In high school my friend Scott introduced us to Rush. The famous Canadian rock group that captivated me from the moment I heard the opening guitar to "The Spirit of Radio" Rush is known for amazing musicianship, as a power trio they create amazing intricate and "tight" music parts, they are characterized by "off time" signatures...the members are a fantastic Bass player, with a falsetto voice, the great "Geddy Lee" a virtuoso guitar player "Alex Lifeson" and then there is "Neil Peart" who many put as the greatest rock drummer to ever live (no argument here)
Although I haven't been as fanatical about listening to them as I once was, they are on the short list as one of my favorite bands.....I can put on pretty much any one of their albums today and every part of it is as familiar to me today as it was in 1991.
OK enough of that...here is what spurred me to write this post.....There were many in the RHCC youth group who objected to the "Pentagram" depicted on the 2112 album. Even though this had nothing to do with the devil...the 20 minute epic song talks about a totalitarian regime that crushes a young upstart who tries to start a revolution with a guitar....It ends with the ominous announcement "Attention all planets of the Solar Federation, we have assumed control" the Star was the symbol of the Federation...not the symbol of the Devil, Beelzebub, Captain Howdy, or any of the other nonsensical and ridiculous superstitions the group had.
Fast forward to this week and me watching the brand new Rush documentary: something struck me. These guys are extremely soft spoken and polite, Neil Peart, the person who penned the subject of the album is painfully shy. Geddy and Alex are extremely polite and nice to everyone, they are not devil worshippers. In fact Gene Simmons of KISS recounted how when Rush used to open for them he was amazed that the band members never partook of the abundant supply of female groupies. Rush preferred instead to quietly retreat to their hotel rooms and watch TV..Gene Simmons jokingly wondered if they were gay, and couldn't believe how square they were. But they aren't gay, they're just music nerds...obsessed with getting it right...and that is why they have lasted almost 40 years.
One could argue that Amy Grant is more immoral then Rush, after all she divorced her longtime husband after having a fling with Travis Tritt or some such country star.....Yet everyone was singing "Angels watching over me" at the church group.
