First Major Project

This Upcoming January

The "World's Biggest Cult Band"; a band whose fans are compared to Trekkies on the level of their devotion; a band that made you want to read works of Ayn Rand. Whatever the title they are given, they are one of my favorite bands of all time. Complex but catchy, serious yet always with a sense of humor, a power trio unlike any other, Canada's most famous rock exports, the immortal titans: Rush!

Starting off as a hard rock band that took major influence from bands the likes of Led Zeppelin and Cream, the band grew to heights that were thought impossible for a rock band of their type at the time. They were never one to follow trends, never one to take the easy way out with their sound, always willing to expand and push their abilities while still remaining true to their identity.

Terminally uncool was a popular insult to throw against the trio during their career but time has proved fatal to that notion. Never has the band been more popular or respected than in today's music landscape. Bands from the likes of Dream Theater, Foo Fighters, Nine Inch Nails and so many more have looked up to this band, and I wager that many more will follow in the decades to come. From Geddy Lee's grooving bass lines and soaring vocals, to Alex Lifeson's sheering, complicated guitars, and Neil Peart's duel role as the lyricist who gave the band their philosophical identity and his complicated drumming, each piece they hold contributed to the greater puzzle that was Rush. While they have retired from the music scene since 2018, they are a rock institution that will never be questioned or refuted.

From the likes of hard rock, to complicated progressive rock, to the early beginnings of progressive metal, new wave, reggae, this is a band that doesn't know the meaning of the term genre labels.

Strap in, because coming next month I will be going through all nineteen studio albums that the band released in their forty year long career.

We are going beyond the gilded cage.

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Rush Retrospective Part 13: Presto (1989)

Rush hit a tiny speed bump in their career, it was only a matter of time. Luckily, this creative misfire wasn’t even close to stopping Rush’s creative output and in 1989, as the eighties were nearing their conclusion, the band released their final record in the decade that showcased them at their most prolific and creative. With a switch to a new record label, the legendary Atlantic Records, and a new producer at the helm, Rupert Hine, the band was ready to close out the decade in a strong fashion. The big question though was if the trio was going to learn from the mistakes that plagued “Hold Your ”? The answer:...kind of… The album opens with “Show Don’t Tell”, and it kicks off with Alex Lifeson delivering a nice crunchy riff, and it shows the band kind of returning to stronger guitar presence, or at least one that isn’t as clean as what was exhibited on previous releases. There are still keyboards on this track, and on the album as a whole, but they seem to be scaled bac

Rush Retrospective Part Four: 2112 (1976)

The Trio Has Assumed Control After the disaster that was “Caress of Steel” Rush was in dire straits. Both fans and the record company were not connecting with Rush’s new progressive direction. A change had to be made and fast, otherwise the trio weren't going to succeed in the industry. To make sure that didn’t happen, their record company advised and demanded them to craft songs that were more single friendly, radio friendly. Rush’s response: to make the title track of their next album a twenty minute long science fiction epic suite detailing a man going up against a civilization whose rulers detest art. The most insane result of all this, is that this decision should have blown up in their faces, but it didn’t. “2112” cracked the US Billboard Top LPs, reaching 61 in the charts, and sold over 500,000 copies by 1977, reaching gold certification. The biggest question is how? How and where did this album succeed when “Caress of Steel” failed to reach an audience, even

Rush Retrospective Part 9: Signals (1982)

A Sleek New Form Rush were now in the unenviable position of having to capitalize the mammoth success that was “Moving Pictures”. Whatever direction the band was going to explore, inevitably fans were going to compare it to “Moving Pictures”, whether they liked it or not. Luckily, the band did not fall into the trap of resting on their laurels and in 1982, “Signals” was released. This record marks the beginning of a new era of the band, one in which the trio heavily implemented synthesizers into their music, an era that fans have dubbed the "Synth Era". Now synthesizers were an already established ingredient of Rush's music, since the late seventies in fact, but this is the release where the synths started to become a more dominant part of the song making process. “Signals” is a very bold, daring record in many respects helping to push the band's sound further, luckily not resting on the success of their previous output. The record opens with a from

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