Rush: Clockwork angels gets worse with each listen.

I love the songs so much that I've listened through the mud ... especially The Wreckers, The Anarchist, and The Garden.

 

Despite the mud, this album is still kicking my ass.

 

Sorry, not for me...I think it's a bad album, certainly one of their worst.

 

Great sound and/or production won't do anything to save a bad song from being bad IMO. Great sound wouldn't save Rush' material from the mid 80s up...the songs are just weak.

 

So, who is Freddie Gruber and have you got a good link or two?

 

I like this album. I think it's not far from the direction taken on Snakes & Arrows. I even liked the S&A book. Not the best Fantasy book I've read but enjoyable.

 

If the music had been played and produced the way 2112 or FTK was, it would have been a great album.

 

So just re-record 2112 or Farewell To Kings then?

 

I loved Vapor Trails...modern sounding, but still familiar. Catchy, but complex. Clockwork Angels was good, but too much of an effort to sound like they did in the 70s (which they simply can't with the modern production they utilize).

 

That doesn't make good sense.
I thought the topic was Clockwork Angels.
To make this more clear, if Clockwork Angels had been played, recorded, and mixed the same way with the same level of creativity as FTK, it would have been a fantastic album.
What makes it uninteresting is the very computer sounding recording and lame generic paint by numbers production as well as the abuse of compression.

 

It was just the statement - if the music had of been played and produced the way 2112 or FTK was........well to me that means playing 2112 or FTK all over again. You actually mean sounding like that era.

 

You'll be telling us next The Garden is as good a song as Closer To The Heart.

The problem is the writing AFTK is pretty strong in that department Cinderella Man would be one of the better tracks on CA. It's nothing to do with the production though I agree I think all of their productions are an issue in this stage of their career but it's a separate aspect.
They haven't written a whole album of good songs since the 80's imo.

 

One of the things, possibly the main thing, that made Closer To the Heart so great a song was the wonderful musicianship, and the very nice production and arrangement of it.
Had it been on one of the more recent Rush albums and mixed and recorded like those albums were, it would probably not even be a song name that even Rush fans remember.

If a song doesn't draw your attention with its' sound, you aren't likely to pay much attention to the words.

 

They were/are a band that took advantage of the two sides of an album. Neil speaks to this in a few interviews how the first and last song of a side were opportunities to set moods or make statements and they had a difficult time with sequencing for CD. With that said...........Clockwork Angels is in my top 3 Rush albums. The most inspired playing I've heard from them in a while. I cut my teeth on Signals and their synth years or "Sector 3" period is my definite favorite. I wonder if this impacts how I view Clockwork Angels. It would be interesting to see how those early fans see the album as opposed to how those of us a bit younger and who appreciate their synth/pop era see the album. I fear it might be their last real album and that there are no more world tours. The "goodbye" film at the end of the R40 tour hinted to me that they were reflecting on their career in the context of a band who is going to coast until retirement. Just a gut feeling.

I love Clockwork Angels and feel the tour was one of their very best, even with Geddy's vocal challenges. Inspired playing and presentation, very fitting of their most inspired album in a long time. I feel Moving Pictures is their best album even though it's not my personal favorite and Clockwork Angels is right up there in quality but, needs to be heard from beginning to end and it would be hard to pick out a song to listen to outside of that context. That may be the only "drawback" of the album if it even is a drawback. It's a concept album, meant to be heard from start to finish. I love everything about it, the artwork, the story that is told.............I only wish it was produced better. Steven Wilson was right when he lamented about how much better Permanent Waves and Moving Pictures sound. They sound amazing and it would be interesting to have seen how CA might have been with that sonic treatment.

 

Who even mentioned words?

That is frankly daft and fundamentally how people don't listen to music....take The Pass and Available Light on an album that has a pretty ropy production and sound.....they still stand out as good/great songs.

AFTK has a pretty basic production-people don't listen to a sound and production in front of musicality and quality of songs...

All this talk of production and as much as I repeat I do NOT like the sound of recent Rush records is ********. It's about songs. Plenty of great records last year either produced badly or compressed to death....on the right listening format they still are great records.

 

Melody is what draws my attention, not sound.

 

You can try to stess this all you want, but I entirely disagree. Rush is till writing and doing some creative stuff, but the recordings themselves are just far too computer paint by numbers sounding to be interesting.
If they recorded the stuff in analog without the bland uncreative production those albums and the songs on them would be great.

AFTK has extraordinarily creative production and mix. It sounds wonderfull on a good pair of headphones through a nice vintage system. Much creativity went into the way that album was recorded and mixed.
It seems modern production doesn't consider arranging and producing to be a large part of the creative process the way it was during rock.
Much rock era and psychedelic leaning music used dynamics very much the way classical producers do. Playing loud passages against soft, using rising the music scale or descending it for effect, playing high frequency instruments counter to low frequency instruments. All of which is lost in the paint by numbers computer recordings in which the mix is an afterthought, not a part of the process.

I am among those who is drawn to everything. But then again, I tend to listen on real stereo gear and not earbuds, and enjoy analog quality sound.
Merely one element of good isn't enough for me. There is far too much music that has huge sound, great musicianship , satisfactory lyrics, good performance in general, and creative mix and production for me to waste time on something that merely has a good melody but otherwise sounds like a dog pile.

But again, I have always been fascinated by sound and creative use of sound in music. My ears and mind decode music into some wonderful mind altering experience, it isn't just some idle pastime for me. It is a passion.

 

This is an amazing album, a complete surprise at this late stage in their career, and has some great song writing. It is vastly let down by the sonic mud it's encased in. I believe if it wasn't for this, it would be a top five collection.

 

Very solid effort, no doubt about it but no way it even cracks my top ten, even with a Sean Mcgee remastered version.

 

`Clockwork Angels` is a fine album and IMHO in Rush`s top five albums.

I have owned `Exit... Stage Left` and a best of for years but only really got into Rush when `Clockwork Angels` was released. This was the first Rush studio album I purchased and I went on to buy the lot. I listened to them in no particular order, mixing the synth, rock and prog era albums. Nobody is going to have the same view as anyone else, after all these years the `Beatles know it all`s` continue to bicker and long may they do so but I am right about `Clockwork Angels`, anyone disagreeing is wrong.

 

There's not a song on CA that is a patch on just about everything on AFTK....that album has what they considered their greatest song for many years....Xanadu......anything on CA with that mood or atmosphere or strength of purpose?.....there's more melody in CTTH than anything on CA....more dynamics,edge and excitement on Cygnus that anything on CA.....

The Garden for example in theory could sit on AFTK unfortunately it would struggle song wise to be on there in terms of quality. Rush have had a real problem with songwriting quality in terms of a whole album since the 80's. I would say mid-80's.

I listen to music on the move some of the time, some modern music struggles on my main system which with t would hold it's own against most people's systems-that's a completely separate argument but it seemed you felt the need to play the snobbery card.

Compressed or badly recorded music without doubt sounds worse on a big system.....and CA isn't great in that regards but we are talking about quality of music here imo CA has maybe three songs that are good, a few that are decent and a lot that misses the mark. If you think the recording/production is robbing us all of a masterwork then fine we'll agree to disagree.........maybe Robert Johnson is crap and some audiophile produced light jazz transcends Miles Davis......who knows.....I just know radio broadcasting, a boombox or a 78 recording from the 20's won't kill good music.

 

The simple answer to this is you haven't listened to the other albums enough.....just about everything in a straight run from their debut even up until Hold Your Fire is better than CA....

 

I totally realize that every Rush fan has their favorite era or period of their work they like the best but for me the first album through Moving Pictures is the masterpiece era. The first three easily sit strongly in my top ten and Rush and Fly By Night may be top five.

 

RUSH lost their way after Test For Echo...no melodies, very odd, seemingly out of place chord changes, blistering to the ears. It just doesn't flow... This is just coming from a fan from the start.

 

I reckon I have listened enough and with fresh ears, which proves I`m right because you are wrong. Anyhow a stop to this lunacy I have music to listen to.