ROLL THE BONES

Roll The Bones returned to a slightly more organic and rocking sound after a couple of synth dominated albums. It features enjoyable parts scattered throughout the album, but just like the preceding Presto, there's simply too few of them.

Just as on Presto, producer Rupert Hine managed to squeeze out what little excitement and bite these songs once might have had. Dreamline and Bravado work quite well on Rush's live albums but here they are too mainstream and radio-friendly. Even the songs that impress me most (Ghost of A Chance and Neurotica) could have been so much better.

Production issues aside, there's also some real stinkers here. Roll The Bones, Face Up, The Big Wheel and Bet Your Life are downright cringe worthy. I can understand that some fans didn't like the synth dominated sound of the 82-87 period, but that period at least had stellar songwriting and high-level musicianship. Here the synths are mostly gone, but apparently, the song writing skills went out the door with them.

Bubble-gum Rush alert! Avoid.