Guitar in 80s Rush

I was just listening to Grace Under Pressure today, and I got to thinking that the classification of Rush's work from 1982's Signals to 1987's Hold Your Fire as the "synthesizer period" is a real myth.  Just about every description you hear of that era describes it as "synthesizer dominated," "drowning in keyboards" or something of the sort, trying to tell us that the guitar was pushed to the background as the keyboards came to define the sound of the music and take the lead in almost every song.  This has never made any sense to me.  Sure, Alex Lifeson had to share the spotlight with some keyboards, but for the most part, the synthesizers were confined to the rhythm section, playing chords, ostinatos, and atmospheric parts.  They emerged into the lead from time to time but Alex still got all the solos and played some brilliant rhythm parts and arpeggios, working with the keys in a masterful way.  If anything, this period was his most tasteful, where his parts might have been a little more sparse, but added to the music that much more, not to mention that he shredded on his solos as much as ever.