Believe it or else - I had my first complete listen to Rush's Caress of Steel just a few days ago. For some reason I had an aversion to listening to this album. I think it was the completely uninteresting looking cover that put me off. Maybe it was the cheesy Manowar-esque title. Also, while I like FBN, I don't listen to any pre-2112 Rush very often. I had heard Bastille Day a few times, I Think I'm Going Bald probably once 30+ years ago, and maybe Lakeside Park once back then too. But I'd never heard either of the epics. Maybe just the narrative intro to The Necromancer once. But I bought the remastered edition about a year ago, and finally last week popped it in the car CD player, and cranked it a couple of times while driving.
Overall, it's a fun listen. The short songs, especially, are pretty good. I'm surprised to find that ITIGB is possibly my favorite - it kicks ass, and Geddy does probably his best Robert Plant impersonation ever. Basically, these three sound like the songs on the first album done better, so that's cool. The two epics are certainly enjoyable and have some pretty cool sounds, but to me they kept sounding like an initial attempt at 2112 that never reached the levels of 2112. Oddly, in some ways Fly By Night sounds more polished than Caress of Steel - maybe not the sound quality, but the compositions and execution. The shorter songs seem more assured, and By-Tor and the Snow Dog seems overall a more successful epic. More unique, anyway.
Rush sometimes seemed to go two steps forward then three steps back sometimes. I've often thought that 2112 is a better album than either A Farewell to Kings or Hemispheres. It usually seems to me that this is just because the band was doing what it wanted, when it wanted, so I never usually found it to be a detriment. Also, I first got into Rush right after Moving Pictures came out, and it was 2112 I got into first, so I've always seen that album as my focal point for Rush. Everything was in some ways judged against that. The title epic is pretty much my favorite Rush piece of all, and it's like all the rest of Rush's work revolves around that, if that makes sense.
I like pretty much all Rush, except there was this one hole, and also I've really never listened to the first album, but I've heard several of the songs in concert a lot. There are probably one or two songs on there I've never heard actually, but that doesn't bother me too much. So I'm glad to now have Caress of Steel as a fully-fledged entry in the Rush pantheon.
What are your thoughts on this album? Where does it sit in your view of the band's work, and when did you first listen to it?
There are some other albums I've surprisingly never heard, which I should probably also have a listen to - like Jethro Tull's "This Was," (again, know most of the songs from concerts and live albums, but still...) and the first two Yes albums. The horror!
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