Review Summary: 2112's title track is a true epic that manages to be sprawling with it's strange, dystopian story, its wild setup, and it's ambitious feel; and yet its still very influential on all music to come ahead of it. The rest of the album is too disjointed from
Lately, I had hit a brick wall regarding my music. I've suddenly either seen the light, or just gotten ridiculously tired of the bands I used to listen to and enjoy very much. It's been a hard time for me musically; albums like Smashing Pumpkins'
Zeitgeist and Silverstein's
Arrivals and Departures had let me down; and it was hard to believe I'd hear any good music that was new to me ever again. But as I was digging through my vinyl collection, and my old copy of Rush's
2112 managed to catchy my eye as something new and interesting to listen to; because I'd never really ever given this record a chance on account of the 20-minute epic opening track putting me off. Popping the record in my record player for roughly the second time I'd listened to it, suddenly it became an amazing, sprawling epic that began with the long title track
2112 and the closer
Something For Nothing.
There's not one track that isn't good on
2112. Sure, the keyboards aren't really present much in this album, it still manages to kick serious tail and manage to still have that Rush charm. But it's not because Geddy Lee is the lead singer; it has the charm and 'feel' of later Rush albums with the 'epic' feel of this era found in fellow albums such as
Hemispheres and
Caress of Steel. While the storyline may be a little wild, 'out-there', and a bit outdated, the album is still the ultimate doomsday album.
The title track,
2112 manages to be one of the only 20-minute epics that doesn't come off completely as self-indulgent. It manages to tell a story in-depth that anyone can really understand, while managing to fuse some nice guitar work, Neil Peart's amazing drumwork, and some truly impressive Geddy Lee screaming vocals; especially in the section of
2112,
The Temples of Syrinx. The title track,
2112 begins with
Overture, which sets the mood and the tone of
2112. But the song truly picks up with
The Temples of Syrinx which manages to begin the story of
2112 which begins the story with the antagonists of the story, the Priests of the Temples of Syrinx who are basically the rulers of the universe. It's the best section of the song without a doubt because the guitar riffs are catchy, Neil Peart's drumming is truly great, and Geddy Lee's vocals stretch into the upper reaches of his voice in the verses and choruses. After the harder
The Temples of Syrinx, the title track goes into
Discovery which is the tale of a human living in the year 2112 who discovers a guitar and begins to play, and eventually presents it to the Priests of the Temples of Syrinx in
Presentation and they destroy the instrument. In
Oracle: The Dream, he goes into hiding, and dreams of the music the guitar could play, which eventually ends up with him killing himself in the solemn, slower epic
Soliloquy. As he dies, the song goes into an epic, guitar riff heavy ending,
Grand Finale. The song is truly Rush's best long epic, and may be one of the best songs of all time as it manages to tell the story about as perfectly as a rock band could while still managing to grasp the sound a rock album must have.
The rest of the songs however, are seperated from the rest of
2112 as
A Passage to Bangkok,
The Twilight Zone, and
Something For Nothing sound like typical Rush songs of the time filled with Geddy Lee's high pitched vocals at higher decibel levels mixed with riff-heavy guitars and drumming which leads the songs. That kind of draws away from
2112, as the songs aren't anything special or unique, and drop the whole dystopian theme as a whole pretty easily. But, there's a few other songs which are great other than the grandiose yet excellent title track like
Lessons, a really fun, yet unorthodox song for Rush in this period, and it manages to sound like
The Temples of Syrinx which really makes the song a great one.
Tears is a really slower song, especially for this era in Rush's music; and manages to be much more emotional yet still as good as a typical Rush tune. These songs that close out
2112 are good, but kind of seem disjointed from the rest of the album and almost as filler, which keeps this album from becoming an immediate classic.
But I'm not saying this album isn't a very, very good album; because it is. It's one of the most influential albums of all time; influencing a number of doomsday albums such as Nine Inch Nails'
Year Zero. Its pretty simple to see that if Rush would have connected the rest of
2112's tracks to the storyline that the album could have been the best album possibly ever. But make no mistake, its an album that every rock fan should have, and truly is Rush's best album hands down.
DOWNLOAD:
2112
A Passage to Bangkok
Seriously.
