Canadian musician Neil Ellwood Peart, who left us far too soon on January 7, 2020, was best known among music fans who play drums for his phenomenal technique, which earned him a fair share of imitators early on, while devotees of the legendary Canadian progressive rock trio Rush revere him no less as an exceptional lyricist.
Peart wrote all the Rush lyrics from their second album “Fly By Night” (1975) to their final studio effort “Clockwork Angels” (2012). Here are ten of Peart’s deepest and most representative lyrics, the ones that many longtime Rush fans feel reflect his philosophy of life most vividly. That means his rather complex fantasy and sci-fi lyrics, which marked some of Rush’s most famous songs especially in the seventies, didn’t make the cut this time. The ten picks aren’t ranked by quality but chronologically: from the oldest to the newest lyrics, the ones that most clearly reflect Peart’s philosophy of life, experiences and personal beliefs.
- Anthem – Fly By Night
Know that your place in life
Is where you want to be
Don’t let them tell you that
You owe it all to me
Keep on looking forward
No use in looking round
Carry your head above the crowd
And they won’t bring you down
The lyrics for the opening track of “Fly By Night” (1975) were among Peart’s first contributions after he joined Rush in 1974, replacing original drummer John Rutsey (1952-2008). The title and lyrics of “Anthem” were inspired by the novella of the same name by Russian-American writer and philosopher Ayn Rand. This controversial, often divisive figure also had a major influence, through her literary work, on Peart’s lyrics for the famous concept album “2112” (1976). In his later, more mature years, Peart distanced himself completely from her individualist, libertarian or neoliberal philosophy. Before that, music fans long wrongly assumed he was a conservative musician or even a supporter of the American Republicans. In later interviews Neil put his misguided phase down to a youthful search for ‘himself’ and for a solid system of values and ethics.
- Closer to the Heart – A Farewell to Kings
And the men who hold high places
Must be the ones to start
To mold a new reality
Closer to the Heart
The Blacksmith and the Artist
Reflect it in their art
Forge their creativity
Closer to the Heart
Philosophers and Plowmen
Each must know his part
To sow a new mentality
Closer to the Heart
You can be the Captain
I will draw the Chart
Sailing into destiny
Closer to the Heart
“Closer to the Heart” was the first song Rush came up with for “A Farewell to Kings” (1977), and it’s still one of their most beloved. For a while before the album came out, it was even picked as its unofficial title. Peart stressed more than once that most of the lyrics on “A Farewell to Kings” tackle various problems of human society, while “Closer to te Heart” offers concrete solutions to those woes in its verses. According to Peart, part of the lyrics was inspired by a verse from writer and journalist Peter Talbot, a longtime friend of the cult Canadian band.
- Losing It – Signals
Some are born to move the world —
To live their fantasies
But most of us just dream about
The things we’d like to be
Sadder still to watch it die
Than never to have known it
For you — the blind who once could see —
The bell tolls for thee
The lyrics to “Losing It” from “Signals” (1982) deal with the final years of the iconic American writer Ernest Hemingway: his loneliness, his anguish and his slide into a dark mental state that ultimately ended in suicide. They also carry a moral: being famous and rich, or someone who ‘moves the world’, isn’t always a good thing, since plenty of the rich and famous actually suffer terribly, even though most ordinary mortals would love to be in their shoes, especially these days. Rush didn’t play this often-overlooked song live until 2015, on the R40 Live tour, which celebrated forty years since Peart joined the band in 1974.
- Red Sector A – Grace Under Pressure
I hear the sound of gunfire at the prison gate
Are the liberators here, do I hope or do I fear?
For my father and my brother, it’s too late
But I must help my mother stand up straight
Are we the last ones left alive?
Are we the only human beings to survive?
Are we the last ones left alive?
Are we the only human beings to survive?
Peart’s bandmate, singer/bassist Geddy Lee, would have plenty of interesting things to say about the lyrics for “Red Sector A” from “Grace Under Pressure” (1983), since they were inspired by the life story of Lee’s grandmother, who survived the Nazi concentration camps and the Holocaust. The verses of “Red Sector A” don’t refer only to the Nazi camps and the Holocaust, though. It’s a critique of all political camps and internment zones in human history and a condemnation of any inhumane, repressive system.
- Territories – Power Windows
The whole wide world
An endless universe
Yet we keep looking through
The eyeglass in reverse
Don’t feed the people
But we feed the machines
Can’t really feel
What international means
“Territories” was Peart’s biting critique of nationalism and isolationism, in line with most of the lyrics on “Power Windows” (1985), which were all pretty socially critical and steeped in Cold War themes. In 1985 the Cold War was still very much a reality, and nobody had the faintest idea the Berlin Wall would come down four years later. The lyrics to this overlooked gem in Rush history feel especially relevant today, when history seems to be repeating itself in a tragic and rather ironic way.
- Time Stand Still – Hold Your Fire
Summer’s going fast–
Nights growing colder
Children growing up —
old friends growing older
Experience slips away
“Time Stand Still” was Peart’s first lyric for “Hold Your Fire” (1987). This time around it’s one of his most personal pieces, in which he looked back on his years with Rush so far, on their past, mostly sprawling tours and the countless flights during which they were often forced to neglect family and friends. Even though Peart criticized that kind of estrangement as a consequence of long tours, and took a swipe at the music industry’s detours along the way, one of the verses in “Time Stand Still” also carries the message that we shouldn’t become prisoners of the past or get too hung up on nostalgia.
- The Pass – Presto
Someone set a bad example
Made surrender seem all right
The act of a noble warrior
Who lost the will to fight
…
No hero in your tragedy
No daring in your escape
No salutes for your surrender
Nothing noble in your fate
The lyrics for “The Pass” from “Presto” (1989) are about an unnamed friend of Peart’s who, during a motorcycle ride together, once toyed in a childish way with the idea of suicide on the highway. Thanks in large part to the lyrics, the song became the most beloved on “Presto” (1989) among both fans and band members, and it got a follow-up on the next Rush album.
- Bravado – Roll the Bones
If we burn our wings
Flying too close to the sun
If the moment of glory
Is over before it’s begun
If the dream is won —
Though everything is lost
We will pay the price,
But we will not count the cost
When the dust has cleared
And victory denied
A summit too lofty
River a little too wide
If we keep our pride —
Though paradise is lost
We will pay the price,
But we will not count the cost
And if the music stops
There’s only the sound of the rain
All the hope and glory
All the sacrifice in vain
If love remains
Though everything is lost
We will pay the price,
But we will not count the cost
“Bravado” was a kind of sequel to “The Pass” from the previous album, and it was Peart’s favorite piece on “Roll the Bones” (1991). In it he returned once more to the foolish suicidal notions of his motorcycle buddy, which clearly haunted him for a long time. At the same time, Peart, who had no time for organized religion yet wasn’t afraid of death either, stressed that human life is precious and one of a kind, so we must never give in and take it.
- Faithless – Snakes & Arrows
I don’t have faith in faith
I don’t believe in belief
You can call me faithless
But I still cling to hope
And I believe in love
And that’s faith enough for me
The lyrics for “Faithless” from “Snakes & Arrows” (2007) were perhaps Peart’s most outspoken reckoning with organized religion. A committed atheist for whom faith in an afterlife was downright absurd, he took aim at the dogma of organized religions and revealed that his own faith, the belief in love, had always been enough for him. He probably wouldn’t have been thrilled by the many comments after his death saying he’s ‘now drumming in (rock) heaven’, since he never believed in religious dogma about the afterlife.
- The Garden – Clockwork Angels
The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect
So hard to earn, so easily burned
In the fullness of time
A garden to nurture and protect
…
The future disappears into memory
With only a moment between
Forever dwells in that moment
Hope is what remains to be seen
“The Garden” was the closing act of the ambitious concept on Rush’s final album, “Clockwork Angels”, which was inspired in many ways by Voltaire’s literary classic ‘Candide’. After countless adventures and trials, the protagonist of the “Clockwork Angels” story ‘retires’ away from a world gone mad, giving up his travels and wanderings so he can tend a garden in peace. That’s a metaphor for his self-fulfillment, his commitment to love and respect, and the end of chasing material comfort. Plenty of Rush fans also read in the lyrics a hint of the famous Canadian trio’s retirement, or winding down, which officially happened in 2018.
Honorable mentions: Something Or Nothing, Cygnus X-1 Book II: Hemispheres, Free Will, Witch Hunt, Subdivisions, Kid Gloves, Manhattan Project, Mission, Everyday Glory, Resist, Ghost Rider.
Author: Peter Podbrežnik
