Consuming the Tangible

As a modern document of a band, the live album has been suffering since the onset of the 21st century. I don’t know if it’s because of streaming, the turn to singles and the growing dismissal of record sales, but it feels like the heyday for new live music (archival releases are a completely different, glorious matter) seems to have passed for most bands. Thank goodness Rush never seemed to care about anything like that. 11 live albums that continuously chart the evolution of their live presence is a huge feat, and you could argue they never put out a bad show, even when touring some less than great albums (looking at you, Presto and Roll the Bones). Snakes & Arrows Live is a great example, showing how their later, hard rock approach meshed nicely with their classic tunes, and how a band then more than 30 years its their career can bring excitement and maturity to songs you’ve heard a hundred time before.

I wear no shame in saying I’m a huge fan of Rush’s later work. From Counterparts on I really liked everything – yes, even Test For Echo to a degree – that they put out, and Snakes & Arrows was a rich, layered rock album, taking some of the hard edges from the previous two records and bringing a little bit more of the progressive rock wanderings back. The songs work great on Snakes & Arrows Live: after bursting out of the gate with a killer sequence of “Limelight” followed by “Digital Man” and Enter Nous” they slow for a moment with “The Mission” before getting back to basics with “Freewill”. But then they hit “The Main Monkey Business” and while it doesn’t have the immediate hook that an instrumental like “YYZ” does, it’s an instant live classic for me. Alex Lifeson is positively on fire, Geddy Lee uses the upper register of his bass to tremendous effect and Neil Peart reminds everyone that he was one of rock’s greatest drummers.

That song kicks off the fantastic interplay between the Snakes & Arrows tunes and the older, more recognizable hits. Songs like “Far Cry” and “The Way The Wind Blows” are modern rock classics in the same vein as something like “Ceiling Unlimited” from Vapor Trails (sadly not represented here) or “Animate” from Counterparts. And the older cuts get a massive workout here. “Natural Science” has always been one of my favorite Rush songs, and it sounds towering on Snakes & Arrows Live. The band is instantly comfortable with the complex changes, having literally played them for decades, and that allows them to really attack the songs. Geddy Lee’s voice in 2008 was like an aged wine, some of the top end sanded down but exposing a rich warmth that really works for songs that in the 80s relied on sheer power and height to maximize their impact.

At close to two and half hours, there a lot here, including all the expected classics like “Tom Sawyer”, “The Spirit of Radio” and the epic close of “YYZ”. But at this point I know those songs so well and expect to hear them they kind of drift by, effortless and effervescent. But then there’s “Circumstances” from 1978’s ultra-prog Hemispheres, mixed in with the 80s synth work of “Between The Wheels” and the modern hard rock of “Secret Touch” from 2002’s Vapor Trails.

And it all works. Even “Dreamline” from Roll The Bones, perhaps my least favorite Rush album has a lift and bite live that makes it feel right at home with the established and new classics. That’s the magic of Rush, a band that has only grown and grown for me over the years. The chemistry of these three guy can never be replicated, and each album was a damn gift we should be thanking the rock gods for, even if we’re sick of hearing Moving Pictures for the 10,000th time.

Sigh…even Presto I guess. I’ll have to go back and revisit it.