GEDDY LEE of RUSH the Rush Bassist and His Band Are Marking 30 Prog-Rocking Years Together with Their Rush in Rio CD and DVD
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-4i·iMiUii'lt -- ------------------------------------ -- -- - By VIC GARBARINI GEDDY LEE OF RUSH The Rush bassist and his band are marking 30 prog-rocking years together with their Rush in Rio CD and DVD. Now, Lee pays homage to the music that keeps him warm on cold Canadian nights. much more theatrical. The music "HOW MANY wasn't about people stepping out MORE TIMES?" and doing bluesy solos; they were Led Zeppelin taking a high level of musicianship and weaving it into the guts of the Led Zeppelin song, playing with layers of melody, SWAN SONG, 1969 odd time signatures and strange "I saw them in Toronto at a little place guitar riffs. What fascinated me was called the Rockpile, We were in the how these intricate parts all sup second row, and when ported one another-and the song:' they played this song it just blew me away, It reaffirmed for me all "3/5 OF A MILE the creative potential INTEN in blending hard rock with progressive SECONDS" music. John Paul Jefferson Airplane Jones was the unsung hero in that Bless Its Pointed Little Head V>w~ band. What bass player of that period RCA. 1969 z didn't know how to play that riff? I still "A great live record, where the band 3- jam to it sometimes at soundchecks," takes some risks and really changes '" the arrangements, especially rhyth- § "THICK AS mically. Jack Casady, one of the truly " A BRICK" great, underrated bass players, is the .: star of this record. His tone was very ~ Jethro Tull different from other American 0::. Thick As a Brick bassists ; it was edgier, and his riffs ~ CHRYSALIS, 1972 were really challenging-they aggres- ~ "In my view, this is the first truly sively pushed the songs along. I like ~ successful concept album by a when a bass player gets a little pushy ;< British prog-rock band. They even and won't keep his place, He or she brought a flute into heavy rock steps out of line, but in a great way." music. How dare they! [laughs] Their music is so brilliantly written "SPOONFUL" and well put together, what with its Cream hard-to-play parts and odd time signatures, not to mention the Fresh Cream great guitar sounds of the totally POLYDOR. 1966 underrated Martin Barre. And I love " 'Crossroads' was the song you how, no matter what influences had to learn to play if you were in a they brought into the music, they band. Clapton just flies through always did it in a rock context." that song, But for me, 'Spoonful' was more about Jack Bruce's great "TIME AND voice and adventurous playing. Bruce, like all the bass players I've A WORD" mentioned, Yes wasn't content Time and a Word to be a bottom- end, stay-in- ~ ATLANTIC, 1970 the-background "I didn't know who Yes were until a :2 bassist. He 's u friend loaned me this record. I was playing a '" totally amazed, I'd never heard a Gibson bass band like this, and I'd never heard a o obviously too loud, to where it's :3 bass player placed so upfront in the :r: distorting the speakers, But it gave V> mix, Chris Squire had such a driv z him this aggressive sound and a ing, aggressive sound. and it made ;< kind of spidery tone, and Ilove o this such a pivotal, influential song C everything about it." for me. Squire's melodies were bril '"o liant, and they were definitely 'out ~ there: But they were always essen "MY .: tial to the skeletal forms of those GENERATION" " songs; he never wandered off out of The Who '" context. His lines help hold the songs together." Live at Leeds amazing pioneer, and just an incred It's really hard to play that thing "WATCHER OF MCA, 1970 "I AIN'T ible stylist. The notes he squeezes it manages to grab something "What an amazing guitar sound on out of that thing with a whammy bar, essential from the Eastern quar THE SKIES" this album' And [Pete] Townshend SUPERSTITIOUS" a volume control knob and his fin ter-tone style without just being Genesis even plays a few solos, which he gers are simply incredible." imitative of Indian music. And it's Jeff Beck Foxtrot usually never the hook to a pop song from back does. Was there Truth ATCO . 1972 "OVER UNDER when pop, particularly in England, anybody better EPIC, 1968 "This is a very strange, ominous could be a platform for experi at expressing .: "If I had to pick a favorite guitarist of SIDEWAYS mentation and innovation. Beck, tune from very early Peter themselves z all time, it would probably be Jeff DOWN" Page, Clapton and some other Gabriel-era through power Beck. I mean, was there a better gui Genesis. The ~ The Yardbirds Brits really discovered a totally chords? I just z tar sound ever? I think this was the new sound. They figured out how time Signature loved that record, and I know Alex z first great Jeff Beck 'moment: the Roger the Engineer to get a pop angle on the blues by was completely [Lifeson, Rush guitarist] did, too, ~ > first time when you'd hear some RHINO. 1966 odd-it was a Every time we jammed as a young > electrifying it, and it became a o thing and know that it couldn't be "Jeff Beck again, playing one of profound way for guitarists to little like Yes, band we would wind up jamming u V> anybody but him, He was such an the most unique guitar lines ever. speak through music," but darker and parts of that record.". 52 GUITAR WORLD Rio pared with Ford's covering Grand own numbers, like Metallica tunes, the slow and soul- or how perfectly Rush get the royal treatment with their latest CD and DVD. ful "Hand in Hand James Hetfield's with the Blues" brooding lyrics fit the playing is sharper, more together and and the riff-riding the genre's high RUSH "Lifetime Thing," 'n' lonesome more energized than it was on Rush's last which features the acoustic sound? live album, 1998's Different Stages; Live. It's guitarist at his Foregoing blazing power-strum- **** as ifthey were a band reborn. The Crown guitars, Iron Rush in Rio Possessed 13 ming, note-bend- Horse play ANTHEM/ATLANTIC ing, vibrato-laden speedy man- There's a lot of music here-31 songs on METAL BLADE best. R&B singer dolins-with help the three-disc CD set; 29 on the DVD-and ») The sixth Mavis Staples and from upright bass album from this 1/2 apart from the pretty, pop-friendly "Closer British blues god- and steel-string **** melodic Swedish Rush in Rio (DVD) father John flat-top acoustic to the Heart," nearly everything clocks in at death metal band ANTHEM/COM ING HOME/ZOE Mayall make guitars-picking marks the return four and a half minutes or longer. Yet none notable cameos. out the riffs and of original vocalist of the songs seem padded out; in fact, the -Ted Drozdowski solos in mostly Johan Lindstrand, late-era numbers OF great revelations con- longest-a 10-minute tour of "La Villa but that's not all ONE THE that include that makes COUNTRY tained in Led Zeppelin's recent DVD Strangiato"-actually benefits from the "Enter Sandman" Possessed 13 sig- and How the West Was Won CD was unexpected detours the band takes. and "Unforgiven." nificant. Guitarists Hetfield's heart- how the band made improvisation an inte- That song is also one of the instances in Marko Tervonen felt huffing is and Marcus gral part of its material. Zeppelin didn't which watching Rush on DVD truly trumps replaced by Sunesson have sweet four-part jam-they played, keeping the music lively, the CD experience. Toward the end of the grown consider- harmonies, while ably as musicians focused and fresh every time out. Watching song, the three veer off into a goofy, swing- "Ride the since the Crown's those old Zep shows, it's hard not to wonder inflected vamp, over which Lifeson pours a Glen Lightning" has all earlier recordings. the brimstone why there aren't bands like that anymore. strangely fluid guitar solo before announc- Their playing is Campbell and retribution of still technically Ah, but there is: there's Rush. ing, "Jazz is weird ... " Hearing it is funny, The Legacy a bluegrass clas- precise, but (1961-2002) sic. Now Not that Rush are Zeppelin-esque in but watching it is an education, because of they've developed CAPITOL Metallica needn't a greater feel for the Whitesnake sense. Yet, their similar Lifeson's deft use of the whammy bar and ») Before he was go "unplugged." dynamics and tex- approach to music becomes obvious in because, judging from their expressions, a golden-throated -Ted Drozdowski ture. The brutal the CD and DVD, on which "Rhinestone Rush in Rio neither Lee nor Peart had any idea what barrage of "No Cowboy," Glen the Canadian group takes a free-ranging Lifeson was going to say. (He introduces Lee Tomorrow" is Campbell was romp through three as "the guy from tempered by twin- one of the most guitar harmonies, sought-after ses- decades of material. Ipanema," which and the brooding sicn guitarists in While the songs prompts a brief UBow to None" Los Angeles, blends colossal remain the same, rendition of the adding nimble chugging with string bending to the playing keeps samba classic.) striking atonal Phil Spector proj- evolving-so much Naturally, the licks.