HOLD YOUR FIRE

I'm not certain "Hold Your Fire" is a concept album, but here's my take on things. Using the four elements (fire, water, earth, air) as imagery, RUSH tells the story of a pilgrim who searches to find the calm and understanding human being trapped beneath the surface storm of negative emotions. The "story" (as it were) alternates between the present journey and past recollections, finally achieving peace on "Tai Shan" and returning to the water of our origin on "High Water." Maybe that's stretching things a bit, but the good news is even without a uniting concept the songs on "Hold Your Fire" hold their own. In fact, the opening combination of "Force Ten" and "Time Stands Still" is probably their best stage entrance since "Moving Pictures". Add great standalone songs like "Prime Mover" and "Turn The Page" (which appear at well-placed intervals to shake the listener from potential apathy), and the sum total may edge out "Grace Under Pressure" and "Power Windows". Purists will note that RUSH still leans heavily on synthetic sounds, which diminishes the effect of their technical brilliance, but it's unfair to expect the trio to discard a style that they've obviously embraced and made work for them.

I'd stop short of calling this a great album, since too many critics have championed any one of their post-Pictures albums as the Dauphin in the discography, but I can see where folks would warm up to this more than their last two efforts.