I’m sorry. But Rush is the worst band I’ve ever heard. Neil Pert is a rediculously overrated drummer, and his vocals sound like an 80’s metal band gone horribly, horribly wrong (Oh wait, Rush is and 80’s metal band gone horribly, horribly wrong!). What in the world is so special about Geddy Lee? I’m still confused as to why people think this guy has talent. And the guitar? I mean, come on. Those are some of the most boring riffs ever. And his solos are very unimpressive. How can these guys be progressive Rock? The song 2112 isn’t a huge, progressive concept song as it’s sold as, it’s 5 terrible metal songs with 15 seconds of blank reel between them and put into one track. That isn’t progressive rock. Sorry, I’ll stick with real Prog Bands like Yes (you know, the kinds with a hint of talent and originality).
I was just listening 2112 for the first time, and it was so bad I actually turned it off so I could listen to Sonny Rollins.
That’s right, Rush is more boring than Sonny Rollins!
If this is better off in the Pit someone can move it there for me!
Did Neil Peart sing? If he did, I wasn’t aware of this. I’m not a big Rush fan either, then, so…
I like to think of Rush as three potentially obnoxious musicians who got lucky finding each other. I do like what music of theirs I’ve heard, though. (Limelight and Tom Sawyer, et al.)
I have to agree about Rush being overrated… I’m from Chicago originally… There used to be a station there called Rock 103.5… They played Rush about every 9th song or so… It got to the point where people where I worked were calling up the station asking them to play ANYTHING else… I was one of those people… I got Lou Brutus ( www.harddriveradio.com ) on the phone and talked to him about it… Lou was a pull-no-punches kinda guy… His words were:
“This is what happens when a band is allowed to purchase a voting block of shares in a broadcast company…”
So they get airplay not because they have skill or write things people want to hear, but simpoly because they have the cash to force it down your throats… Yes, I know thats the way it is, but I don’t have to like it… Or them… Each person in Rush could suffer fates that would give H.P. Lovecraft nightmares and I wouldn’t waste an ounce of sympathy on any of them…
put your crack away, my friend, and learn!
rush USED to be great!
i don’t know about now…after cold fire (93), i couldn’t recognize them from anyone else. they started getting that way mid-late 80’s. they weren’t like yes, they were more of a good led zep. i mean, if crap like zep can be superstars, i think that we can afford calling rush progressive. put them in context. they were innovative, it’s just that in the almost 30 yrs since they started, well, everything has been done rock-wise, so rush can’t really do too much else. let them lay down their weary load with some dignity. they did their fair share!
rush is an acquired taste. kind of like smoking cigarettes. you have to keep at it if you’re serious! you don’t just pick them up and love them! you have to hang in there!
also, geddy lee used to be the vocalist, not neil peart.
I don’t love 2112 like i do most of their stuff. about 1/2 of it is crap,. passage to bangkok is crap unless you hear the live version. (on Exit: stage left album) they didn’t really start getting primo till about 80-81, give or take, after the 2112 album.
rush is kick ass. don’t let this bad encounter harm the inner splanky!
(my mind is kinda worn out now, been studing french revolution…
Actually, I think Peart wrote most of the lyrics, and Geddy Lee did most of the singing. Sorry about that.
While I found some of their singles listenable, I don’t find any of the CD’s I’ve listened to good at all. As I said, I find '40s soft jazz more interesting than Rush.
What pisses me off most is that hear so often that each of the musicians in the band are so groundbreakingly good, and that they are on such a greater musical level than any other band ever, that they are suspended on some undefined tier of music greatness that will never be surpassed or that can ever imagined, and that even by listening to their music you cannot truly understand such phenominal, astronomical pure heavenly bliss. Like they’re manna from heaven or something. Man, they suck.
Yeah, Neil Peart sings, to avoid bears…Its in his book(which I highly recomend).
The rest of the OP is pretty…Well, thisnt the pit, but as a musician I have nothing but the greatest respect for the Holy Trinity of art rock…Neil Peart is the greatest rock drummer who ever lived, and one of the greatest lyricists as well. Geddy lee is one of, if not the greatest Bass players(in his style), and is multi-talented beyond belief. I have seen the man sing, play incredibly complex basslines and play synth with his feet all at the same time. Alex Lifeson, while I wouldnt call him the greatest, is an incredable musician, and the subtlety and creativity of his work is pure art.
Even the musicians I have met that dont like rush, respect them as artists.
Ok, well I’ve also listened to their Self Titled CD (the first one, without Neil), and another one which I forgot the name of.
Now the self titled one I really hated. Sure, it was without Neil Peart, but come on. How can anyone say that the song “Working Man” is a classic? Possibly the worst song I’ve ever forced myself to listen to, ever.
I didn’t like the other CD I listened to either (it’s name escapes me). The only good thing was it had a song called Rivendell (about Elves, dir!). The song itself sucks, though.
Maybe I’m just listening to the wrong stuff? I think this is all early material by them.
i hated them at first, but i loved spirit of radio. i kept listening to that one over and over. i listened to it in a car with a tape player that didn’t have a rewind, so i had to flip it over a couple million times…i liked the song reverse of spirit orf radio and i thot, hey, maybe i’d better listen to the rest. i got hooked
I love how bdgr has to qualify his statement about Geddy Lee by saying “In his style”… I suppose you are right if you consider “Suck” a style… I saw a video of a Rush concert where this “awesome god of bass guitar” played a riff ONCE, looped it, and went off to play the keyboards instead… Gee… Doing that, can I be the greatest of my style too?
With me, it was Carress of Steel. I hated the band, but I respected the musicianship. Then I was walking around in the mountains fishing in Colorado, listening to The Fountain of Lamneth on a walkman. Then it hit me, as it does most rush fans. I just sorta got it…something clicked and I could hear what they were doing. After that I couldnt get enough of it.
Its funny, but for me, with rush, when I first hear a new album, I usually dont like it at first, but after I listen to a time or to, it clicks again and I can love it.
In his style, as in, flea is probably the best in his style, Les Claypool in his style, Victor Wooten in his…There are differant distinct styles of bass, and while Geddy excells in his particular style, he doesnt play funk like Bootsie Collins, so you cant compare them…He doesnt play Funk like Flea, so you cant compare them…He doesnt play whatever the hell you wanna call Les Claypool, so again, you cant compare them…Course nobody plays bass in the style of Claypool…Or Flea really for that matter.
As for looping the bass, pray, what video was this? I have seen most of the rush live footage, and have seen them live many times, and I have never seen such a thing. I have seen Geddy play open strings with one hand, and keys with the other. I have seen him play synth with his feet as well, while playing bass. His last concert was totally devoid of sythisizers, the band has sworn off of them(I almost cried, being a keyboard player)
I play Trumpet and guitar and have a very, very diverse taste in music. I listen to everything, from Klezmer to Bluegrass to jazz to Hard Rock. I can’t perform basic functions without some sort of audio device playing in the backround. I personally think I’m very open-minded music-listening-wise, and have a refined taste in music. I Still can’t see what other’s see in them.
Sigh As soon as I mentioned it I knew I was going to be called upon to name the video clip… I don’t remember… It was long ago… before my hatred for the band began to develop into its current levels… There were several of us watching the video (Most of us musicians… I am a drummer) We were shocked to see him record a bass track on stage, set down the bass and play keyboards… Its older footage… It had to be in the mid 80s when I saw the clip… I can’t really lock it down any better than that… Perhaps some other Doper with a better memory than me can fill you in…
Hard to define. First of all, 2112 was a very early song, they have put out something like 30 albums since, and every one is a differt style to some degree. 2112 is hard to get without a lyric sheet and headphons. Its based on Ayan Rand, IIRC. There are parts of a narative in the liner notes that you dont get unless you read along. It was intended to be their last album, a big fuck you to the music industry. They had been told that if they released another long, conceptual album, that they would not get renewed, so they decided to do it anyway and go work in a factory somewhere. It caught on, so they got sigined again anyway.
The story in song is about repression of artistic freedom.
And while one of my favorite albums, their later stuff was much more musicly intricate.
Look at Free Will, where it changes time signature every other measure or so, and you have a bass solo, drum solo, and gtr solo all at the same time, interacting with each other, without stepping on each other. Incredible
As far as considering Peart the “greatest drummer who ever lived” there are several others I would think would get that award before Peart… And I find it interesting that you can compare Peart to people in all other styles of music, but not Geddy… Lets see… Drummers that I’d consider better than Peart… Ginger Baker, Billy Cobham, of course the obligatory mention of John Bonham… That man had a grasp of syncopation that no one before or seince has been able to match. Carl Palmer is another that I’d say deserves an award like that before Peart… Why Palmer? People point to his days in asia and say how basic and simple his style is… True… His words, as closely as I can remember them, were: “I play what the music calls for… If the music calls for a simple rythmn thats what I will play.” Peart could learn something from this. Every single song doesn’t have to show him hammering out 64th notes as fast as he can at every fill… But his ego would suffer if it didn’t… Palmer also said: “Drum solos are for the audience… If I do an eleven minute solo, maybe a minute of it is for myself… Everything else is for the audience…” Once again, Peart could stand to remember that his ego isn’t the most important thing on the planet, even if it IS one of the BIGGEST things on earth… The same could be said for the rest of the band… Even their style of music shows how much ego each member has, by stroking each of their egos at every opportunity…
Having said that, you like them… If you gain pleasure from listening to them, good for you… But spare me the “greatest musicians ever” speech… They aren’t and they have no hope of being…
I WILL give you this… Peart IS a great lyricist… One of my favorite lines from ANY song is from Free Will…
“If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice”