Neil Peart

I just got up after 12 hours in a sleep-debt coma. I cannot ATM recall the rush lyrics referring to (paraphrasing because I can't even get this part right):

"The weight of darkness pushing down on me"

Describing a motorcycle ride.

Hi trk.

Don't remember where that line's from, but I swear it sounds like an anagram of a line somewhere in "Double Agent".
 
Hi trk.

Don't remember where that line's from, but I swear it sounds like an anagram of a line somewhere in "Double Agent".

YEP!
"On the edge of sleep, I was drifting for half the night
Anxious and restless, pressed down by the darkness
Bound up and wound up so tight'

So tight...

'So many decisions, a million revisions
Caught between darkness and light...'"

Thanks for the neurostimulus.
 
Yeah, i was always taken by mr Peart's lyrical prowess. It reads like true poetry, most often in iambic pentameter. If Mr Peart lost his limbs in an accident, he'd still be an accomplished poet.

Oh yeah, we're on DW, he's a darn good drummer too. =P
 
Yeah, i was always taken by mr Peart's lyrical prowess. It reads like true poetry, most often in iambic pentameter. If Mr Peart lost his limbs in an accident, he'd still be an accomplished poet.

Oh yeah, we're on DW, he's a darn good drummer too. =P

He plays the drums too??? Wow! for over 30 years? He should be inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame!
 
Guys, guys, guys...


If you haven't realized his genius after all he's done...


just stay in your cave. :-|


Yea...I know you guys are in jest. ;-)


Uhh...I hope. :-|


:)
 
Guys, guys, guys...


If you haven't realized his genius after all he's done...


just stay in your cave. :-|


Yea...I know you guys are in jest. ;-)


Uhh...I hope. :-|


:)

It was an ironic statement.
Yep... the R&R hall of fame has made itself an in-joke. Rush should have been in there 10 years ago. With the album and concert sales they have as well as following, there is absolutely no excuse besides someone inside the organization has issues.

Neil Peart not in the R&R hall of fame is like not putting Wayne Gretzky in the hockey hall of fame because someone doesn't like it that he left the oilers. The reason Rush isn't in the R&R hall of fame has to do with internal poltics, nothing else supports an omission.
 
It was an ironic statement.
Yep... the R&R hall of fame has made itself an in-joke. Rush should have been in there 10 years ago. With the album and concert sales they have as well as following, there is absolutely no excuse besides someone inside the organization has issues.

Neil Peart not in the R&R hall of fame is like not putting Wayne Gretzky in the hockey hall of fame because someone doesn't like it that he left the oilers. The reason Rush isn't in the R&R hall of fame has to do with internal poltics, nothing else supports an omission.

The rock n roll hall of fame is a joke.

The museum is $20 to get in, but they don't have much more than the average Hard Rock café.

Selections make little sense, with so many rock bands left out, yet Madonna gets in. *shakeshead*
 
The rock n roll hall of fame is a joke.

The museum is $20 to get in, but they don't have much more than the average Hard Rock café.

Selections make little sense, with so many rock bands left out, yet Madonna gets in. *shakeshead*

Really? that sucks. That sounds like nothing more than the interactive R&R museum in Seattle. That costs about the same, and 90% of it is PC terminals so you are basically surfing a database.
 
Oh Yes!

You guys are correct, Sirs. It's a travesty that Rush hasn't been elected into the H of F. :-(

Which just goes to show, that it is a disheveled organization that is made up of pompous, stuck-up, unappreciative individuals that have no business deciding who does or does not deserve to be members of itself.

Jealousy, IMO, is a huge part of it. :-(


Ughh...
 
But then again, jealousy is so much of everything, isn't it Michael?
 
Jealousy, IMO, is a huge part of it. :-(

Not sure about jealousy. I have a feeling it's for the same reasons rolling stone doesn't do much for progressive rock and took about 30 years to interview Rush. It's a combination of curmudgeon and perception of pop hipness.

Britney Spears will be in there before Rush is just due to album sales to "tweens." She doesn't even appear on my radar as a singer, much less a HOF caliber talent.
 
Britney Spears will be in there before Rush is just due to album sales to "tweens." She doesn't even appear on my radar as a singer, much less a HOF caliber talent.

But those Britney "tweens" would probably think the same thing if Geddy were in and she wasn't...

See how that works...
 
Thats a rediculous statement...
At some point you will realize not everyone is obligated to like Rush....

No they're not, and I understand when people don't like them. It's their personal taste. Nothing wrong with that. But to not induct the rock band that comes in at #4 all time for consecutive gold or platinum records is a joke. (Beatles, Rolling Stones and Aerosmith are 1,2, and 3).

How the Rock & Roll hall of lame can overlook their contributions to rock is beyond me. Madonna being inducted before Rush should tell most people what the R&RHoF is all about.
 
I am not really a Neil Peart fan, but this has much to do with the fact that I am not really a Rush fan. If they had a good singer and a keyboard player, they could be a lot better, and more varied. But then again, they wouldn't be who they are. Millions of folks are happy who they are.

Peart's style is a bit too mechanical for my tastes, and being a jazz nut, I love improvisation, rather than the airtight, rote style Rush plays. I also think he overplays a bit, but that is a VERY subjective evaluation.

That said, I have great respect for Peart because:

A. He is the most influential drummer of his generation (my generation is the era before Peart. Carl Palmer was my hero, the Peart of his era. Yet Palmer also has limitations).

B. He is greatly regarded, not only by fanboys, but by established professionals. Do you think all those great drummers would have contributed on Burning for Buddy if they considered him a fraud?

C. As an admirer of technical proficiency, I get great joy listening to Peart's sticking.

D. His passion. He absolutely LIVES for his craft.

E. My heart also goes out to him for his unspeakable tragedy.

Keith Moon once famously responded to a question by a journalist regarding who the best drummer is by saying, "Who's the best? I have no idea. What is a style?"

Indeed. Is Peart better (or worse) than Gadd, Coliauta, Weckl, Palmer, etc?

NO! They, and MANY others, are ALL titans of the skins. If Neil is your favorite drummer, be proud of that! He is as worthy a choice as anyone, and more worthy than most.

As for his lyrics, I could really care less. I was into Ayn Rand in high school, but outgrew her when I went to college and later entered the workforce. Perhaps the way he plays drums is reflective of Rand's Objectivism philosophy. It is hard to argue with, but Objectivism is soulless. Like Rush, all meticulous precision. After the plug is pulled, we all are worm food. No God. No soul.

As an aside, the quote "It's not the destination, but the journey" has been used by Harley-Davidson for decades, probably before Neil was born. As an avid motorcyclist, he fully understands the allure of the open road, and after logging 55,000 on his bike after the deaths, he lived the life of the road.
 
GavGator,

You bring up interesting points and I enjoyed reading your post. Why do you think Carl Palmer was the Peart of his era? I am not that familiar with Carl's playing other than radio hits. I ask this because I could sort of hear similarities in both players too.

I think the Burning for Buddy was more "money talks" because Modern Drummer wrote something like "only Peart had the financial ability to pull of such a project" out of any other drummer. Must be cool to be so rich from playing drums you could hire many of the best out there to play on your project. What do any of you think?
 
Well, in the beginning, there was Gene, Louie and, of course Buddy. These were the drummers that made the drums the showcase of the band.

Carl Palmer was, with Mitch Mitchell, the first of the wave of technical drummers that came to rock in the late sixties and early seventies, emulating the style of the big band drummers. The paradigm of the era for the young drummers was the power drummer, be it Peter (Ginger) Baker, Moonie, Bonham and many others. All three were incredibly powerful drummers, but none had the speed and finesse of Mitchell and Palmer. So many young drummers (I among them), while appreciative of the power guys (I memorized every Zep drum track and even tried to play Who songs like Moon), was dazzled by Palmer, whose virtuosity was not grounded in a blues-based foundation (even Mitchell was blues and bebop based), but rather, with the complex classically-based structures of Bartok, Prokofiev, Janacek, and many other 19th and 20th century composers.

It was something completely different, something Keith Emerson and Greg Lake wanted as part of their sound, a radical departure from the blues-based direction of rock. Mitch Mitchell auditioned for what would become ELP, but neither party was comfortable with the chemistry. Jimi Hendrix was even interested in joining (he was knocked out by ELP at the Isle of Wight festival), but died before the first rehearsals were scheduled. God only knows what HELP would have produced!

If you ever were a band geek and was exposed to a wide range of classical music, as I was in my formative years, you could not HELP but be knocked out by the speed, dexterity and style of Carl Palmer. Most rock fans had Bonham as their paragon, but at least in my part of the world, most drummers idealized Palmer, Mitchell, Cobham, Danny Seraphine and others whose chops and speed were extraordinary. Some say flashy, pretentious and self-indulgent, but then again, many said that about Buddy as well. There is a place for all styles; it only depends on what one prefers.

Fast forward to the late 1970s. Progressive rock's peak has crested, to be replaced by punk and arena rock. Out of Canada comes this power trio that featured a drummer that, like Palmer, Bruford and others several years earlier, was not content to simply keep 4/4 time as loud as possible. Once Rush refined their sound to appeal to a larger audience than the metal crowd, everyone started to sit up and take notice of a talent the metal heads knew all along.

Even today, while many thousands of drummers still prefer the frontal assaults of power drummers like Travis Barker and Tommy Lee (among many other great power drummers), thousands of others prefer the dexterity and virtuosity of Neil Peart, the man who carried the torch from Mitchell, Palmer and other virtuosos before him. Because of Peart, there are many drummers out there who gladly pick up where Peart left off, and a new generation will follow them.

The radio hits of ELP is not really a true measure of Palmer's talent. Download The Barbarian, Tarkus, and Pictures at an Exhibition, and you will hear an amazing demonstration of power, speed and endurance. Palmer was never a groove master, and often varied in his timekeeping (one of the charms, actually, as it allowed the music to breathe). Then again, I can imagine ANY drummer, be it Gadd, Vinnie or whomever, would struggle keeping good meter going 200 BPM or faster in 5/4 time, having to keep up with arguably the greatest rock keyboardist of all time, someone who liked to play even faster in concert to show off HIS chops. On Keith Emerson's recent solo album, he covered The Barbarian with Greg Bissonette, an amazingly talented drummer. As great as Greg is, it does not have the energy and power Palmer had on the original version. Check it out.
 
Last edited:
I have to say, that was a treat to read. Thanks for the references to check out too. I know radio hits are really never indicative of a drummer's true ability. They play the original cut of "Closer to the Heart" every day on this "rock" station and it drives me nuts.

I will check out Palmer's material. I usually suggest Neil's songs: Tai shan, Territories, Vital signs, Cygnus X-1, Hemispheres, Time Stand Still, The Weapon, The Enemy Within and Scars to really get a sense of Neil's rhythms that he is capable of putting to music and play live in front of thousands.
 
I don't want this to turn into a CP thread, there is one already but I will say I discovered Palmer's work before Pearts by a few years.

I was always impressed by the speed, power and precision he had. Not to mention the sound of his snare and drum kit. His kit was used for more than just thudding on. He had to influence Peart in many ways.

"Ani music" included a classical bit as an homage to Palmer, it's the creator's favorite band and drummer. He wanted to consciously avoid mimicking Palmer in the piece. He explains it in the dvd commentary.

Finally, I thought Carl was tasteful and I enjoyed his work with ASIA.

I am saying all of this because he did all of it long before the internet, and I can see for those that grew up with him that there is a tendency to go overboard with praising Peart and say "Carl who?" Knowing Palmer's contributions adds a historical perspective to "reign in" the modern perspective.
 
Back
Top