After 44 years at the top of the prog rock game, Rush released what would be their final album, Clockwork Angels, in 2012. Even without knowing it was their swan song, Prog pointed out that the Canadian trio had become more than just a band over the previous decade.
“Their sales are right up there with the Beatles and the Stones, but Rush keep a pretty low profile,” we said. “But you realise just how deeply they’ve been absorbed by popular culture. It’s an affection reserved for only a handful of enduring rock bands – those who can only really be divided by themselves and one. Rush are reaping the rewards for being themselves.”
Despite all their achievements, vocalist and bassist Geddy Lee offered Prog editor Jerry Ewing a glimpse behind the Clockwork Angels scenes.
"Frankly I haven't played the record to many people, so I'm very curious to see how people react to it." Even at a remarkably vernal 58 years of age, and after a 44-year career with more peaks than troughs, Geddy Lee still bristles with slight nervousness when mention is made of Clockwork Angels, Rush’s 20th (if you count 2004's Feedback EP) studio album, their first for five years and one of the most eagerly awaited albums in the band’s career.
Of course, Lee has nothing to worry about. Clockwork Angels is an album that, as we will discover, has not only made three middle-aged men from Canada very happy, it will also delight their worldwide fanbase – most likely beyond expectations. For starters, it's a concept album; the band's first, despite the fact that illustrious past works such as Fountain Of Lamneth, 2112 and Cygnus X-1 have long left Rush with the concept tag. It’s Lee admits they spent many years avoiding.
As they settle into a luxurious autumn of their career and an inner calm clearly pervades all they do, buoyed by the renewed interest and – perhaps more importantly – a new understanding rock fans have gleaned from their excellent Beyond The Lighted Stage movie, Rush feel emboldened enough to re-embrace their inner conceptuality.
Musically, too, they haven’t sounded so energised for years – possibly since 1981’s momentous Moving Pictures. Caravan, BU2B and the bombastic rock-out of Headlong Flight, most of you will know: pounding slices of thoughtful hard rock instilled with enough established motifs to excite long-term fans, but equally fresh enough to show Rush are still progressive. But wait until you hear the soaring riffs and seductive melodies of the likes of The Garden, Seven Cities Of Gold, the title track and The Anarchist. You will, to put it bluntly, shit!
"We've been very fortunate these last few years that people tend to have appreciated what we do – but it hasn’t always been that way," laughs Lee. "Nothing polarises people quite like Rush for some reason!”
Rush have been such a single-minded musical entity. Was that something you set out to do, even subconsciously?
It’s always been part of the reaction to Rush. There have always been people with this fanatical reaction, and people who just don’t get it at all – who are grossed out by what we do!
If you had the option of remaining a polarising entity, or being accepted by the mainstream, even if only for a few years, what route would you have chosen?
I’m not certain that’s an entirely fair question, asking someone if they’d live their life a different way… In my career maybe I’ve had some small regrets, but no giant regrets. Coulda–woulda–shoulda applies to all of us, but I’m not unhappy with the circuitous route our professional lives have taken. And the strange evolution of our music is fine with me. We’re still pretty happy; we love what we do and we’re very, very fortunate that there’s a number of people around the world who seem to like our jagged history.
Your career longevity seems to speak for itself.
Yes, it’s very gratifying. It’s not lost on us that we’ve been able to have an unusual career path. We’ve developed in a one step forward, two steps back, one step sideways, two steps forwards kind of way. That we’ve been able to maintain a successful career through all that is very gratifying. We’re pretty happy working together. It’s nice when all those things work out that way.
There are nods to your past on Clockwork Angels, but they’re delivered with a delightful musical freshness. Were those reference points deliberate?
There are nods to our past but specifically when it suits the story. For example, Headlong Flight is the story of our protagonist looking back over his life; so it seemed apropos to do that in musical terms as well. We looked back at some things we’d done in the past and put a new twist on that – before jumping headlong off in another direction.
Mention of ‘the story’ brings us to the fact that this is a concept album. Although conceptuality and Rush seem to have forever been linked, this is your first whole concept album, isn’t it?
We did 2112 as a side, and Hemispheres has a side that almost began with the last song on the previous album. We’ve done concept pieces, but never a full album. But there‘s a significant difference in that we wanted these songs not to feel like a concept album – but feel like a song in itself.
I felt we’d reached a happy medium in telling a story in a rock-opera style – that’s a dangerous place to go – and telling it in a rock framework
On the R30 tour, we asked you and Alex Lifeson how much it would cost for you to make another concept piece. Neither of you seemed too keen on the idea!
About 350,000 other people had also asked that question along the way! Sooner or later, I guess, it starts to resonate with you. Again, we never set out trying to do a concept record; but this idea came to Neil and the idea turned into a concept – instead of looking for a concept. We’ve always tried to keep ourselves open and we’ve never tried to pre-plan our destiny, rather to see where we are at any given time. But this idea struck Neil and we all went, “Fuck it, let’s do another one.”
Are you aware of the enormous excitement that Rush are recording a concept album instils in your fanbase?
Not really!The concept of doing a concept album is an anxious one – especially for me. I was so sensitive to going out there and be seen as being rooted in the past. I was so conscious of wanting to move forward. It’s a kind of sticky wicket – as you guys would say – and we wanted to make sure, by working all the way through with Neil on these lyrics, that there was a freshness and a vitality running through it.
‘Prog,’ used as a derogatory term, could have been applied to Rush in the 70s. But in the last 20 years, surely people have come to view Rush as the epitome of music that always moves on.
That’s good – that was the intent. Being progressive is what we’ve dedicated our lives to. Trying to be interesting within our hard-rock framework. Moving it. It’s hard for me to look at it objectively; I felt we’d reached a happy medium in telling a story in a rock-opera style – that’s a dangerous place to go – and telling it in a rock framework. I think we’ve achieved that with this album.
The concept itself is intriguing: a watchmaker controls the life of a protagonist, revealing the life of that character. It could be seen as a metaphor for God and life – but coming from Neil, an atheist, probably not. The story will be unfurled in a novel by fantasy author and prog fan Kevin J. Anderson. How did that collaboration come about?
It’s an idea that Neil and Kevin had been tossing around. It wasn’t until we were well convinced that it would work as an album backdrop for us that they consolidated the plans for that. And of course Neil wanted to make sure everyone was happy with that. I think it’ll be interesting.
The tour was only three months long, but it was going so well that it was wrong not to bring it to Europe and South America
It was also a bit tricky because there’s so much Neil wants to say about the story, and not all of that is appropriate on a rock album. There were times we’d say, “Look, we know this aspect is really important to you, but it’s going to bog the record down.” The frustration of wanting to say much more led him to explore other ways to tell the story. It makes a lot of sense and inspired him from a creative point of view.
The job of paring down Neil’s work into lyrical form for the album fell to you this time, did it not?
Well I’m the guy who’s got to sing it, right! I have to be totally into it and I’m writing the melodies. Neil and I have a really fantastic writer-editor relationship. He appreciates what I’m up against in terms of making it musical, and we’ve developed a really great rapport in that sense. We have really great conversations back and forth with what’s working and not working, and he’s such a professional he never takes it personally. He fights for what he thinks should be in there, and likewise I’ll stick to my guns – but we always managed to work it out, and that’s what a really good working relationship is.
Do you ever think you deserve a writing credit that says: Lyrics: Peart / Edited: Lee?
Ha-h! Lyrics left out by Lee!
The last time we spoke with Rush the Time Machine tour was about to get underway. At that point Caravan and BU2B had already been written.
So had The Garden and The Anarchist. We had a chunk of it written.
Talk back then was that the album would arrive at the end of 2010. But how did we get to May 2012 before Clockwork Angels is about to come out?
When we planned the tour I didn’t feel right about going out without having anything new written – what we like about playing live is getting our juices going playing new music on stage. We’d discussed the idea for the album and decided we’d just get at the writing. We had a great session and recorded those two songs very quickly. The tour was originally supposed to be only about three months long, but it was going so well – and we were playing Moving Pictures as well – that it was wrong not to bring it to Europe and to South America.
People are so into what we’re playing. It’s such an ideal situation, especially after what the members of the band have been through
So we decided to put the album on pause. Alex and I had a jam session on the tour, when we wrote Headlong Flight and Carnies. When we got back and got really close to finishing the album, I rediscovered those jams, and those two songs came out of them. So it’s weird: this album is made up of music that’s been written over a two-and-a-half-year period.
That must be the first time the band have ever created a record like this?
Yes – and it’s interesting because there’s this song on the album called Wish Them Well. I love the lyrics and I the sentiment, and I felt it was really important to the concept of the album. It’s about how you look at people in a non-judgemental way – I thought that was important as a part of growing up and achieving adulthood. But the first two versions didn’t do the lyrics justice, so we kept rewriting it. That’s the luxury of having two and a half years to work on material for a record. We got third time lucky!
The sense of enjoyment – palpable when we saw you at the O2 in London and on the Live In Cleveland video – seems equally evident on Clockwork Angels.
Oh, we do have fun! We’re living our lives up there; we have a great fucking job and it is fun, especially when people are so into what we’re playing. They feed us and they urge us on. It’s such an ideal situation, especially after what the different members of the band have been through over the years – not always good things. You get an appreciation, one of the few benefits of getting older, of your context and your opportunities. And we really do.
In the new songs, one feels a sense of recalling your early days that wouldn’t have been there 10 years ago.
I think that’s true. One of the great things of experience and success – because you get confidence from success – is that you’re relaxed enough to let your hair down and let yourself be yourself.
That’s the benefit of years of making records and having crowds that appreciate your records: it gives you a sense of calm when you go to make your next piece of music. You allow yourself to just be and have confidence that it’s the right thing to do.
When you’re younger you feel the need to prove yourself; there’s an insecurity that you’re trying to overcome. All that plays into your performances when. Our present sound is part of the maturing process, I suppose.
That all helps when it comes to deciding that you’re going to record a concept album.
Oh, yeah – It’s like, “Fuck it. Good idea. Let’s do it!”
Will that go for any new pre- and post-gig movies? At the O2 in 2010, the band had long left the stage but the auditorium was still full of laughter at the closing film.
It’s a lovely thing to look out and see our fans laughing and smiling. It’s not something you’d readily associate with a heavy rock, prog rock show. I think it’s a breath of fresh air that we’re allowed to flex our silly muscle and I’m glad the crowd digs it. It makes the whole evening feel a lot more fun on a lot of different levels. And we’ve got some great ideas – we just hope people like them as much as the old ones.
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