And now another Weird Moment of Randomness. As you know (or should by now) the CD Odyssey is almost entirely random - I occasionally pick a new CD to review, but that's pretty rare (I like not knowing what's next).
On Friday I reviewed my last album and was preparing to head out to the theatre to see the new Rush documentary, "Beyond the Lighted Stage", made by Victoria film maker Sam Dunn. FYI the documentary is awesome.
Anyway before I left, I rolled my next album and got..."Snakes And Arrows."
This Weird Moment of Randomness brought to you by the letter sssssss.
Disc 137 is...Snakes & Arrows
Artist: Rush
Year of Release: 2007
What’s Up With The Cover?: A vaguely Indian God type figure sits in the background, seemingly presiding over a bunch of snakes and arrows graphics that are going in no particular direction. Also, the figure has a burning fountain of fire in his crotch. No, this does not qualify as the weirdest Rush album cover.
How I Came To Know It: I really love Rush, so I just bought this when it came out. Also, if you are friends with Kelly, you will always know when Rush has a new album out - I believe he has three or four versions of this one.
How It Stacks Up: I have all eighteen of Rush' studio albums. While another album is imminent, for now "Snakes & Arrows" is the most recent. It holds up well against a strong body of work. I'm going to say it is 8th or 9th best, depending on my mood.
Rating: 4 stars.
I haven't rolled a Rush album since I reviewed "Caress of Steel" back at Disc 26. The chronological distance between that album and this one is thirty five years, and even that doesn't span Rush' entire career.
"Snakes & Arrows" is a reminder that bands can still make fresh, interesting music decades into their careers, if they push themselves.
In terms of style, this record is much more straightforward rock and roll than many Rush albums that preceded it. I for one am glad to see Alex Lifeson's guitar being heavily featured on some driving riffs - particularly "The Main Monkey Business" and "The Way The Wind Blows". He even has an acoustic piece all too himself with "Hope". Lifeson has got to be one of the most non-egotistical masters of the guitar in the history of rock and roll (alongside Buck Dharma).
Geddy Lee gets in on the musical act, with his bass coming to the forefront for the third (and final) instrumental on the record - "Malignant Narcissism". Only Rush could have an album with three instrumentals not be wrong.
I also think that this album has some of Neil Peart's better lyrics (which is saying something, since Neil Peart is one of the greatest lyricists of...all...time).
As evidence, let's quickly consider the song "The Larger Bowl" It is a song questioning why some people on the earth fare so well, while others encounter bad fortune at every turn. It is also a pantoum. For those who don't know (I had to look it up) a pantoum is a poem composed of a series of quatrains with repeating lines throughout. The second and fourth lines of each quatrain are repeated in the first and third lines in the next. With me? Like this:
"If we're so much the same, like I always hear
Why such different fortunes and fates?
Some of us live in a cloud of fear
Some live behind iron gates.
"Why such different fortunes and fates?
Some are blessed and some are cursed
Some live behind iron gates
While others see only the worst."
Form in literature has very sadly been cast aside in our modern age, and Peart reminds us that the structure in a work of art doesn't have to be viewed as limiting, but rather can actually add a deeper resonance to your message.
On Friday I reviewed my last album and was preparing to head out to the theatre to see the new Rush documentary, "Beyond the Lighted Stage", made by Victoria film maker Sam Dunn. FYI the documentary is awesome.
Anyway before I left, I rolled my next album and got..."Snakes And Arrows."
This Weird Moment of Randomness brought to you by the letter sssssss.
Disc 137 is...Snakes & Arrows
Artist: RushYear of Release: 2007
What’s Up With The Cover?: A vaguely Indian God type figure sits in the background, seemingly presiding over a bunch of snakes and arrows graphics that are going in no particular direction. Also, the figure has a burning fountain of fire in his crotch. No, this does not qualify as the weirdest Rush album cover.
How I Came To Know It: I really love Rush, so I just bought this when it came out. Also, if you are friends with Kelly, you will always know when Rush has a new album out - I believe he has three or four versions of this one.
How It Stacks Up: I have all eighteen of Rush' studio albums. While another album is imminent, for now "Snakes & Arrows" is the most recent. It holds up well against a strong body of work. I'm going to say it is 8th or 9th best, depending on my mood.
Rating: 4 stars.
I haven't rolled a Rush album since I reviewed "Caress of Steel" back at Disc 26. The chronological distance between that album and this one is thirty five years, and even that doesn't span Rush' entire career.
"Snakes & Arrows" is a reminder that bands can still make fresh, interesting music decades into their careers, if they push themselves.
In terms of style, this record is much more straightforward rock and roll than many Rush albums that preceded it. I for one am glad to see Alex Lifeson's guitar being heavily featured on some driving riffs - particularly "The Main Monkey Business" and "The Way The Wind Blows". He even has an acoustic piece all too himself with "Hope". Lifeson has got to be one of the most non-egotistical masters of the guitar in the history of rock and roll (alongside Buck Dharma).
Geddy Lee gets in on the musical act, with his bass coming to the forefront for the third (and final) instrumental on the record - "Malignant Narcissism". Only Rush could have an album with three instrumentals not be wrong.
I also think that this album has some of Neil Peart's better lyrics (which is saying something, since Neil Peart is one of the greatest lyricists of...all...time).
As evidence, let's quickly consider the song "The Larger Bowl" It is a song questioning why some people on the earth fare so well, while others encounter bad fortune at every turn. It is also a pantoum. For those who don't know (I had to look it up) a pantoum is a poem composed of a series of quatrains with repeating lines throughout. The second and fourth lines of each quatrain are repeated in the first and third lines in the next. With me? Like this:
"If we're so much the same, like I always hear
Why such different fortunes and fates?
Some of us live in a cloud of fear
Some live behind iron gates.
"Why such different fortunes and fates?
Some are blessed and some are cursed
Some live behind iron gates
While others see only the worst."
Form in literature has very sadly been cast aside in our modern age, and Peart reminds us that the structure in a work of art doesn't have to be viewed as limiting, but rather can actually add a deeper resonance to your message.
As for what that message is, Peart writes about themes, both personal and global in scope. Whatever he writes about, Peart always seems to elevate any such discussion above any one political or metaphysical view, and help us see the larger patterns.
For example, while he readily wades into the dangerous topic of middle eastern politics on "The Way The Wind Blows" the song strikes a tone that is more introspective and conciliatory, rather than suggesting any particular solution. It ends with:
"Like a solitary pine
On a bare wind-blasted shore
We can only grow the way the wind blows."
On the introspective side, Peart again gives voice to his longstanding metaphysical skepticism in "Faithless". While not exactly the anthemic "Free Will" from 1980's "Permanent Waves", it is nevetheless powerful and moving. While "Free Will" is more defiant, "Faithless" shows the mellowing of Peart with age, while still underscoring his vocal refusal to succumb to any easy answers. Here's just the end:
"I've got my own spirit level for balance
To tell if my choice is leading up or down
And all the shouting voices
Try to throw me off my course
Some by sermons, some by force
Fools and thieves are dangerous
In the temple and marketplace.
"Like a forest bows to winter
Beneath the deep white silence
I will quietly resist.
"Like a flower in the desert
That only blooms at night
I will quietly resist."
As Peart teaches us the value of quiet resistance, Rush as a band has managed to teach us the lesson of rock and roll persistence, and none too quietly over the years. "Snakes & Arrows" is a worthy entry in the enduring legacy they've carved out in the annals of music history.
Best tracks: Armor and Sword, The Larger Bowl, The Main Monkey Business, The Way the Wind Blows, Faithless, We Hold On
For example, while he readily wades into the dangerous topic of middle eastern politics on "The Way The Wind Blows" the song strikes a tone that is more introspective and conciliatory, rather than suggesting any particular solution. It ends with:
"Like a solitary pine
On a bare wind-blasted shore
We can only grow the way the wind blows."
On the introspective side, Peart again gives voice to his longstanding metaphysical skepticism in "Faithless". While not exactly the anthemic "Free Will" from 1980's "Permanent Waves", it is nevetheless powerful and moving. While "Free Will" is more defiant, "Faithless" shows the mellowing of Peart with age, while still underscoring his vocal refusal to succumb to any easy answers. Here's just the end:
"I've got my own spirit level for balance
To tell if my choice is leading up or down
And all the shouting voices
Try to throw me off my course
Some by sermons, some by force
Fools and thieves are dangerous
In the temple and marketplace.
"Like a forest bows to winter
Beneath the deep white silence
I will quietly resist.
"Like a flower in the desert
That only blooms at night
I will quietly resist."
As Peart teaches us the value of quiet resistance, Rush as a band has managed to teach us the lesson of rock and roll persistence, and none too quietly over the years. "Snakes & Arrows" is a worthy entry in the enduring legacy they've carved out in the annals of music history.
Best tracks: Armor and Sword, The Larger Bowl, The Main Monkey Business, The Way the Wind Blows, Faithless, We Hold On
2 comments:
Good Review, not much else to say. As you mentioned there are few bands that can keep producing on their own terms in this day and age.
The cover is a Hindu painting called "The Leela of Self-Knowledge", after the game of the same name, also called, surprise surprise, "Snakes and Arrows". This game is still popular to this day, although most Western types know it as "Snakes and Ladders" (I played it quite a bit as a child - my mom is English, and it was very popular in Britain, another import from the Raj). It was designed as a game of karma, that is, your actions determining how your life turns out. Landing on a snake represented a bad deed and you would move your marker down to the lowest end of the snake. Conversely, landing on an arrow represented a good deed and took you to the top of the arrow.
And that fountain of fire in his crotch is a chakra, one of the seven wheel-like vortices of energy that in Indian medicine are believed to exist in the etheric body. I'm not totally sure which one it is, but it is most likely svadhisthana, the sacral chakra which corresponds to the testes or ovaries and governs relationships, violence, addictions, emotional needs, and pleasure.
-Kelly
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