Artist: Rush
Label: Mercury Records
Release: 1984
Rating: 4/5
The minimalism of “new wave” production at the turn of the seventies into the eighties, revolutionarily bent on hunting for digital-electronic approximations to stand in for the old organic liveliness of classic instruments like drums, bass and guitar playing off each other, touched Rush in every possible way. What “Signals” (1982) hinted at, “Grace Under Pressure” (1984) embodied once and for all. “Signals”, the last album that still carried a live, voluminous, old-school sound, has now been replaced by a record with a much slimmed-down production, one that in this new direction scraps Lee’s trademark bass rattle and thereby shrinks the depth of that penetrating old-school bass playing and rock fire. Neil Peart shamelessly brings electronic drums into the new look. The guitars are draped in a clean echo effect that sounds sharp and distant when the chords are struck, and for the first time on an album we no longer feel that magic of studio liveliness that Rush still managed to conjure up on “Signals”. If fans were still willing to let “Signals” slide, “Grace Under Pressure” is the album in the Rush discography that clearly splits the core mass of Rush fandom around the world.
“Grace Under Pressure” is, in every respect, the first real art rock album. Lifeson’s guitar motifs are maximally detailed and fully fleshed out; the man is sensibly stingy with notes, but every one he hits has a point that, in the space it occupies in each song, carries a clearly expressed purpose. The only thing left that’s natural is Lee’s vocal, which in this kind of new wave production, with synthesizers thickly propping up the guitar phrases, and without any of the pretentiousness of his old screaming, is one of the key elements, and thanks to its particular character it brings a heightened gleam of emotion to such a freshly built sound. In such a washed-out, “other-worldly” production it offers a unique, hugely appealing counterweight, a creature of flesh and bone fighting with bare hands against the dominion of computers, robots and machines.
Despite the further sophistication of the sound, this album is incredibly dark and, thanks to Peart’s lush imagination, still mystical. The main architects of this darkness are Peart’s typical “one against all” Rush lyrics and a sonic backdrop sailing on the wings of guitar phrases and synthesizers talking to each other. Red Sector A is the song where Rush win the most points in their search for a new sound. A track with a gripping lyric about the fight for survival in the middle of wartime chaos, it carries a strong charisma, and the band manages to capitalize on the new direction in the most effective way. There’s no bass guitar to be heard on this one; Lee pulls all of his melody exclusively from the synthesizers. Peart sneaks into the song with electronic drums. Into this slimmed-down, cosmetically artificial approach Lifeson’s guitar cuts like a blade through cheese (backed by synthesizers), taking the lead with a sharply profiled motif, right up until Geddy’s melodic, emotive vocal enters the song, which, through the sung verses of hopelessness, despair and the final confrontation with doom, comes across as downright chilling. It’s so heartfelt, thin and confessional in its depth that it’s almost scary. Red Sector A is definitely one of the finest creations on this album, especially on the melodic side. In it, the band managed to capitalize on all the novelties in the evolution of the new Rush sound in the most fitting way. It’s the most “new wave” era song on the album. The most “eighties” song on the album.
The album opens with Distant Early Warning, which could easily have found a place on the previous album had it followed the old production. This track is the typical, and first, example of the band’s sound being pared down, of a further surrender to dependence on synthesizers, though this time the band adds a more concretely and clearly shaped sound to the basic guitar phrases, given the enthusiasm for the possibilities of musical expression through synthesizers that they’d newly discovered on “Signals”. Right here you get that dark atmosphere which hangs like a veil over the whole album, and keeps doing so as it goes on.
“Grace Under Pressure” is also strongest at its start as well as at its close, which remains the trademark of their albums. Specifically in the opening foursome of Distant Early Warning, Afterimage, the aforementioned new wave “juicy” Red Sector A, and The Enemy Within. With that last one, thanks to its virtuously emphasized rhythm line, the band comes, among the songs on the album, along with Distant Early Warning and Between The Wheels, closest to the sound of “Signals” and to the state of the band’s earlier look of “rebelliously adolescent fantasizing”. With “Grace Under Pressure” Rush grew up and defined the cornerstone of the new art rock face of their sound.
As is usual for Rush, the band once again manages to shape every song as a clearly self-contained entity, expressively set apart from the others, with a recognizable atmosphere and musical heritage. Afterimage, with a subtly disguised reggae rhythm in the chorus, is a complete flip of atmosphere compared to the album’s opening, and a chilling prophecy of what actually happened to Neil Peart in life 14 years later. In this song the band (pay attention to Lifeson’s constantly shifting way of playing the basic motif) keeps making small minimalist changes “from circle to circle”, typical of art expression in rock music. Any pretentiousness in the sense of overcomplicating things is completely unwelcome this time, and its absence is made up for by “big” new wave production. The less interesting songs on the album are The Body Electric, with an opening trick reminiscent of Distant Early Warning, and Red Lenses, which gets some of its missing fire back from Peart’s dominant tinkering. Kid Gloves is the most positively oriented song, a quiet announcement of the energy Rush would offer on “Hold Your Fire” (1987). Between The Wheels is the album’s strongest moment and, together with Distant Early Warning, could easily share the top spots on the album’s track list. A mighty atmospheric mini-epic mood built on a colorful curtain of synthesizer, into which Lifeson’s guitar monologue bites, brings some badly needed rays of rock grip and “Signals” vibe back to the record, with a masterful creation of contrast between the dark pre-chorus and the major-key, rock-accelerated chorus, commanded throughout by Lee’s deeply felt singing. When the album finally flips over, that sweet (unconscious, yet eternally demanded) feeling of the deepest and most unique “Rush-ness” lingers in your ears for a long time.
The band had long since stopped offering mini-epics, and with the minimalizing they also trimmed down the instrumental middle sections, which are now further shortened and even more tightly detailed compared to any predecessor of “Grace Under Pressure”.
This album redefined the Rush sound. It’s special and unique in every respect. It belongs in the must-have collection of every Rush fan, as well as of every lover of art rock and eighties new wave expressionism. I wouldn’t be far off, really, in recommending it as an addition to the record collection of all the “eighties” nostalgics too, those who swear by the sound of bands that helped shape the mainstream sound of the day, like Crowded House, Madness, Simple Minds, Level 42, Men At Work and Talking Heads.
With “Grace Under Pressure” Rush caught up with the trends while staying recognizably their own, unique selves in every way. As such, they went on diligently washing out and minimizing their sound. More on that when we get to the review of “Power Windows” (1985). Many seventies dinosaurs burned out artistically in the eighties, in a paranoia that drove them to make a change of sonic and stylistic image at all costs. For some, this washed them away from the field of relevance for good (Jethro Tull with their post-“Stormwatch” albums); others, like Genesis or Yes, did fill stadiums in their made-over guises, but literally made fools of themselves, given how they were selling off their own expressive intellect, which they swapped for minimalized sound on their new albums (though, unwittingly, they brilliantly helped define the new wave and pop rock sound on the flip side). A third group managed to keep their artistic freedom despite integrating the new stuff. Their intellect, through new paths in the evolution of their own musical expression, remained unblemished, just as we’d been used to since the seventies. They always knew how to masterfully turn the challenges of novelty to their advantage. And with every statement they grew upward and kept developing. Among them in that period, alongside “Discipline”-era comebackers King Crimson, definitely belong Rush in their eighties “synthesizer” period.
Lineup
Geddy Lee – vocals, bass guitar, synthesizers
Alex Lifeson – guitar, synthesizers
Neil Peart – drums, acoustic and electric percussion
Production
Rush & Peter Henderson
Track List
1. Distant Early Warning (4:56)
2. Afterimage (5:03)
3. Red Sector A (5:09)
4. The Enemy Within (4:34)
5. The Body Electric (4:59)
6. Kid Gloves (4:17)
7. Red Lenses (4:41)
8. Between The Wheels (5:44)
Album length: 39.23
