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Album Details
- Artist: Rush
- Album: 2112
- Label: Anthem / Mercury
- Year of Release: 1976
- ME Rating: Indie Classic
- Reviewed by: solitaryman on 2007-09-30
RecommendWhen you first experience 2112, if the effect hits proper, you should have a drastically different view of what music is capable of conveying. Of course, if you had originally heard it when it was released all of 31 years ago, that would have been a much easier pill to swallow. But just for old time's sake, or if you haven't had the chance to hear it yet, do yourself a favor; dust it off (or buy the damn thing), pop it in and try to transpose yourself to that time. Society is in flux, the world seems on the edge of bad things and even though prosperity is knocking, it is easy for a cynic to see decline where others see ascention. This spirit is embedded in 2112, an absolute behemoth of an album in terms of scope and precision. It contains, at it's heart, a scathing attack on the common woes of the times, and more directly at the business music was becoming.
Hidden beneath the title suite's infamous majesty and literary beauty is a spite that generates great friction. It creates the tones of an almost metal-oriented rage during the opening passage, while also giving a very different view of the theme of man discovering creativity only to have it stripped from him in favor of simplicity and cold mechanization. As a progressive piece of music, it's merits have long been defined and praised by so many that doing so now can feel a bit worn. Still, if you're asking me, the section entitled "Discovery", when the protagonist discovers a guitar and slowly learns to manipulate it, to create a melody of notes and a simple chord...well, if you're asking me, that may be the most creative thing I've ever heard on record.
What often gets left behind is how damn good the rest of the album is. Rush had come a ways from their early jazz-rock days, and now it seemed they had happily grasped a literary sense of songwriting that created stories behind solidly-written pieces of progressive rock. "A Passage To Bangkok" is a wonderful mid-paced tribute to a certain herbal delight the band no doubt enjoyed. "The Twilight Zone" is quite creepy, obviously referencing the infamous television program. The most underrated piece here has to be "Tears", a departure for the band as a very heart-felt song of loss and regret, and I think it's one of Geddy's best songs.
A true classic in every sense of the word, 2112 took Rush and thrust them into the limelight. The way they'd respond to the pressure was all laid out here, their manifesto of sorts towards the ideals of the industry (or lack thereof); they'd do it their way and to hell with the consequences. The results are nothing less than some of the best thinking-man's rock ever cooked up, mastered and offered to the masses.
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on 2011-07-19 CharlesMartel Said:
Rush may be said to have come of age as prog rockers with this album. "2112" marks the high point of their concept album (or rather concept side) philosophy. That particular style of their music was not going to get any better than this, though it could be argued they attempted it with "Hemispheres".
However, let me start with the second, rock side. This is the one where all the problems lie. It opens with "A Passage To Bangkok" which has a cheesy Oriental start and then just turns into a panegyric to all the places in the world where they make all the drugs: Bangkok for heroin; Lebanon for weed; Botoga for cocaine. This is just plain bad. "The Twilight Zone" is marginally better and offers a prog rock variation to the side as a whole. "Lessons" stretches Geddy Lee's vocals a bit too far and does not succeed as a result. " Tears" is rather weak and not a patch on the quieter songs which had appeared on other, earlier albums, with considerably more success. The closing track, " Something for Nothing" is more to my taste and is a classic up tempo rocker which draws the band back to their roots.
The concept side is credited to the genius of Ayn Rand . That should give you a hint - this is conservative libertarianism in music. Rush have been heavily criticised for this but much of that has been criticism for the fact that, while politics have a place in music, it has to be left-wing politics for being a right-wing musician simply will not do.
The pretext is a future society where every individual is part of a closely controlled state machinery which provides every citizen's every need - not for nothing does the cover feature a red star. The unnamed protagonist finds a guitar and it opens up a world of possibilities to him for individual expression. However, those possibilities are rejected by the state, in the form of the priests of the Temples of Syrinx, and our hero lapses into despair at his inability to make the all-powerful priests see what he can see. Therein lies the rejection of regulation and the power of the individual and free expression which forms the link between the concept of the album and Ayn Rands philosophies (I use that term in the loosest possible sense. Most of Ayn Rand's writings were ridiculous babble with as much philosophical thought as a cream doughnut).
All is not lost, however, as the elder race of men return to liberate the masses from the slavery of the priests. This elder race left the world long ago and, as they were presumably an elite, left behind the mass of society to fend for itself. At this point the story bears a closer relationship to the film "Idiocracy" than Ayn Rand (Are they not, in essence, the same?), but you have to have a happy ending, don't you. Having said that, if a race of super beings descended on my world and made loudspeaker pronouncements of "We assume control! We assume control! We assume control!" I would be more likely to feel my liberty was at risk from them than a bunch of amusical freaks prancing around in white dressing gowns.
Musically, the side has a libretto and runs through the various short tracks with an easy flow. It is not difficult to follow the 'story' here, though it is unclear whether our despairing hero remains alive long enough to see the apotheosis. There are some great pieces of music, the guitar solo of "Soliloquy" being the highlight.
If you are not a Rush fan this album will perplex you and probably put you off. That would be a shame. The musicianship is clearly first class, but Rush had a habit of making rather inaccessible albums at the end of the seventies and this exemplifies that tendency.
Rating: 7/10
