Launched on March 1, 1974, the debut Rush album set the Canadian three-piece off on one in every of rock music’s most long-lasting and profitable recording careers.
The band first fashioned in 1968, beginning as a gaggle known as The Projection till drummer John Rutsey’s brother Invoice mentioned, “You need a better name for the band – how about Rush?” As Rush, they finally settled as a trio comprising Rutsey, Geddy Lee (lead vocals and bass), and Alex Lifeson (guitar and backing vocals), although within the early 70s their vinyl output had been restricted to a couple singles, together with a canopy of Buddy Holly’s 1957 tune “Not Fade Away,” whose B-side was a tune known as “You Can’t Fight It,” the primary unique Rush tune to be launched.
Take heed to Rush‘s debut album now.
By 1973, the group had been a longtime a part of the Toronto music scene and, assured of their skills, determined to make the debut Rush album a self-produced affair. They started recording at Japanese Sound in Toronto, in March of that 12 months, however had been sad with the early outcomes. Deciding to not embrace “You Can’t Fight It” on the album, they started once more at Toronto Sound Studios. Lifeson remembers the place as “a very small 16-track studio, which was very smoky.”
It was a manic time for the musicians. As Lee recalled: “We would be doing four sets a night, and then we would be finished by 1am and load out of the bar and load into the recording studio and record all night, and then go home to crash for a few hours before loading back into the bar to do another show. Back and forth – that’s kind of how we recorded our first album.”
Rutsey (who left the band after the album’s completion, to get replaced by long-standing drummer and songwriter Neil Peart) was the band’s principal lyricist on the time however saved telling Lee and Lifeson that he was not happy with what he had written and finally tore up the songs he had penned for the debut Rush album. That they had solely sufficient cash left for just a few days of studio time and determined that determined measures had been wanted. “I had to sit down and write the lyrics basically for the next two days and sing them as soon as one was written,” Lee mentioned. The temper of uncertainty is mirrored within the album opener “Finding My Way.”
A part of what rescued the state of affairs was the shut private and musical bond between Lee and Lifeson. They had been each 20 and had been associates since they had been teenage college students collectively at junior highschool. In addition they shared the bond of each coming from households who had emigrated to Canada (Lifeson’s mother and father had been born in Serbia and Lee’s mother and father had survived Auschwitz).
The tune “Working Man,” with its excellent guitar solo, is probably the important thing tune on the debut Rush album. It was influenced by Cream and has the texture of a bluesy jam, and continued to be a show-closing monitor at Rush concert events for a few years afterward. Although Rush launched solely a few thousand copies of the unique album, on their very own Moon Information label, the one “Working Man” impressed Cleveland DJ Donna Halper and her fixed airplay in Ohio helped carry Rush to the eye of each an American viewers and the bosses at Mercury Information.
Different highlights included the pacy, two-minute “Need Some Love,” which showcased Lee’s energetic singing. Lee, who was impressed by Robert Plant and Small Faces’ Steve Marriott, had been singing since his days as a soprano in a Toronto church choir. Lee and Lifeson co-wrote all eight songs on the debut Rush album, other than “In The Mood,” which Lee had written again in 1971. The seven-minute “Here Again” is the longest tune on the 40-minute report.
Rush earned some publicity from Billboard, whose evaluate, revealed in August 1974, praised the trio for “serving up a dose of good hard rock highlighted by the often Robert Plant-like lead vocals of Geddy Lee and the powerful guitar work of Alex Lifeson and solid drumming from John Rutsey. Good material here for AM or FM play.”
Lee has described the debut Rush album as being “off-the-cuff” however it stands the check of time and exhibits why the band – who started recording its successor, Fly By Night time, with Peart as a substitute of Rutsey, inside six months of the discharge of Rush – had been on the street to stardom.
Rush may be purchased right here.
