Rush Album Poll

Vote for your favorite Rush album

I'm voting for Permanent Waves. Spirit of Radio is one of my favorite short Rush pieces of all time, and there isn't a weak spot on the album. Natural Science is my favorite Rush epic as well other than Cygnus Book II and maybe Xanadu. Freewill, Jacob's Ladder, Entre Nous and Different Strings are all Rush classics in my mind's eye.

For me it has to be:

My favourite album of all time!

Permanent Waves is also a classic, I love 'Natural Science' and 'Jacobs Ladder'

gdub411 wrote: Velvetclown wrote: Another recycled thread  Agreed...about a lousy Led Zeppelin wannabe band as well!!

Stop it or else- me and the Clown got some rather nasty pictures of you and a jalopy!

Robinlondonuk wrote: Shame we only get one vote, Id have voted 1st Hemispheres, 2nd Farewell To Kings, 3rd Fly By Night

Agreed Robin!! I'd vote

Moving Pictures

Hemispheres

Permenant Waves

AFTK

Grace Under Pressure

Vibrationbaby wrote: I voted for Hemispheres only because of La Villa. This band should have disbanded long ago. The only thing tat they did after that album which merits mention is Signals. I 've seen them live many times and I've always walked away disappointed. Geddy can't plal bas or keybords even if he had a gun held to his head.

Now you're just trying to get a reaction.

If they dissapointed you more than once why did you return 'many times'??

My favourite album changes about every three days, so I can't exactly pick a favourite.

However, By-Tor is the song currently stuck in my head, so my vote goes for Fly by Night.

I voted for 'Hemispheres'. As a way to illustrate my point, here comes my review for this album in the Archives:

In my humble opinion (which is coincident with that of many Rush loyal followers), “Hemispheres” establishes the finest hour of Lee, Lifeson and Peart as both performers and portrayers. Keeping their strong step on the road of hard rock driven symphonic prog that had been started in “A Farewell to Kings”, “Hemispheres” finds this power trio exhibiting an air of finesse fluidly combined with their habitual metallic rock conviction. The namesake suite, which occupied the whole A-side in the vinyl format, is a perfect example of the maturity that by now Rush has achieved: it is more cohesive and its successive sections are more cleverly arranged in an integral way than the ‘2112’ or ‘Fountain of Lamneth’ suites. The link between the ‘Prelude’ and the main motifs of ‘Apollo’ and ‘Dionysus’ arrives to an awesome climax in the martial-like tout-de- force of ‘Armageddon’; the inscrutable spatial ambience in the first part of ‘Cygnus’ creates a dramatic ethereal intermission between the epic fire of the previous sections and the one that burns even more intensely in the climax that signals the last part of ‘Cygnus’. A bang on the gong announces the closure of ‘Cygnus’ with powerful majesty, but there’s still something left: a beautiful 1-minute acoustic ballad in which Lee gently proclaims the dream of a unity of both sides of the human soul (the rational and the emotional). Hard as it seems to be, the remaining repertoire is not to be overshadowed by this explosive epic. Well, ‘Circumstances’ actually is just a moderately complex rocky number, whose melodic lines are based on catchy guitar riffs: but what a good rock song it is, indeed. ‘The Trees’ is an attractive fable that still nowadays is part of the band’s usual tracklist on stage. Its storyline, centered on the subject of unfair inequity being eventually replaced by forced equity, is conveniently reflected by the varied instrumentation, handled with a sense of fine musical vision: a classical guitar intro, the rockier sequences switching from 4/4 to 6/4 with total fluidity, a brief introspective interlude in which the Moog solo and the cowbells portray a forest in a state of “calm before the storm”… each and every element in this song shouts out the greatness conveyed in it as a whole. And the same happens in the case of ‘La Villa Strangiato’, a powerful instrumental “exercise in self-indulgence” that is among the most emblematic pieces in Rush’s entire career. All along its 12 sections displayed in a time span of 9 and a half minutes, the threesome expose their technical abilities and their combined versatility in order to create a multi-faceted journey through the realms of symph prog, hard rock, jazz rock, Arabic-like eerie ambiences (even a memorable although brief Flamenco intro!!). The guys seem to be at ease fulfilling such a demanding task, having fun while challenging the listener with all the overwhelming complexity that is contained in ‘La Villa’. What a way to close down an album! In fact, what an album! Just like its predecessor, “Hemispheres” is a 5-star masterpiece.