In November of 2011, I was commissioned by an exclusive group of music enthusiasts to create a Rush “supermix”. My goal was to represent the essence of Rush via song and word to the curious and the uninitiated.  What transpired was a greatly received double album, the following write up and a half-empty bottle of rye.

Is it a bit masturbatory to write an article about…my own article?  Hell yes, it is.  If this site had ethics or morals, it would cease to exist. (Or effort, really.  I’m repurposing a six month-old email, for god’s sake.)

Please enjoy.  Links to the actual supermix at the end.

(The following has been edited for grammar and legibility.  Translated from rye to English by myself.)

Esteemed Mix Club Members,

I was commissioned by the venerable Annile Alexander to create a Rush supermix.  While I was excited to tackle this mix, I was also a bit frightened, as there are few more polarizing bands in the existence of music than Rush.  Their influence is vast and wide, their talent has rarely been paralleled, and their catalog is a shape-shifting list of artistic craftsmanship.

They are also nerds; big, giant, unapologetic Canadian nerds. To put it better: to find a female Rush fan is to find a straw-colored needle in a haystack.  And to find a racy story on them is impossible—they do not party, they do not generate off-stage headlines and they do not make public spectacles of themselves.  Neil Peart—one of the greatest drummers who ever breathed air—would rather quote Ayn Rand than have a beer.  Alex Lifeson—the most forgotten of the “great guitarists” community—would rather hang at a diner than a strip club.  Geddy Lee—a multi-instrument storm of a talent and one of the best bassists you will always misremember—would rather play a prank on either of his band mates and giggle like a teenager than preen and posture for the tabloids.  They were—and are—Canadian to the very end: a band where fanfare and pomp go to die.

Oh, and regarding Geddy Lee…

Historically, the biggest knock on Rush has always been his voice.  To that I say this:  if your argument is against Lee’s voice, I bet you a trillion dollars that you’re also a person who defended Billy Corgan for a decade (who, by the way, is a titanic Rush fan).  Feel free get over yourself.

While I’m not a huge believer in representing bands chronologically in regards to mixes, it is impossible not to do just that with Rush.  They have measurably different periods throughout their existence that, yes, occasionally succumbed to the popular trends of the day. While they were already venturing into the early synthesizer era in the 70s, their 80s catalog sometimes can seem to verge on Mr. Mister territory in terms of keyboard saturation.  However, I would argue that their synthed-out 80s albums blow most of that era’s music away (take Prime Mover for a spin at 80+ MPH and you will better understand that statement). It’s exactly this reason that I represented so much of this Rush era on the second half of the supermix.  It’s also why “Tom Sawyer” kicks massive amounts of ass, by the way.

As for their beginnings?  Straight up classic Rock ‘n’ Roll, and pretty Zeppelin-esque in terms of blues chops and weighted soundwaves.  None of their early material could be described as “earth-shattering”, but it was most definitely hard, heavy and tight.  Let me put it another way: much of the first half of the mix will have you reaching for a sixer of Molson.  This is not a bad thing.

More recently in the 90s and 00s, they journeyed back to their hard rocking roots and still knocked everything out of the park.  Yes, they did try to assimilate to the times a little. (“Driven” is a killer hard rock song, but probably could be conceived as having been written by Creed, Fuel, Nickelback, Staind, or any other horrendous “hard rock” band of the late 90s.  The problem?  They all would have made that song suck.  Rush actually did younger music better than younger musicians at that time.)

But it’s the experimental middle of their existence where they created the most interest and generated both the most fans and haters.  I could have thrown on the twenty minute “2112”, which is musically stunning, but can easily inspire Dungeons & Dragons games to break out everywhere instantaneously.  I also could have thrown on “La Villa Strangiato”, but it would have caused high school music teachers everywhere to mold their comb-overs into mullets and pull out their gravity bongs.  I tried my best to both represent and hide the over-inflated dorkdom from you.

Music nerd moment #1: It is also important to note that, regardless of era, Neil Peart’s lyrics often verge on staggering (even if they seem like they’re talking down to you—which they generally are).

At the end of the day, Rush is a supremely talented, intelligent band that have always squired rock music into the shallow end of nerdy waters and then shoved it head first into the deep end of technical proficiency.  Which may or may not explain why only men like them (I refer you to the terminally awful movie I Love You Man for further explanation).

Music nerd moment #2:  They are not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  ABBA is.  Talk amongst yourselves.

As always, age defines the medium, and if I could have pressed this supermix to vinyl and delivered via US Mail, I would have.

You will just have to settle for yet another double album:

RushMix 1: Beyond the Gilded Cage

RushMix 2: Alternating Currents

Please blare and enjoy.

– D