An epic saga: the review of 'Rush 50'

On the 47th piece on the 50 of the anthology that traces the history of the Rush comes a kind of Easter Egg. At the beginning of Headlong Flight Of 2012 Alex Lifeson plays a guitar solo to which Geddy Lee and Neil Peart respond with rapid bass and battery in unison. It is a desired and almost identical reply of a passage of Bastille Day of 1975, in turn included in the collection. It is a way to wink at the past by having fun and the demonstration of the fact that Rush 50 It tells the story of the band as if it were an epic saga.

The narrative structure is the strength of Rush 50. Who is not a Greatest Hits like Chronicles of 1990, even if it contains many of the band's best known songs. And it is not even a collection of rarity, although it contains a handful of unpublished. Instead, it is a musical memoir that fishing in chronological order by all the trio studio albums with the addition of a good dose of live pieces, including the last medley performed during the 2015 farewell concert. Available in various versions, including one in 4 CDs and a 7 LP containing, it is the first anthology of the Rush to go out after the end of the band and the death of Peart in 2020. Cura, it is the right crowning of the career, but it works equally well as an introduction for not started or as a gem for superfans.

For those who are part of the latter category, one of the main attractions of Rush 50 It is the debut single released in 1973 for the band's label, the Moon Records. The 45 rpm contained a cover of Not Fade Away by Buddy Holly e You Can't Fight Itwritten four hands from Lee and the first drummer John Rutsey. Nothing special in themselves are in themselves, especially if you think that in that same year, bands of bands that have indicated the way to the Rush as Houses of the Holy of Led Zeppelin or Selling England by the Pound of the Genesis. They also seem to be of the same opinion. “My God, we hated him,” says Lifeon to David Fricke in one of the two essays contained in a volume cardboard in format Coffee table Over 100 pages included in the box, together with a lot of photos, with the graphics of Hugh Syme, historical author of the Rush covers. They hated it, but it is used to grasp the extraordinary evolution that occurred in the following years.

Rush 50 does justice to Rutsey, especially with Need Some Love And Before and Afterpair of songs recorded during a 1974 concert in a high school in the Ontario (included in the 2010 documentary Beyond The Lighted Stage) which are much more incisive than the study versions of the homonymous debut. But the initial part of the disc is only a prelude to the most important change of drummers that took place in the history of rock: the arrival of Neil Peart in August 1974.

It is interesting to compare a couple of unpublished ones taken by a concert held in Cleveland less than two weeks after Peart's debut (the cover of Bad Boy and the first version of Garden Road) with the live version in the studio of Anthemthe piece that opens Fly by nightrecorded only four months later. In the first two Pearts gives his own interpretation of Rush 1.0, in the other he already feels his trademark, a mixture of stunning power and precision. It is the photograph of the moment when the drummer lays the basics of the band mature sound.

Rush 50 The great creative season between half and the late 70s through the correspondence of registered studies (the initial sections of 2112 And Closer to the Heart) and a selection of very powerful live pieces. In Something for Nothingrecorded at the Massey Hall in Toronto in June 1976, all the elements that made the group the Power Trio par excellence of the time have made the group: the penetrating singing of Lee, the Riffs of Lifeson, the aggression of Peart. A version pulled to the spasm of the instrumental suite The Strange Villa At the Dutch Festival PinkPop in 1979 explains more than many words the growth of compositional ability hand in hand with technical skills. The welcome of the public makes it clear that the Rush have managed to always test themselves while continuing to excite the fans (among the elements of interest there are also so -called Vault Edition Of The Treesso far never published outside the video game Rock Bandwith an alternative Lifesto guitar solo, and the version of Working Man previously released only as a digital single).

The first part of Rush 50 contains most of the bands best known of the band and a generous review of the period following the commercial boom of Moving Pictures of 1981 And instead within the story narrated by Rush 50 They play very well. In The Big Money of 1985, to say, there are some of the most inventive guitar passages of Lifeson (and a brilliant solo) and in Time Stand Still of 1987 Peart brilliantly adapts his superhuman technique to a contemporary pop-rock context.

The sections dedicated to the 90s and 2000 enhance mistreated albums such as Counterparts of 1993 (see the aggression of Stick it out typical of the grunge era) e Snakes & Arrows of 2007 (represented by the dynamic and exotic instrumental The Main Monkey Business and from a live version of the poignant Workin 'Them Angels). It is nice to hear the rush to bring on stage with enthusiasm pieces of their most dated catalog, such as the short and fiery dip in the instrumental prog Cygnus x-1 of 1977, in Rio in 2002, and the 2004 interpretation of BETWEEN THE WHEELSa little known song by Grace Under Pressure of 1984 (it is also one of the many songs of Rush 50 With a text, written by Peart, terribly current, see also Witch Hunt which inescapably evokes the xenophobia of the Trump era: “They say that there are foreigners who threaten us / our immigrants and infidels”).

In addition to the opening single Not Fade Awaythe most relevant song from the historical point of view is the one that closes Rush 50the unpublished document of the last 10 minutes spent on stage in front of an audience from Lee, Lifeson and Peart. At the end of the R40 tour, which provided for a staircase of pieces in chronological order backwards, they made a jump back to the beginning by playing a medley of What you're doing And Working Manfrom the debut, with a fragment of Garden Road in the final. Beyond the music, it strikes what happens later. While thanks public and crew, Lee says: “Wow, what a surprise”. As fans know, it was amazed that Peart had come by his side. In the past, the drummer had always respected what he called the back of the backline and had never reached his bandmates on the stage front, at the end of the show. It is a small exciting moment that commemorates the fraternal bond between the musicians and dignity closes the journey of Rush 50 Through one of the most beautiful stories that rock has given us.

From Rolling Stone Us.