Rush 80s albums: signals to HYF

In order...

Grace Under Pressure - Incredible songwriting, Rush start to use the synthesizers WITH the guitars again instead of just letting them drown them out on the last record.

Hold Your Fire - Underrated by most, there are some great tunes on this one, and even the lesser tunes are worth listening to.

Signals - A bit overrated, but still good...  I still can't get over the fact that the synths overpower the songs at times.

Power Windows - Never got into this... maybe because the production and feel was a bit TOO 80s, but the good songs on here are definitely quality stuff.

Sometimes opinions are troubled by memories. This cenrtainly is the case for me.  as i got to know the music of this band during the eighties. For a very long time I considered this part of Rush history as  the most essential part. Later I realized there were some excellent albums before Signals. The 4 albums have an equal level of quality. I voted Grace under pressure but I do like the others as well

1. GUP : an amazing album with not one track which isn't worth of checking out. The massive wall of sound is simply amazing and the album rocks more than any other eighties release of the band. Even now after all those years I still listen to this album very often. Especially the science fiction atmospere attracks me. Also this is the closing album for some elements of Rush' typical style before 1984. Everyone likes the title track and Red sector A but a track like Afterimage is the perfect bridge between those songs. Great to hear the band put some emotion in their music.  Tracks like enemy within or Red lenses still have some elements of Rush rock roots. These tracks could easily have ended up on Moving pictures as well but later on Rush didn't do these things anymore.

2. HYF comes very close ; again, excellent songwriting, great production, the band dares to to enter some new musical territories on High Water or Tai Shan which I know not many fans seems to like but I do !  I'm not keen on Force then. This album was added later to the album and I think you can hear that ! I do the single Time stand still which may come close to mainstream but I don't care. Open secrets is another highlight.

3. Signals : I first heard Signals in 1988 and I noticed the production work wasn't as good as the other releases which was pretty normal because this album was released in 1982. However some tracks do sound better in their live version on live albums to come. A great album but there's some flaws. Chemistry is a fine track but they used the same formula with better results on Grace. Digital man and The weapon are too long and quite boring. Highlight of the album is the last track Countdown, a perfect soundtrack to the launch of a rocket.  

4. I listened to Power Windows an awful lot in the eighties but nowadays it seems forgotten. The sound is typical eighties and gives the band a sterile sound. Marathon, middletown dreams and emotion detector are the most enjoyable tracks

my four favorite Rush albums. I choose power windows, because when ranking the individual songs on that album I give them all a perfect score. Listening straight through I like Grace under Pressure better though.

Favorite songs from those albums:

Subdivisions

Between the Wheels

Manhattan Project

Grand Designs

Red Sector A

I voted for Signals because I think it's a criminally underrated record and has some great songs

Subdivisions (killer guitar riff) Analog Kid (killer guitar solo), Digital Man (killer rhythm guitar playing), New World Man (killer bass playing), Countdown (killer guitar playing) and even Losing It features some of Alex's nicest playing. For an album that people write off as synth-heavy, there's a lof of great string instrument action going on!

Actually, I think Rush really only succumbed to '80s production overload (huge reverbs, washes of tasteless keys) with Power Windows. I think Moving Pictures and Signals actually owe a lot more to late '70s new wave production and arrangement techniques - dry, brittle snares, clipped cymbals, heavily compressed guitars, sparse arrangements etc. Grace falls between two stools, with the drums getting more boomy but the guitars and basses still holding to that dry pop of late 70s and early 80s tastes.

By Power Windows Geddy has opted for the squashier sounds of Steinberger and Wal basses , Alex is so tooled up with bad digital processing racks that his guitar sound has reached a chorused, icy brittleness that's only audible to dogs and Neil's has blended some hideous synth drums with acoustic drums that sound like they were recorded inside the empty hold of a supertanker - some good material is utterly ruined by the awfulness of the technology employed. A shame.

I tried to choose between Power Windows and Signals. Voted for Signals though - I really like Subdivisions, The Analog Kid and especially Chemistry!

Grace Under Pressure is also good (especially the track #3), though counting 80s and the whole discography my choice is Moving Pictures