It’s been over three years since I last rolled an album by this next band. It was a long time to wait. Why did this happen? Because it happens – roll the bones.
Disc 1440 is…. Roll the Bones
Artist: Rush
Year of Release: 1991
What’s up with the Cover? A kid kicks a skull. This kid looks like quite the little punk, and when that skull gets reunited with his skeleton, I hope it comes looking for some payback. Or maybe they two of them will become friends and play a friendly game of Yahtzee. The wall behind them provides plenty of dice for it.
How I Came To Know It: I like Rush a lot - enough to buy all their studio albums, and this album is proof positive of my commitment. Keep that love I hold for the band in mind at those times when I say unkind things.
How It Stacks Up: I have 19 Rush albums. I had reserved a spot for “Roll the Bones” at #16 but it just couldn’t live up to its initial seeding. Instead I am going to bump “Presto” up one spot and drop “Roll the Bones” in at #18, second from the basement and barely holding off “Power Windows”.
Ratings: 3 stars but only barely
Rush made some amazing records over their career. “Roll the Bones” is not one of them. The musicianship is still there, but it is often wasted on songs that feel like incomplete notions at times, and at other times try way to hard.
The album starts out strong, with “Dreamline.” It features some solid guitar work from Alex Lifeson (no doubt happy at this stage to be emerging from the band’s deep dive into synthesizer in the eighties). Sure, the way Geddy Lee sings, “We are young” at the beginning of each chorus always makes me think of Pat Benatar singing the same line on “Love is a Battlefield.” But that’s OK; he moves on quickly and besides, I like “Love is a Battlefield.”
Geddy Lee’s voice sounds great on this record, catching him in that later career when artists know exactly how to sing a tune to showcase their strengths, but where they haven’t yet started flailing to reach hard notes. Lee doesn’t hit the stratosphere with his high notes anymore here, but he sings with an easy grace that matches the record well.
When this album came out, I really loved the title track, but I think the reason for this was in large part to the message. Lyricist Neil Peart examines why good and bad things happen. His answer? Stop looking so hard for a reason; the universe is filled with a lot of random shit, and you’re gonna get caught up in it. If his classic “Freewill” is a call to take responsibility for your actions, “Roll the Bones” is the reminder that not everything is a matter of will in life, and sometimes things are just going to happen. Roll the dice and take your best shot.
I still like half the song, but with every listen it is hard to overlook the absolutely terrible section featuring Geddy Lee rapping. Hearing middle aged prog rockers attempt a rap in the middle of a rock song is about as jarring as you can imagine it would be. It is hard to pick a “worst line” from this monstrosity. I think it is a tie between “Jack, relax/Get busy with the facts”, and “Stop throwing stones/The night has a thousand saxophones.” Thankfully the second option does not make good on its threat.
This song is immediately followed by “Face Up” which feels like something Andy Samberg would write if he were making fun of Rush. As an actual Rush song? Gentlemen, you can do so much better.
“Face Up” has some very forced lyrics, a problem on several tracks on the album. The worst of these may be “Neurotica” where Peart seems obsessed with rhyming the song title with various other words (“erotica”, “exotica”), and almost-words, (“chaotica”, “psychotica”). The fact that half the words are real, doesn’t make the exercise any less pointless.
He is still Neil Peart, though, and also delivers some thoughtful messages. One favourite is “Heresy,” a song about the end (at that time) of the Cold War, and the realization that we had lived for decades in fear, with precious little to show for it. Peart does a solid vocal delivery of the message, capturing the right tone somewhere between anger, relief, and weariness.
On “Ghost of a Chance” Peart further explores the epistemological themes of the record, musing about the incredible number of random events that pull us in different directions, and yet despite all that he believes…
“There’s a ghost of a chance?
We can find someone
And make it last.”
It’s an idea that appeals to me. The universe is a big chaotic place, but love could still be just around the corner. Roll the bones and find out. Just don’t rap really badly while you are rolling those bones, guys. Because it sounds bad new, and gets even worse with age.
Best tracks: Dreamline, Bravado, Heresy, Ghost of a Chance
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