Grace Under Pressure - Rush
Rush's 1984 album 'Grace Under Pressure' was really my introduction to probably one of the most influential drummers in rock music, Neil Peart, and his bandmates bassist, keyboardist and vocalist Geddy Lee, and guitarist Alex Lifeson. Since that day, I have pretty much been a fan of all their releases, from their debut album 'Rush' (with original drummer John Rutsey) to 2007's 'Snakes & Arrows'. But this album, for me, still has an important place in the band's 40+ year history. Although 'Permanent Waves' (1980) was the start of the band departing away from their longer song times, 'Moving Pictures' (1981) was album that put them way up in the charts with the stadium staples "Tom Sawyer" and "Limelight", and 'Signals' (1982) might have been the start of their 80's synthesizer-based period, 'Grace Under Pressure' is really the album that set the blueprint of a band which showed that although they started in the days of 70's progressive-rock, they weren't afraid to embrace the writing, technology and styles of the emergent new wave period, synthesize that with their song writing approach and still have a band identity that was theirs and theirs alone.
Production wise, it was the first album in which they departed from long time producer Terry Brown ("Broon"), and they had Peter Henderson produce the album (as a replacement for U2's producer Steve Lillywhite). Sonically, apart from the keyboards that bassist Geddy Lee had been using more and more since the previous albums, this was the first album in which Neil Peart also embraced electronics in the (hexagonal) shape of Simmons electronic drums and literally surround himself with both acoustic and electronic drums and percussion. Even Alex Lifeson's guitar sound and playing was morphing more around this time, as the band were now showing how much New Wave groups of the 80's such as The Police and Talking Heads were as much an influence on them as their earlier heroes such as Led Zeppelin and Cream were. Lyrically, it is also some of the most darkest writing of Peart's (as he is their main guy when it comes to lyrics)....songs about foreboding times ("Distant Early Warning", "The Enemy Within"), personal loss ("Afterimage"), a sci-fi allusion to The Holocaust ("Red Sector A"), or how people react to pressure, whether self-inflicted or caused by other ("The Body Electric" and "Between The Wheels"). No, you won't find many simple love songs on a Rush album (they have done a few, trust me, lol), but if you want some thought provoking lyrics together with some intelligently written prog music (along with some challenging drum parts, as always), then this is a must have album to have in any serious music collection.
Some trivia:
*First album where Neil Peart started using electronic as well as acoustic drums.
*Cover art by Hugh Syme, a long time collaborator of Rush, who has done various additional keyboard parts for some albums, as well as their cover art. The "p/g" lettering on the right of the album cover stands for "pressure/grace", hence "grace under pressure." And yes, you're not seeing things, there is an eye and some teeth in that 'mountainscape'! On the vinyl and some CD gatefolds, there is also a picture of an egg in a clamp, referring to pressure once again. The band photo at the back of the vinyl album and CD was taken by famed Canadian-Armenian photographer Yousuf Karsh, someone who was far more used to taking portraits of royalty and dignitaries like Winston Churchill rather than rock musicians!
*Only Rush album produced by Peter Henderson. It was another Peter, Peter Collins, that produced their later 80's albums. In fact the "Roger Kneebend" they refer to in the album credits was a dummy they put in the producer's chair as an in-joke when they were going through a number of producers before Henderson arrived and were being frustrated, according to author Bill Banasiewicz (referred to as the "B-Man" in the same album liner notes).
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