FLY BY NIGHT

This album I would not classify as Progressive, more like Aggressive. It starts out with a flurry - Anthem, Best I Can, Beneath B&B, ByTor & the Snow Dog - introducing everybody to "The Professor". Great hard rocking stuff and some excellent guitar work from Alex, especially the solos. I love Geddy's wail in their earlier work as well, I think it fits the kind of heavy, fast paced music that they were playing while each band member displayed their impressive talents. They weren't trying to be artsy here, they were (and are) a hard- rocking power trio and a great one at that. The production of FBN is better than their debut album and in my opinion an underrated piece of work for most Rush fans and rock fans in general. On the downside, the lyrics aren't yet what we've come to know from Rush and the album is a bit short. As a hardcore Rush fan I'm trying to be realistic to those who may not be so even though this CD may not be quite 4 stars, I think it's better than 3.