Rush: Classic or Dud?

"Grace Under Pressure and Power Windows are my two favorites" two of mine also. actually I don't really care for any of their full albums after Power Windows. Hold Your Fire has some good stuff and there is good stuff on all their subsequent albums but to me PW is their last great back-to-front album.

Test for Echo is the only Rush album that I have no fondness for at all. But I really like Grace and PW for the mix of tight arrangements and triggering/electronics, which, ironically, probably would not be so prominent of they weren't dated. There was some great article I read - or maybe an excerpt from a book? - that went into all the pioneering sampler stuff they were doing to do what they were doing.

"International" is amazing.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, March 23, 2018 5:15 PM (one month ago)

Oops, it's called "Territories".

After the low expectations this album feels like such a gift. I think "Territories" and "Grand Designs" are two among their best songs.

power windows is great, it's one of my three favorite rush records (the other two being signals and grace under pressure)

Totally. It's where there was this perfect collision of songs, production, playing and concision. It always irks me when people call Rush a prog band based on just a couple of the '70s records Most of their songs are busy and complicated, but they are rarely particularly long, and they're almost always immaculately arranged.

For me, they were great from 2112 up to and including Power Windows, although I still love the first three albums. Hold Your Fire is the first one that I don't have any time for.

I bet you have at least 7-10 minutes for it.

Rush were definitely a prog band, but one that had several different phases.

Were the Police a prog band?

It seems that everyone has their own preferred "version" of Rush, but I thought they were equally great as a hard rock band as they were as a band that put together ambitious, intricate 20 minute sides and when they were soaking up new wave influences.

There's a world of difference between The Police and Rush, even if Rush were influenced by them for a short while. The Police were never as progressive, so the answer to your question is no.

The Police never rocked as hard as Rush either, thinking about it. Even during their early '80s period, Rush had stuff like 'The Analog Kid', which is a maturation of their hard rock side blended with the new wave and prog influences they'd picked up over the years.

Never as progressive because they never had 20 minute side-long songs?

hold your fire is uneven but "prime mover" and "time stand still" are prob my two favorite rush songs ever

Rush is not a prog band imo.

"prime mover" especially, my god xp

xpost That's what I say. I say they had a prog phase, but moved out of it pretty soon.

Ian Anderson once said The Police were the last great prog band.

They're more hard rock or modern rock with some prof flourishes

Never as progressive because they never had 20 minute side-long songs?

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, April 27, 2018 8:12 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You don't even need to look at the 20 minute sides - 'Subdivisions' is incredibly progressive.

But I mean, when someone talks about Rush in the context of prog rock, that's the phase they're referring to, right? I don't think it's crazy to make a connection to prog with the whole period from Fly by Night through Moving Pictures, which is six albums. If someone calls Metallica an important thrash band, they're not necessarily talking about "Nothing Else Matters".

3xp

xpost That's what I say. I say they had a prog phase, but moved out of it pretty soon.

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, April 27, 2018 3:13 PM (six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I mean "Working Man" is about as gutbucket 70s hard rock as it gets

"The Analog Kid" sounds a lot like "Omegaman" by The Police

Like, Yes and Genesis moved out of their prog phases too.

excited to see how this vital question is resolved

I mean, yes, they moved away from doing stuff like 'Cygnus X-1 Book II: Hemispheres' in the sense that the compositions became shorter, but even though they did soak up new influences, they did not entirely abandon their prog and/or hard rock influences. 'YYZ' is progressive rock, as is 'Subdivisions' ...

Like, Yes and Genesis moved out of their prog phases too.

― No purposes. Sounds. (Sund4r), Friday, April 27, 2018 3:22 PM (two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the key is Rush was not prog before they were prog
therefore their default state is not prog
it's just science really

pedantic point: genesis were not prog before they were prog

i've never heard the first yes album but i assume it isn't 100 percent prog either

(Wasn't going to go there but, yeah, so was Yes, arguably. xp!)

So, by that logic, since Status Quo were a psychedelic pop band before they were a boogie rock band, their default state is psychedelic pop.

SCIENCE!

there you go turrican you're getting it :)

I'm p sure ums was joking but also worth noting that "progressive rock" is by definition a fusion of aesthetics, i.e. not a genre that is about being 100% anything in the first place.xp

I was going to make the same point about Genesis. Yes is a trickier one - their first album isn't exactly Close to the Edge but it's unmistakably a Yes record.

wait what genesis isn't proggy? from genesis to revelation is very 60s but i'd put it in the protoprog moodly blues camp

(unless there's earlier still i haven't heard)

i mean compare this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lUJ9f0B3jo

to

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5njyO9h9Ys

there's an innate fancypantsedness to genesis even then

Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers both spent time in prog bands before the Police, and Sting was even in (at least in his mind) a fusion band. By the end they were singing about Jung and dinosaurs and spots on the sun. In their early days people used to call Sting Jon Anderson, because he has a high voice. You know who else has a high voice? That's right, Geddy Lee. And Peter Gabriel, come to think of it. Ergo, the Police are as prog as they come.

Science.

from genesis to revelation is very 60s but i'd put it in the protoprog moodly blues camp

fair!

I think of The Moody Blues as "post-psychedelic" rather than "proto-prog" ...

Procal Harum is somewhere in that transition, too.

Procol Harum, too.

Well, the Moody Blues with Justin Hayward anyway, not so much Denny Laine. I can hear 'em as an influence on the wetter end of prog - the Canterbury stuff. Procol Harum definitely part of that transitional period!

APOLLO WAS ASTONISHED!
DIONYSUS THOUGHT ME MAD!

a quantum leap forward!
in time and in space!
the universe learn to expand!

of salesmen.

OF SALESMEN!

oooooooooooOOOOOOF SALESMEN!

new wonders in the world they
wonders in the WORLD THEY
wonders in the world
they
WROUGHTTTTTTTTTTTT

Better the pride that resides
In a citizen of the world
Than the pride that divides
When a colourful rag is unfurled

Think about it!

SPIN-NING! WHIRL-ING!
STILL DE! SCENDING!
LIKE A! SPI-RAL!
SEA UN!!!1!ENDIIING!!1!!!1

I heard "Manhattan Project" on the radio when I was doing a long drive a little while ago and was struck by how clear and precise Geddy's enunciation of that text came across, relative to most of what I was hearing.