved Marathon when this album was first released and the wisdom contained in the lyrics has only become more evident as I have piled on the years. And Grand Designs is a great critique of lowest common denominator pop culture and the struggle to maintain integrity within. There is some great playing on this album, such as Geddy Lee’s bass during Marathon and some blistering guitar work by Alex Lifeson on The Big Money. This album has definitely earned its place in the top 5.

6) Hemispheres: This is the most overtly prog album Rush ever did, at least in the 70’s sense of the word. The title suite that encompasses the side 1 of the original LP was a thing of beauty, with excellence in all phases: guitar, bass, drums, and lyrics. In the overarching theme of Hemispheres, Peart provides more wisdom to latch onto and live by. The Trees is a great metaphor for the perils of enforced equality. And La Villa Strangiato is one of the most fascinatingly complex instrumentals ever done by any rock band.

7) Permanent Waves: Like Moving Pictures, this is a transitional album, as the transition of Rush from the 70’s to the 80’s really took two steps. The first step was here, as they pared down some of the excess of the previous three albums. The most well-known song is, of course, The Spirit of Radio, about the tension between art and commerce and maintaining one’s integrity through the same.  Several other great tracks are here too. The thunderstorm imagery invoked by Jacob’s Ladder is a thing of lyrical beauty, while Free Will, Different Strings, and Entre Nous are all excellent in their own right. But it is the mini-epic Natural Science that really puts this album over the top for me. I was finally able to witness the performance of this song live on the Snakes and Arrows tour, and it was one of those moments I will never forget.

8) Vapor Trails: This album just screams TRIUMPH!!! After the well-documented tragedies, travels, and searching for answers, Rush returned from a near death of their own with a spectacular album. One Little Victory taught us to take joy in even the smallest victories, while the title song reminds us of our transitory nature. Ghost Rider takes us on the road with Neil, while Secret Touch implores us to have the fortitude to endure. The underrated gem and favorite track for me on this album is Earthshine, with it’s amazement at nature’s beauty. This is a statement album by Rush, and that statement was, emphatically, “we are BACK!”

9) A Farewell to Kings: The title track, Cinderella Man, Cygnus X-1 and Madrigal are all excellent tracks in their own right. But the two tracks that really make this albums are the anthem Closer to the Heart and the epic Xanadu. These became two of my favorite Rush tracks upon initially hearing them and they remain so to this day. That being said, the one downside of this album for me is the production, which was a bit harsh and dry. Particularly with Xanadu, I’ve always preferred the live version from Exit Stage Left over the studio version.

10) Signals: This is a difficult album for some, mainly due to the fact that it is probably the most keyboard dominated Rush album, and thus Lifeson’s guitar often gets lost in the mix. That’s still not enough to knock it out of my top 10, as the songs are still just too good. Subdivisions is another Rush anthem, one full of great insights and even more wisdom. For guitar excellence, The Analog Kid and New World Man are two tracks where it didn’t get lost in the mix. And while few others would mention it, the heart of my inner space geek is warmed to no end by Countdown, which ultimately celebrates humanity’s ability to create and do great things.

Looking at the other lists of best Rush albums here, it’s evident that each of us differs somewhat from one another in our preferences. And I myself will agonize over some of the albums left off the list.  I’ve listed ten albums above which I consider to be truly great albums, and I’ve had to wonder if I should have had others on the list. But how many bands ever release ten great albums? Neither The Beatles, nor prog-gods Yes, nor 70’s icons Led Zeppelin can claim to have ten great albums in their catalog (Zeppelin didn’t even get ten studio albums total, unless you count the posthumous Coda). In comparison, some of the albums that didn’t make my list (or that of others) are truly great albums. And therein lies yet another testament to the true greatness, the unparalleled excellence that is Rush.