Original subtitles

There's a message in 21 12 that resonates with people

and has continued to resonate with people.

That's what has given it its longevity.

l think 21 12 was the first record that we made

where we sounded like Rush.

21 12 was the beginning of everything for us,

and without which, nothing.

The audience were attracted to Rush 'cause they were heavy.

Progressive heavy rock. One. Period. End of story.

Sometimes you hit one out of the park

with a concept that resonates with everybody,

and that's what they did - it was out there.

21 12 was a seed that spread out and grew and attracted,

but Moving Pictures arrived in a fertile field and...

You put Moving Pictures on and it's hit, hit, hit, hit, hit.

ln the case of Moving Pictures it was the mainstream success

and the fact that every track on that record is a killer track.

Our fans, they keep wanting us to play more songs from Moving Pictures

than any other album.

So, to me, it tells me that it's just a deep, deep record,

and that's given it its lasting power.

We formed the band in 1968, when we were 15 years old

with our original drummer, John Rutsey.

We were playing a lot of Cream, British blues.

We liked the American blues songs

that had been re-interpreted by the British rockers.

The fact that we were writing music early, was very, very important.

With the influence of Led Zeppelin, we started to get heavier and heavier.

Alex and Geddy, in particular, were so good for kids that age and...

totally, totally absorbed with wanting to be musicians.

That first album we recorded in about a 48-hour space.

We had two full nights and recorded everything,

and then there was one day to mix the album, beyond that.

The original mix of the album

was...wanting, to say the least.

So Terry Brown stepped in.

The didn't really have a handle on what they were doing at that point.

They were very young.

And it needed somebody to, sort of,

pull all the elements together.

He was our hero, because...

he made us sound the way we wanted to sound.

We originally released the record on our own label,

'cause no one would release it in Canada.

A series of events happened that were wonderful.

We had a radio station and a music director in Cleveland,

that loved the record and started to play it.

The program director there, Donna Halper, in turn,

called a friend of hers, Cliff Burnstein, in Chicago,

who was at Mercury Records,

talked to him about it,

talked about the response that it was getting.

He got a copy.

l just put the album on

and l was blown away from the start.

l made some inquiries,

and by the end of the day we had signed the band.

ln the space of a couple of months,

we went from being this local bar band,

to having a shot at touring with Uriah Heep, at the time,

and Rory Gallagher, and all these great bands

that we looked up to and had so much respect for.

Alex and l had started writing material that was more progressive,

a little more complicated,

and John Rutsey really wasn't into that kind of music.

He was more of a rock'n'roll purist.

So, change was in the air.

John was diabetic, he had juvenile diabetes.

We were getting very serious about trying to conquer the US.

When they went out on the road,

he couldn't cope with being on that kind of rigorous schedule.

The other two guys would have done this for as long as they could,

until they were successful,

and l'm not sure John was quite as committed as they were.

We'd spent six years playing in this band together

and building up the foundation of the band,

so it was... it was a sad parting.

So we started auditioning drummers

in the summer of '7 4.

A drummer friend of mine, from my town of St Catharines,

recommended me as a possibly suitable drummer

and suggested the audition,

but l had no knowledge of the band or their music.

He pulled out his drums.

He had double bass drums, but they were very small,

the smallest double bass drums l've ever seen.

He set them up, and because he's quite a tall guy,

he sat behind this drum kit and he just looked huge behind it.

And he started doing these drum rolls with his feet,

and it just blew me away.

After we'd met, l really wanted it.

l loved the other two guys right away,

l loved our conversations about music,

and our shared interests and sense of humour.

Magic.

Magic. Could it have gotten any better?

They not only get the benefit of a guy who, in most people's opinion,

becomes the best rock drummer, in the world,

but is a hell of a lyricist, as well.

We made our first album together, Fly By Night,

in the winter of 7 4/75.

So we toured madly all that fall,

and then we were writing songs along the way.

Right from the get go, with that first album of the three of us now,

we looked at some longer pieces,

some places we could stretch out a little that was less jammy.

That was our first experiment

at writing a piece that was made up of different sections

that were all kind of glued together, and told a story.

And that's kind of how our style evolved.

Through his lyrics and our desire to complicate the music more.

lf you liked Yes, and you liked Genesis for their complexity,

yet you liked Black Sabbath for their power,

then Rush was the perfect band for you.

That summer of '75, a certain gelling came together.

Caress Of Steel l see, in retrospect, was weird as hell,

but we loved it so much.

lt was a dark record,

and coming off Fly By Night,

it was just a little too much, too soon.

We suffered a great disappointment

when the rest of the world didn't share our affection for that record.

We went out on tour after that, into the fall of '75,

and things were not going well.

We were having trouble getting dates

and a lot of them were ill-attended,

and our road crew started calling it the down-the-tubes tour.

There was a great deal of pressure on the band,

from the record company, from management,

to take a couple steps back and ''think about where you're going, guys.''

l think that a lot of people at the label

were concerned that the progress wasn't fast enough.

You want a quick pay-off.

And l think that there was, probably,

some pressure on Rush

to become more commercial.

After Caress Of Steel came out,

and wasn't more successful,

Terry Brown and l actually flew to Chicago

and met with Mercury Records,

who were debating whether to drop the band or not.

We basically created the assumption

that the next record would be more commercial,

and would be less concept, of course.

And we got out of Chicago

with the deal intact for one more record,

breathed a sigh of relief,

then it was up to Terry and the band what they were gonna deliver.

There was really one of two directions that we could go at that point,

after we toured Caress Of Steel.

That was either to give in to the pressures or to just say,

''You know, screw it.''

We got mad, we got angry and thought,

''lf this is our last shot, we're gonna give it everything.

''We're gonna do it our way.''

So we went into the studio to try

to perfect that whole sidelong thing one more time,

and that's when the 21 12 idea came up.

There it is, the unmistakable opening of 21 12.

And this was Hugh Syme...

playing various synth parts for us,

and then it was all put together in a collage,

and we finalised this intro for the piece.

And then we come out of that into the Overture.

He was a huge fan of Ayn Rand's writing,

and he introduced her writing to us.

Not exclusively that, he's a very, very broad reader.

l had read, certainly, a lot of science fiction

and Samuel R. Delany was a big influence on me.

Around the same time, l found a copy of The Fountainhead,

and said, ''All the smart kids at school used to carry that around.''

We all liked the book Anthem,

which is the thing that kind of inspired 21 12.

Anthem was a novelette that Ayn Rand wrote

l would say, roughly 1939, 1940,

when she was in the middle of writing The Fountainhead.

And so Anthem is basically the story of a society

taken over by a priesthood

of totalitarian dictators

who use mysticism to try and subdue all the people of society.

Which is so collectivistic and so totalitarian

that the concept 'l' has been eliminated from people's minds.

They don't even have the concept 'l',

which means they can't conceive of themselves as individuals.

That whole idea of the individual and its libertarian values

played a big role in the way that album shaped up.

l dreamed up this story

of music being invented against a dystopian, totalitarian society.

l felt this great sense of injustice

that this mass was coming down on us and telling us to compromise.

Compromise was the word that l couldn't deal with.

l grew up a child of the '60s, and l was a strong individualist,

and believed in the sanctity of, ''You should be able to do what you want.''

Without hurting anyone.

When l realised that the story was paralleling Anthem,

l had to say something about Ayn Rand

and the association with 21 12,

so l put, ''With acknowledgement to the genius of Ayn Rand.''

How that came back on to us, afterwards!

We got in trouble with the NME in Britain.

We did an interview and this journalist...

..wrote it up like we were Nazis, ultra right-wing maniacs.

Growing up as a son of Holocaust survivors,

l found that just...

you know, just so offensive.

The connection with Ayn Rand definitely was a media turn-off.

There was certainly a... kind of an association

with the '50s conservativism,

the McCarthy years.

All this stuff probably made the media think,

''Well, this is just not my kind of band.''

And even though Rand was, and still is to this day

a controversial figure,

it doesn't mean that Neil believes everything she says.

You don't have to believe everything she says

to understand that there are points in those books

that are worth serious consideration.

lt's about creative freedom.

lt's about belief, believing in yourself.

lt's a great lesson

in what Joseph Campbell termed as ''Follow your bliss.''

You better listen to your own heart,

you better do what you think is correct.

l did not think of politics and global oppression,

l was... ''These people are messing with me.''

You can say what you want about Ayn Rand

and all the other implications of her work,

but her artistic manifesto, for lack of a better term,

was the one that struck home with the three of us.

And since this was the 1812 Overture for us,

we couldn't resist but to pay homage to Tchaikovsky.

We recorded at Toronto Sound Studios, which was my studio at the time.

We'd done all the records there, it was just a natural place to work.

lt was his home and it became our home.

Small, comfy, cosy control room,

and a moderate-sized live room.

We had a booth set up where Neil had his drums set inside the booth.

lt was almost like a little cottage within the studio that he was set up in.

They basically came in and said,

''Here's the record, how can we make it great?''

We had kind of sketches of a lot of that material,

but once we got in the studio with Terry,

we put it together as a kind of a unit.

We recorded most everything off the floor as a three-piece,

and did any overdubs, vocals, and maybe guitar solos, after the fact.

21 12, the piece itself, is so raw and so direct,

it's guitar, bass and drums, it's loud, angry guitars.

l know that...Temples of Syrinx...

for me, as a listener,

was like the heaviest thing l'd ever heard in my life.

Certainly the anger that the guys came in with

is expressed in this tune, for sure.

The playing is very aggressive and Ged's vocals are very aggressive,

so l think we achieved that.

Anger, this raw determination, all of that is implicit in the music.

lt was built in, you know.

Anything could be least likely to make you popular in the world,

but, somehow, that anger reached people.

Unmistakably Neil.

And couple that with Ged's bass playing.

There's nothing sloppy about the bottom end of this band.

And that makes a big difference,

because everything on top sits in a nice place,

'cause the bottom is so well defined and accurate.

And then, of course, Alex.

Then, all together.

The focus on 21 12 was about the loss of individuality.

And, kind of...state rule

and the oppression of expression.

And, and...

To the extent of the extinction of music, basically.

And so that record

is about a guy discovering a guitar,

this lost artefact from a former age.

So the guitar is discovered in the cave,

with the water running in the background.

And it's obviously out of tune,

it's been there for hundreds of years,

and the strings are old.

Alex picks it up and we started with it out of tune

and he starts tuning it and putting it into tune.

And once he's got it in tune,

he starts playing the intro to this piece.

So it was all done in one take.

They had to step up as melody writers

and as... almost as architects.

They had to figure out a way to make that piece stand on its own

and yet have pieces inside of it.

We've always been very democratic in the band.

We like to share the responsibilities,

Geddy and l write all the music and Neil writes the lyrics.

So there's an equal sense to the partnership.

A lot of times, the piece of paper with the words on it makes a great map.

l would be submitting random lyrics to them at that time early on and later.

He's really come to rely on my opinion as his editor, in a way,

and he has great consideration of the job that l have to do

as a writer of the melodies and a vocalist.

There's stuff that Geddy isn't comfortable singing,

or he doesn't see the music in it, that l do,

or maybe only four lines of it speak to him.

He has to feel those lyrics

and he's not comfortable singing something that he's not feeling.

And l think Neil understands that very clearly.

ln 21 12, when the main character

is going up against the priests,

you're going to have an uphill battle

and you're going to be dealing with forces that are bigger than you,

who think they're better than you,

and are going to do everything they can to keep you in your place.

And that's, in a sense, also the story of Rush.

So we're heading into the presentation now,

where our hero takes his philosophy, his idea

to the priests...

and the vocal is...

very humble, l would say.

And then, shortly, we get the reply from the priests,

which is a totally different, aggressive approach

to the vocal delivery.

Geddy's voice was on the high side, at the time,

and quite unique and different, and not particularly radio-friendly.

Part of the problem l had as a promotion man

was people saying to me,

''That Geddy Lee, you know, l can't stand his voice.

''Who wants to hear that?''

The fans were coming out in droves to see the band,

but the press still didn't really get it.

l can remember reading stuff

and it was shocking what they would say.

Geddy's voice has always been a strength of the band, to me.

Very high, very loud, very forceful.

lt wasn't any more shocking to me

than Robert Plant or opera.

lt was, in fact, somewhere in-between the two.

l found that quite intriguing.

We took some fairly harsh criticism,

but we were young and undaunted.

We just ploughed ahead.

OK, we're heading into the Grand Finale.

Where good triumphs over evil.

And we're running a number of guitars here,

but we've basically got Alex's signature guitar sound,

which is a double track 335

through Marshall amps.

l had two guitars in the studio with me at that time.

An ES-335, the Gibson semi-acoustic hollow body,

one of my first good guitars,

and a borrowed Stratocaster.

Couldn't afford it.

ln the 21 12 retelling of the story,

it's a darker, more dystopian vision.

He's a pretty dark character, is Neil.

There's no telling what was going on in his mind at the time.

l certainly don't think he would want to just recreate...

the Ayn Rand story,

living happily ever after in the mountains.

lt would have made a much less dramatic ending for us on a record.

The end of that story is a little ambiguous,

and there's obviously some sort of war going on.

That's the good guys, that's the cavalry,

coming in at the end.

So it actually, to me, had a happy ending, as it were,

that the Solar Federation was gonna be shut down

by the vision that our hero has of this other way of living.

They're the people coming at the end. That's how l intended it.

When they come to the end

and the voice is going, ''We have assumed control,''

people were just delirious.

l guess l was delirious too.

lt was about the whole epic, more than anything.

We have assumed control. We have assumed control.

For 21 12, they focused their ambition,

and in doing that,

they made a really fantastic first side of the record.

l think side two of that album was a very clear statement

that we can write songs

and we can write songs that people will sing along to.

lt was kind of a relief from this 20 minutes of intensity

to flip the channel and to experiment with the other sides of the pan.

There was this pressure - felt pressure anyway -

from the other guys to be lighter in tone,

and write some funny songs.

You've got Passage To Bangkok

and this is like, yeah, you know, drugs.

OK? This is what we like to do. We like to get high.

We know what that song's about, don't we, Neil?

lt was those times, a lot of things can only be appreciated in the moment,

but in the mid-'70s there were things like Thai sticks coming around.

So we thought we had to put in a good, strong toke, at some point.

So this leads into the solo. l'll play it for you.

We were just travelling around the US, and hearing about these exotic things.

We'd never been to any of these places.

lt was really just this sense of the exotic, the sense of the unknown.

lt was romantic, in a way.

And it is interesting how, when we played it on the last tour,

how noticeable the atmosphere became.

We have one of the finest, most aromatic audiences

you'll ever find in rock'n'roll.

We felt the Twilight Zone

was really one of the most creative TV programs available.

And we were always shocked that it even got on the air.

The writing was spectacular,

the visual component of every single episode

was so unique and so different.

Rod Serling was truly a great artist.

He would tell these seemingly simple stories

but they would have such a moral twist and irony,

based on human nature.

Having Rod come out at the beginning and the end,

doing his little thing with the cigarette, was just so super cool.

You've heard of trying to find a needle in a haystack,

well, stay with us now, and you'll be part of an investigating team

who's mission is not to find that proverbial needle.

No, their task is even harder.

They've got to find a Martian in a diner.

ln just a moment, you'll search with them,

because you've just landed in the Twilight Zone.

And we wanted to pay respect

by writing a song.

We did want to try to capture the atmosphere of the show a little.

lf you watch enough of the show, sometimes the plots...

He uses a kind of demented sense of humour

in some of the stories and then there's always that fatal twist.

That song has a particular feel to it and tonality,

that's a little bit mysterious and a little swirly and moves around.

Kind of like most of the episodes that we watched.

Of course, Neil makes mention of a number of the episodes in the lyrics.

The two narratives were probably just vivid enough

and brief enough, that l could get them into a sing-able verse.

The verses are quite...quite jaunty.

Setting the scene.

Then when we get to the chorus...

we go into this whole,

you know, different mode, tonally.

Different kind of key structure.

Gives it a bit more atmosphere, a bit more...mood.

And it was fun to throw that whisper track in to double the chorus vocal.

They always had the dark side mixed with the lighter side.

That's really what we've done here.

Ray Danniels actually brought a record into Mercury.

We all sat in the conference room and listened to it.

The general feeling in the office was...

''We're in trouble.''

This is exactly what we don't need.

They were a bit puzzled,

but there were some people at the record company

that actually kind of got a charge out of it.

l knew that... l could do something with this record,

because it wasn't actually all concept,

one side of it was concept, the other side were a bunch of songs.

Of course, 21 12 was a very, very successful record

and it bought us our freedom.

From that day on, nobody ever gave us any kind of trouble.

That was the record that really moved the band into a different level.

There was like a tribal drum being beaten

throughout the North American continent

and it was driving people toward Rush.

There was a stylistic breaKthrough on 21 12

that kept evolving.

lt was a time when things like bass pedal synthesisers were coming out,

we jumped on that, Geddy had a Minimoog.

And they both started playing 12-string electrics and acoustics.

l started getting keyboard, percussion, and Temple blocks,

and chimes and all this kind of stuff that would give us more sounds.

From 21 12 through A Farewell To Kings and Hemispheres,

there was definitely a development, melodically and structurally,

they were still doing the longer pieces,

but they were also still experimenting with the shorter ones.

But Permanent Waves, it showed what great listeners they were,

because you could hear that they were taking punk

and so-called new-wave rock very seriously.

The punk movement kicked off the new-wave movement,

which grew into so many things,

and brought in reggae music and electronic dance music.

So we were very open to it, we were young enough to be influenced by it,

and to change.

The difference between 21 12 and Moving Pictures

is startling.

21 12 is a very dark, hard rock album.

You get to Moving Pictures and you have reggae influences,

and you can hear The Police on there.

Synthesisers are prevalent.

And songs are stand-alone stories.

Neil made Red Barchetta into a thrilling little short film.

l've seen feature films that have probably had less content

than is in that song.

The story itself, called A Nice Morning Drive,

had been published in Road & Track magazine several years before,

and just stuck in my mind.

The car l loved at the time, and still do really,

is the Ferrari 166 Mille Miglia Barchetta.

Barchetta, properly.

He just had this fantasy about a time when cars were not allowed.

We tell this little story, this cautionary tale,

about beating the car police.

lt's almost like the banned guitar from 21 12,

but it's a banned car and he finds it and rides it on the highway.

He's talking about, ''Let's have fun,

''let's put the pedal to the metal and see what this thing can do.''

The beauty of Red Barchetta is... it's totally a car song.

lt's got all the fetishism and romanticism

of muscular machines, but it's a Rush song.

To me, it's about freedom,

it's about how can l get away from what's happening?

When did we lose all the fun? When did we lose the spirit?

Red Barchetta, to me, was like a fight to get the spirit back.

Now we're getting very close to the solo.

Which starts out with screeching tires and...

lnteresting guitar sound here.

lt's being fed through a very short delay,

so it has a very tunnel-like sound to it.

Neil would write the lyrics in such way that it's ''us against them''

but this time in a fancy sports car.

lt's the music that carries Red Barchetta.

The story is just a vehicle for it and Geddy and Alex responded to that

in that sense, to musically narrate the story,

and decorate the story, musically.

That's where it was successful.

l don't know that you can really appreciate this band

if you haven't seen them live.

These are three guys that make all of this extraordinary music,

and you have to be at such a high technical level...

to pull that off.

lt's hard enough in the studio,

but live, to pull that off, says everything about them.

YYZ was really exciting for Torontonians,

because it's our airport code,

and it was maybe Rush's nod to coming home.

We were in an airplane, flying into Toronto,

listening to the Morse code, which is YYZ, the airport,

and l just... The rhythm stuck in my head.

That song really began as a bass and drum extravaganza.

ln fact, l remember in the rehearsal hall,

Neil and l putting that track together,

almost without guitar.

l think Alex was out flying his remote-controlled airplanes.

Neil and l were itching to just jam.

Before we knew it, we had put...

jammed all these moments together

that kind of kicked off the beginning of that song.

lt gives them a chance to stretch out

and play anything they would like to.

We didn't have to take into consideration

it was a melody over the top,

because the melody was all written into the parts of the instrumental.

That's pure, for them.

There's nothing to sully it or get in the way.

lt's pure Rush as musicians.

YYZ was always a challenge to play,

and for that reason alone, it is a favourite of ours,

because you always want to feel challenged whenever you're playing.

He started adding his parts to it and really took it to another level

especially with some of the solo work he put on that, it's just magic.

The exotic nature of travel to Alex's guitar solo,

for sure, he wove in that kind of Eastern mode,

which gives a sense of the exotic.

Coming to the end of the solo now,

and into the bridge with all the synths.

And we've got Oberheim, bass pedals,

OB-X,

and some strings.

Gives it a nice full sound for the bridge part.

All the great power trios,

every guy's got to hold up his leg of the tripod

or the whole thing collapses.

And each one of these guys is terrific at holding up his end.

Alex Lifeson is...

he's definitely the rock'n'roll of Rush.

Geddy's playing these crazy bass lines,

and Neil's like the mad scientist in the back.

The hands of God.

Strong. So strong.

He never lets up.

His drum solos are amazing.

But l'm biased because l love the guy.

But l listen to his drum solo every night,

and l never get tired of it.

We went away in the summertime

and worked on the music in that summer of '79.

And stayed at a house in the country and it was joyous.

We just loved this total immersion of working together,

having no responsibilities, all we were supposed to do was write songs.

Everything seemed to come relatively quickly

and it was very exciting.

You can labour over something for hours and hours and hours,

but with Moving Pictures, there was a really good, positive energy

and a lot of it really came together quite comfortably,

and with a great deal of fun.

There's a sound to the album which stands out, as well.

And l think it's become a signature sound.

There's certainly the use of the bass pedals

at the beginning of Tom Sawyer.

ln terms of synthesisers,

this one is a signature sound

that's kind of come to be identified with the band

and this particular song.

lt's this big growly, low-end bass pedal sound

which we created on an Oberheim.

The keyboard ''rizz'' thing plays such a big, important part

and the rhythm of the drums and the way Neil is playing from the hip

is very, very important.

The main thrust of this point

was to get the drum track exactly the way we wanted it.

Alex and Ged would play in the studio

and as moral support and as guides for Neil.

Give him all the support he needed.

That's right. And here's some support now.

Let's put some guitar in.

Alrighty.

Puts them all in. l love it.

He's put a thousand guitars in it.

Why don't we strip that back a little?

Yeah, so there was a few different styles of vocal on this song.

That's kind of me singing in my speaking voice,

which was rare for me at that time.

ln the early days there was a lot of screeching

and a lot of high-pitched, high energy.

At this stage in our career, we were writing more melodies,

and more interesting melodies, and it enabled me to sing lower

and to add a little harmony here and there

and try to flesh out the potential of my voice.

That's like a quintessential stoner anthem,

as far as l'm concerned.

And it's part of the... you know,

''The world is, the world is Love and life are deep.''

lt's like, ''Oh, wow, man. That's amazing.''

And that took Rush to a whole other level.

There's a whole bunch of people who just said,

''Yeah, man. That is my life.''

Just those two lines:

''No, his mind is not for rent To any god or government.''

That says volumes about...

what we as rock'n'rollers are about.

We stood up against the government in the '60s,

we stood up against organised religion

while we were dropping acid to try to find God.

Tom Sawyer, for a hit song, was oddly eerie and dark.

The song Tom Sawyer

is a huge staple on rock radio.

We'll be playing Tom Sawyer as long as there is rock radio.

Obviously Tom Sawyer's their...

..Hotel California, or their Bohemian Rhapsody.

That's their signature song.

We still think it's a wonderful thing

that such a bizarre song could be so popular.

That alone is a miracle to us.

And the fact that it is the one that has endured in people's memories

since 1980, it's a song they remember from their summer.

Tom Sawyer became the anthemic track...

that Rush needed

to become more than the biggest cult band...in America,

become actually a band of mass popular acceptance.

That period, in the late '70s, going into Moving Pictures,

we were suddenly becoming much more popular,

and there were greater demands placed upon us.

We had kind of come to a new level of fandom

and we had new kind of encounters with fans.

This was very uncomfortable for Neil.

He tried to make sense of it in lyrics,

and tried to explain his point of view.

He's saying, what exactly does this mean?

And how do l make some sort of truce with it,

so that l'm appreciating the good things that come with it,

and l cope with the things that are kind of annoying?

l used to go see The Who,

but l would never have dreamed of hanging around backstage

or chasing them to their hotels, never mind going to their homes.

l was shocked to see that kind of behaviour, people chasing us around,

and people coming to my house.

l like the fact that some of our songs discuss these things openly

and give you pause, you know.

''Living in the limelight The universal dream.''

You meet so many people that dream of nothing else,

but being famous.

But living it and dreaming of it are two different things.

That's what the song says, that's the validity of the song,

from a universal point of view,

not just Neil's personal wrestling with fame.

l wouldn't want to be famous, l wanted to be good.

That's a whole other thing.

lt's quite interesting that he wrote it before this record came out.

He wrote it for the album which actually made it come true.

And l think, musically...

that song has some beautiful ups and downs.

lt's very cinematic in that it's light in the verses

which, l think, reflects,

sort of, the joy of what we were doing,

and then the bridges and choruses

were much more lonesome.

And then the solo, of course, is one of my favourites

and it has that kind of character to it

of it's haunting and very lonely,

and it's kind of singular.

We wanted to come up with something different,

rather than just putting a stock guitar solo over this fabulous track.

So we spent a lot of time and Alex came up with some great ideas

and we strung them all together into the solo that you hear on the record.

As we put all the pieces together on the tunes for Moving Pictures,

it became very obvious, l think,

that there was something happening here that was out of our control

and was certainly the best we'd done.

The sound of it and the perception of the energy on that record

reflected that period of time.

lt seemed to be the right place, the right time

with some songs that connected with people.

We just made a record that we liked, that's what we did every time.

But, suddenly, just all of the stars were aligned.

l certainly knew that whatever happened from that moment on,

we would never be going back to where we came from.

Unlike most bands who kind of get it right once,

which is a great thing - if you get it right once you're doing fabulous.

They got it right twice.

Those are the benchmarks, and l think that 21 12 and Moving Pictures

are the albums that defined them.

There isn't a prog rock band

that doesn't live in the halls Rush built.

They did all the riffs, all the time signatures,

and all of us just look at the manual.

When you meet somebody that you have empathy with and you can work with,

it makes all the difference in the work that you put out.

They just work really, really well together, and always have.

lt was a great experience to be a part of those albums,

and for the mark that they've left.

Rush all along has been trying to make the music that we love.

That is the simplest expression.

Then we hope that other people might like it too.

One of the things l really love about being in Rush,

that we're not afraid to do anything on a record,

and even if it's sometimes a terrible mistake,

there's still the willingness to experiment.

l think that's why the three of us have stayed together,

because we feel within the confines of Rush we can try almost anything.

Hugh Syme, who does our album covers, was in the sessions there,

he had played Mellotron on the song Tears.

And he had this little ARP, if l'm remembering correctly.

And, basically, we just recorded a whole lot of him

just playing around with the ARP, making space sounds.

'Cause we knew we wanted to start the song with a kind of sound

that had the imagery of soaring through space, right.

Moving through time and space.

So he just played around with it,

and afterwards we listened back to all the bits that he had done,

then we picked one that was the best.

So it was kind of a one-off

kind of combination of improvisation and playing with buttons and knobs.

l assumed he knew what he was doing

but l think there was a bit of luck involved.

And now when we play that song live, l just...

l have that sampled on one of my samplers,

and l just hit a bass pedal or play a key,

and it sets that whole thing off, to start.

Can l have a drum roll?

l don't ever think as though we invented anything

because our influences were so strong

and so transparent and so genuine.

l've talked before about going through the late '70s

as music started to change stylistically.

We were right there, because we were there as fans, as listeners, so...

What informed us from the beginning

was absolutely the example of others who came before.

And whatever led us to 21 12

was absolutely set before by The Who and by Jethro Tull,

absolutely Jethro Tull, doing those kind of ambitious undertakings too.

There were people like King Crimson, all kinds of examples being set.

We happened to be a power trio from Toronto,

so, naturally, we sounded different than any of those people did

and took it to a different place, just based on where we came from.

We came from Jimi Hendrix, Blue Cheer, Cream, The Who,

these were my... all my first favourite bands.

But when we filter that through the later sophistication

of the more progressive bands that l mentioned,

they came together in us.

We were playing a lot of Cream, British blues.

We liked the American blues songs

that had been reinterpreted by the British rockers,

John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers, that kind of stuff.

Eric Clapton, of course, when he was in Cream, Hendrix,

Pete Townshend was a huge influence, he was such a great rhythm guitarist,

l really learned a lot from his playing.

But, probably more than anyone at that time, was Jimmy Page.

l just loved his sound and his style of playing,

and the way he dressed and everything that he did.

Every time l would hear a Bill Bruford or hear a Phil Collins

it's like, OK, that's how good you have to be now.

The benchmark went up so high from the early '60s,

all you had to do was keep a surf beat,

and you could get in a band.

By the late '60s, you had to be able to play in 7 /8.

You had to be able to transmit through tempo changes,

and maybe play some keyboard percussion.

That was what you had to...

Those were the words, ''This is how good you have to be now.''

l think my first bass hero was...

Jack Bruce, probably, Jack Casady.

Obviously, in the progressive period,

Chris Squire was a huge hero of mine.

Those are probably... John Entwistle.

Those are probably the four most influential guys for me,

early on in...

in...wanting me to be a bass player.

All four of those guys had a very unique and almost more aggressive sound

than your average bass player.

Much more character to their sound personality,

and that really attracted me.

My first inspiration was Gene Krupa

because when l was 1 1 or 12 l saw the movie, The Gene Krupa Story,

and Sal Mineo actually played Gene Krupa

but he did a great job of miming Gene Krupa's drumming.

lt seemed so glamorous, exciting and dangerous.

Gene Krupa gets arrested for marijuana in it and all this stuff.

Sal Mineo was a great looking guy, as Gene Krupa was too,

always impeccably dressed.

He and Buddy Rich had valets in those days, to keep them looking that way.

And then, when the mid-'60s...

l started playing in '65 at age 13.

l played along with the AM radio, in those days.

And many of us, in my generation,

often joke that our six favourite drummers were all Hal Blaine,

because when l was playing along to Simon & Garfunkel, or The Byrds,

or The Association.

All of these bands, they were all Hal Blaine playing drums on them.

l had a little AM radio, l had a little four-piece drum set,

on the radiator beside me, a big steam radiator,

l had a plastic radio that l played along with.

Then when l started buying records,

the first records l bought were by The Who and Blue Cheer.

And the band l was in at the time, my first band,

we played a lot of the San Francisco music by '67,

of the Grateful Dead and Moby Grape and Jefferson Airplane and all that.

But, by then, my firm and fast hero was Keith Moon.

l absorbed learning from these drummers

without knowing it sometimes.

Keith Moon had a wonderful way of framing the vocals.

You can hear that, it's apparent chaos, but it's not at all,

it's a very carefully designed chaos that frames the essence of the song

and it's something that l learned early on was to do that.

To frame the vocals and come in

and punch up the rhythmic basis of a vocal phrasing.

l always say l'm grateful to be the lyricist, l know the lyrics.

l know of bands that record a song before the lyrics are written

and the poor drummer has to stay out of the way,

in case there's some singing there.

l love to know that. Of course l want to stay out of the way but if it's...

We always joke that the three of us are always soloing

if there's no singing going on.

Also, l love knowing where the phrasing is,

l do a lot that, of punching up the phrasing where Geddy is.

Live, with my inner monitor,

l'm listening to his singing and the phrasing

to tell if l have the tempo right.

lf it's a little faster or slower,

the first thing you notice is the vocal phrasing.

That's still something that l'm very much glued to

and very grateful that when we're recording a song l know the lyrics,

so that l can play my part around them,

either to frame them or compliment the lyrical phrasing.

lt was in downtown LA, we were going through a rough part of town

and spray-painted on the wall was ''Freedom isn't free.''

lt's common graffiti now but it wasn't then, it was like, ''Whoa!''

So, no, the genesis of the song was that, it was that graffiti,

which l thought was kind of cool.

Then the rest of it was more about self-actualization.

There's something about waiting for the winds of change to change you,

and waiting for things to happen.

And l think the way the verses go,

it's like, ''No, you have to go do that thing.

''lt won't come to you.''

So l think l was starting to see among my generation

there was a sense of being aggressive or passive,

a sense of: l'm just waiting to get discovered.

While guys like my band mates and me

were out there, going around getting discovered,

or working towards it, at least.

But l knew other people who were just waiting for it to happen.

So that was the dominant inspiration, l think, that l was after,

and again, inspired by that graffiti l just loved. ''Freedom isn't free.''

lt's about getting up and going out and working for what you wanted.

We all had a very strong work ethic.

Speaking personally, my father, he was an immigrant from Yugoslavia.

After the war, spent time in a camp in ltaly,

before he was accepted to come to Canada.

He was a stationary engineer at Massey Ferguson,

he had his own one-man plumbing business,

that he used to pick me up some nights after a gig,

and l'd go and l'd work with him through the night helping him out.

Plus he drove a cab.

He believed that if you wanted something, you worked for it.

You didn't complain about it, or wish you had this or that.

lf you wanted it, get up and work.

And l think we've all had that same work ethic.

We work very hard

and we take great pride in working hard

and seeing the results of our toil.

l think that song has a real strong message to it,

that's directed at the whiners and complainers.

Get up and do it, if you want it.

Don't complain about it, just get up and do it.

Nothing is for free in this life.

So get on with it.

The opening for the song was on the 12-string.

Partway through that opening, the band comes in

and the electric guitar comes in.

And it takes over from the 12, but l'll play what that part is.

Then the six-string takes over.

Again, it starts with kind of an arpeggiated beginning,

and l played the bass part kind of muted.

So it kind of lulls you into a false sense of security.

Then the vocal melody starts.

Then when the band finally comes in it comes slamming in,

and then it's off to the races.

We have a double on there, so there's two vocals, identical.

Ged's vocal tone was something that just came naturally to him.

That's the way he sang. lt was effortless for him.

l'm sure he would disagree, he worked hard at it.

But it wasn't something

that we had to spend hours developing

where the voice came from in the chest, or the head tone.

He just sang that way. lt was a natural thing for him to do.

That's what made it so exciting, he could pop those notes out easily.

A lot of people, we'll call them the baby boomers

who are coming of age right around the time this album came out.

A lot of people actually, maybe felt like,

''We have led very cushy lives.

''We haven't done anything,

''and yet we're living pretty well, here.''

And...

l think that a song like Something For Nothing

with that theme,

it made people...

No. l'd say it resonated with people

in that it was true.

lt maybe made them feel a little uneasy...

because they were getting something for nothing,

but they knew they shouldn't be.

They knew there's a price to be paid

and there's something for them to do themselves

if they want to have a good life, and an ethical life.

Neil is the single most talented musician l have ever worked with.

And the most driven musician l've ever worked with.

l think that really sets his talent apart...

is the fact that...

he's so stubbornly driven

that he won't even play the same groove twice.

Unless you can really make a case how that benefits the song.

lt took years for him to realize

that sometimes that same groove being repeated does benefit the song.

But, to me, that was just a testament to his striving forward,

to not be a clich�-ridden guy,

and to keep pushing himself.

l think that was inspirational for Alex and l.

We both are much better musicians

because of working with him through the years.

He's got a great ear, as well.

A lot of drummers have all the ability

and all the independence,

but he's a composer of drums.

And he tunes his drums in a particular way

that makes them so musical.

And he combines that musicality

with his independence

and his incredible physical capabilities.

So, for me, he's just a consummate rock drummer.

And Alex...

is a deeply creative...

original guitar player.

He doesn't sound like anyone else.

There's times we've pushed him to sound like someone else

and he just keeps sounding like himself.

And that's turned out to be his real strength.

He's...

To be in a three-piece band and to be a guitarist

is a really tall order.

And to develop a way

that you can be a rhythm player and a soloist at the same time

and keep the sound... sounding full

and not, you know, sparse,

was the challenge for him.

He's developed such an interesting way of creating chords and fingering

and sonically experimenting with all his devices

to create a tone for himself.

l think he's a very underrated guitarist in the rock world,

because so much of what he does is nuanced.

A lot of his...

The way a song sounds is because of the way he's coloured the sound.

That takes it out of the obvious,

but when you think that it's a three-piece band

and he's still able to do that.

lt shows you the kind of depth of his dedication,

to not always be the guy that shouts, ''Look at me!''

A lot of guitar players are all about ''Look at me''

and he's kind of taking one for the team.

So he's a great player and a very spontaneous writer too.

l'm very methodical

and l write, l compose in a methodical way,

whereas he's very spontaneous.

He'll come up with something,

he won't even realize what he's just played,

and l have to say,

''Stop. Play that again. That was brilliant.''

And he'll play it again...

So that's the kind of player he is, he's very spontaneous.

That's a lot of pressure to put a guy under.

l described before, as song-writing partners,

and l think it's quite indicative of other aspects of them

and other aspects of our relationship.

Geddy being quite methodical in that approach

and Alex being very spontaneous...

works together in the chemistry of us...

and l think that's true as musicians, too.

Geddy tends to be like me, wanting to work out a part and refine it,

and he and l, of course, just as bass player and drummer,

are always listening to what each other does and building on it.

There was a period in the studio, last time,

where Geddy was working at the computer very methodically,

moving an arrangement around and trying different things.

And Alex is sitting there with an acoustic guitar, just playing.

Geddy said, ''What is that?'' ''l don't know.''

So that's when we conceived the idea of having Alex

record a spontaneous acoustic piece as he did in the song called Hope.

lt came off a reaction like that

'cause he can just play and play, and beautiful things keep coming out,

but if you ask what he just played, he won't know.

So you have to be recording him all the time,

that is an approach that we learned...

You learn to play to your strengths and weaknesses like that

and we learned to record our improvisational stuff.

We had an experience

that sums up the personal relation among the three of us pretty well.

We hadn't seen each other since the tour last summer,

with me being in California and the two of them in Toronto,

so it had been a year that we hadn't actually seen each other.

And we got together for a meeting...

and we were supposed to be talking about our futures,

and Alex had me in stitches.

Both, Geddy and l, say he's the funniest man in the world, bar none.

We were supposed to be having a meal, l kept choking,

there were tears running down my face.

Gasping. lt almost killed me, honestly.

That's what the chemistry among the three of us...

At the beginning, l talked about our first meeting.

We talked about our ambitions as serious young musicians,

we talked about how we loved Lord Of The Rings and Tolkien books

and then we were in peals of laughter over Monty Python skits.

From the beginning, we shared those elements.

A kind of a serious, dedicated musician on one side,

and a romantic mystic in the middle, and then this riotous sense of humour.

That's still the chemistry that makes up this band.

Partly romantic, partly pragmatic, and partly just crazy.

lt's kind of a mid-tempo thing in the verses.

And it's setting the scene, telling the story,

and the choruses are supposed...

l don't know what you call the chorus of this song, frankly.

ln typical Rush fashion, there is no real chorus,

there is no real bridge.

They're all just parts and they all have their own personality.

Some of them repeat and sometimes they don't repeat.

The signature of Rush, l guess,

is that we have no signature, other than...

We don't know where the chorus is supposed to go,

so we make our own rules.

The heavy part, it's...

l guess that's the closest you come to a chorus.

That whole heavy section.

Which is like the big...

That's supposed to represent, l suppose,

the big, heavy machinery of the motor vehicle screaming along.

But the verses are quite pastoral,

and kind of ethereal, a little bit.

l think that's to, kind of, paint the picture of the countryside,

and where this character lives,

and the kind of life he leads.

Quiet, unassuming country man by day,

but at night and weekends he unleashes the beast from the garage

and takes off.

That's best exemplified

when Alex hits that big, whanging guitar note,

and the guitar kicks into gear and there's that whole ''wind in my hair''...

That's really, the race is on.

From that point on, through the rest of the song, it really takes off.

And if you look closely, you'd see that the tempo probably takes off,

and rises faster and faster to the end of the song.

So the song ends at quite a frantic pace,

and then we return at the end to that kind of dreamy, frantic period.

lt kind of ends as it begins.

There's nice moods through that song,

that's why it's endured as one of my favourites.

lt's certainly one of my favourites to play.

l was always a great reader and was voracious through that time.

But l was reading as widely, like John Dos Passos,

and John Steinbeck, and Ernest Hemingway.

A lot of American writers,

because l'd been through a lot of Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy.

Reading became, not only my schoolroom on the road,

but my sanity.

People ask, ''When did you get tired of touring?''

The first month.

lt was just schlepping around like this,

when maybe you play 26 minutes that night,

but the rest of the time is just aimless,

not only aimless, but empty, unproductive time.

You can't do anything except, l found, reading.

lt was a way to fill those hours of waiting in a way that felt good.

lf nothing else, you've got a book you've read at the end of that day.

So l kind of poured myself into that in those days,

and read a ton of the English greats

and then worked into the American greats, starting by that time.

But l can't say that they were a huge influence on lyric writing, per se,

because it's such a different craft.

l always say a typical song has 200 words,

where a novel might have forty, fifty-thousand.

You're dealing on a whole other canvas.

Yes, l was learning from all of those writers about life,

and about the power of words,

but l was kind of feeling my own way, craft-wise, you know?

Later on l did start to explore more into poetry

especially when l was writing lyrics.

l would be reading T.S. Eliot or l would be reading Robert Frost

as a kind of exemplar

of the highest that verse writing can be.

Of course, l was a lifelong music fan, so lyrics in general,

l already had certain preferences.

l liked words that made sense.

l didn't like when they were too repetitive,

like when the first verse came around three times,

not to mention the chorus.

And l didn't like confessional sorts of songs

about people's hearts being broken

by perfidious lovers and stuff.

So l had preferences, certainly, in lyrics.

l think they were much more informed by music, though, that l liked.

And there were a lot of great lyricists, when l think back.

Pete Townshend was a great exemplar of songwriting and ambition,

for me, of what could be done.

l'd often say, as a teenager,

''Here was a guy who smashed guitars and read books.''

lt was a great example. And Roger Waters was another one.

A great example of integrity

and a great example of artistic ambition.

So there are people like that and as widely as Joni Mitchell,

both Geddy and l were Joni Mitchell fans.

Songwriting-wise, Paul Simon.

These were great songwriters, and that meant something to us.

We weren't ready to, perhaps, embrace that knowledge,

but we already had the taste for it.

lan Anderson, Jethro Tull, another great ambitious artist

and a real great twist with words, too.

So these were the exemplars.

l had read a lot of science fiction,

and Samuel R. Delany was a big influence on me,

American sci-fi writer.

Only a big influence because l found one of his books

in the cupboard of a flat in London when l moved there in '7 1 .

l'd read a lot as a young man,

then, once l got into drums,

nothing else existed but drums and music.

l stopped reading through my late teens,

and then when l moved to England... Here's an interesting connection.

Samuel R. Delany's... Lord Of The Flames, l think it's called,

was in the cupboard of the flat and l read it.

l thought, ''l don't like science fiction.'' Then l read it. ''Wow!''

He remains a visionary talent,

incredibly poetic, gorgeous writing,

fantastic images...

of alternate worlds and times and societies.

l could go on about what an important writer he was.

And how fortuitous that l should find that writer,

that novel, in the cupboard.

Then, around the same time, at the Oxford Circus tube station,

l found a copy of The Fountainhead.

l said, ''All the smart kids at school used to carry that around.''

When l was in high school,

all the junior intellectuals would have Lord Of The Rings,

Ulysses, James Joyce,

and The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged.

That's what the intellectuals read.

l was afraid of those. ''l won't understand those.'' And never tried.

And around the same time read Samuel R. Delany's sci-fi writing

and Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead.

Which...became 21 12,

two, three years later, a lifetime later, really.

That's an interesting little moment in time that sparked a lot later.

l didn't pay attention to lyrics, growing up,

l only did later, when l was writing them.

Growing up, l loved the music and l think you sense the care.

l sensed the care that Pete Townshend put into his songwriting

and Paul Simon, Joni Mitchell and lan Anderson.

These people cared about what they did. And that's implicit too.

People don't have to parse every line you write

to understand the internal rhymes and the shifts of rhythm.

l think, just the sense that care has been taken

is obvious, is sensed, by a listener.

Certainly, what l understood about music when l was growing up,

l didn't know about it technically, but l sensed what was honest,

l sensed when care had been taken,

when somebody really meant what they said.

At that point, it wasn't the first time demos had been done,

but it was, l think, the first time

that we put as much time into the detail of multitracking it,

and having access to different tracks and being able to overdub.

So, yeah, it was a bit of a change up.

We basically knew where we were going.

But, interestingly enough,

l notice that one of the big changes on this is the tempo.

The demo is quite a few BPM faster, in fact.

As you will see.

That's racing along.

But a lot of the parts are the same.

ln essence.

lt just didn't sit in the groove properly at that tempo.

As you can tell.

Admittedly, we're so used to hearing the final version,

but it just felt that it was not really speaking properly at that tempo.

And singing it too.

lt gave the lyrics a little bit more substance

sung at a slower tempo.

lt gives you more time to think about what you're hearing.

lt was our first tune of that session.

So we had to set all the gear up

and the emphasis was on drums at the very beginning.

And we spent two or three days

putting the drum sound together for this record.

l think that was quite an important aspect of it.

And came up with a drum sound...

Paul Northfield definitely pulled out all the stops for us

on that particular session.

And we ended up with the signatory drum sound.

Alex, myself and Neil would get into the room and we'd play together,

but most of the attention was for the drums.

You might get lucky sometimes

and have a guitar or a bass part you could keep,

but, generally, we were just moral support and musical support

for Neil's performance.

We'd come in with a very basic power chord,

a pass of the intro and the verse

and, typically, what we would do is,

we would do one track with a particular sound and character to it,

and then we would add a second track.

Like this.

Which has a very different sound from the previous sound.

Together, they build up to make one sort of big, powerful sound.

And then we added a slightly...

Again, different tonality to that track.

Then, when they're all combined,

make for a very broad sound for the guitar.

And this, it sounds like we kind of triple tracked this for all the parts

and they just kind of...

l would just play the song from beginning to end

and repeat it until we came to the solo section

and just do a separate solo.

lt starts off, the instrumental section of the song,

then Alex joins it,

plays the same line and breaks off into his solo.

See now, he's mimicking the synth and then he breaks out.

We kind of developed this style where, because we're three-piece,

and a lot of times, in the early days, playing live

there was no rhythm guitar, there was no synthesizer.

So we developed a style of the rhythm section to be very active.

So even though Alex was soloing,

we could be more active than in an average band

because we had more space to fill out.

So it kind of became a style

and because we were a bit obnoxious in terms of the rhythm section,

we don't mind pushing the boundaries of that.

And Alex developed a style

where he slides right on top of all our busy-ness.

lt kind of became our personality.

l think it made me a better rhythm guitarist.

Because of that.

Quite often you needed a foundation

and where, typically, it would come from the rhythm section,

having the guitar take that role

and letting the rhythm section go a little wilder,

was really a benefit to me,

to develop my style in the way that l have.

And give us some character.

And Tom Sawyer is a good example of how we're all playing hard

all at the same time.

And, somehow, it still works.

This is just the preamble to the solo.

So the Moog starts playing this line,

and then when the bass comes in it takes over the same pattern.

lt mimics the Moog part.

So Alex is joining it now.

Now, when he breaks into solo...

.. l take over what the Moog was doing.

That's why the tone of the guitar is so critical,

because the rhythm section is so busy

the guitar had to sustain that interest too

without any rhythm guitar.

And into Neil's part.

lt's funny, he doesn't need much encouragement,

at the same time, as he got older, in albums later on,

he was much more reserved,

you had to really push him to do that kind of thing.

So, you never know.

l don't really know what it is about this song

that it's just kind of become the quintessential Rush song.

Obviously, it has to do with the...

..the kind of playing that's in it.

There's a lot of emphasis on musicianship.

But there's something about the fundamental groove of the song,

that also is quite contagious.

- l don't know if you have any... - And, lyrically,

everybody seems to connect with the whole spirit of the lyrics.

That shooting-from-the-hip independence,

and individualism.

And it's a catchy tune, on top of that.

You can almost dance to it.

But if you try, you'll hurt yourself.

l like that part. That's the part you don't hear on the record.

Where we suddenly just stop playing.

Geddy definitely stands alone.

He has a very unique voice.

He's very thoughtful, he's a very intelligent guy.

He is dedicated to quality in all things.

As a bass player, he's tough to beat.

He's brilliant, he has this style that you immediately recognise,

and he's been such an influence on so many bass players.

As an all-round musician, he has really great sensibilities,

he's very much the kind of musician that wants to hear everything first,

before deciding on what the right thing is.

And that's really the great way that he and l work together.

l'm much more spontaneous.

l sort of get excited about something

and then l kind of move on to the next thing.

Whereas he likes to examine it a little more

and be a little more in-depth.

For the two of us, this works perfectly in our relationship.

He's got the melodic sensibility that he brings to all our writing,

and to what Rush is all about.

Whereas l might bring more of an edge.

Neil's lyrics are not typical of rock lyrics.

The sort of party, chicks, the whole thing.

Love songs.

Neil always dealt with issues

and right from that first record that we did together, Fly By Night,

a song like Anthem, for example,

talking about the individual and the strength of the individual,

and the merit of selfishness.

l mean, that was back then.

lt was refreshing to hear and read these sort of lyrics,

and talk about things that people our age were thinking about

as they were reaching adulthood, or growing up,

or going through their teens.

These are the issues that you used to sit in a field with your friends

and talk about so passionately all the time.

Not so much about getting laid, you know?

You hoped that'd happen.

But it was all this other stuff that you had in the back of your mind

that was moving forward.

And he reflected that in his lyrics.

And, again, that's a very, very important part of what we've become,

and what we're expected to be.

YYZ. lt's interesting.

We were coming back from the studio when we were making the record.

Just for a break, back home.

And a friend of mine, he was actually my flight instructor,

he came out and picked us up in a small plane,

from... from the...

from the little airline that flew out of this small airport.

On the way back, they had tuned in the identifier for Toronto airport,

which is YYZ.

So it's...

And l think it was Neil, maybe it was Neil and Geddy,

l was flying the plane at the time, Neil and Geddy were in the back.

They said, ''That's a cool rhythm in that identifier.''

And you could see YYZ on the radio, tuned in.

And that's how that whole beginning part came about

to play the Morse code of YYZ

and it's always about coming home.

The rhythm stuck in my head. l said, ''Guys, let's...''

So then, thematically, we said, ''Let's use that airport...''

So much a part of our lives, in those days, and after.

''Let's use that as a metaphor.'' ln a playful way.

There was no sense of, ''This part is this part.''

But there is the sense of bustling and coming and going,

and the grand emotion of that middle section of what airports can be.

The airport giveth, the airport taketh away.

Which is Rick Derringer's song.

ln our lives, airports were rich with symbolism.

Departures, comings and goings.

Departures and arrivals.

Separations and meetings.

That was kind of woven into the song in a playful...

The exotic nature of travel too in Alex's guitar solo,

for sure, he wove in that kind of Eastern mode,

which gives a sense of the exotic.

When you look at the departures

you see Amsterdam, and Shanghai, and all these places.

Airports are, when you strip away the modern-day tedium,

they're pretty romantic places.

So, all of that, l think, informs the composition side of YYZ, too.

Pretty much, it's about coming back home.

lt's that call to home.

Being a band that's spent so much time on the road,

whenever we would check in for that flight home,

and we would see that YYZ ticket on our bags,

it was always really exciting.

lt's like, ''We're coming home.''

We wanted to, basically, put a song together about that,

even though it's instrumental.

lt's about our town and it's about, you know...

kind of where we came from and...

Yeah.

Good to come home.