Rush and Philosophy: Heart and Mind United

340 Pages·2011·2.57 MB·English

by  Jim Berti

Table of Contents

Popular Culture and Philosophy Series Editor: George A. Reisch
Title Page
Listen to My Music, and Hear What It Can Do

PART I - To the Margin of Error
Chapter 1 - Yesterday’s Tom Sawyers
Philosophical Moments
Halloween Traditions, or, Are You Down with What You’re Up For?
Lyrical Motifs
Resistance Is Futile
J-Wags, or, Are You Down with What You’re Up For?
The Virtues of Virtual
Run That by Me One More Time
Interlude
The Sign of the Three
Saturday Night’s Alright, or, Are You Really Up for What You’re Up For?
Aftermath: Not Down with What I Was Up For
Processed Processes
Houston, We Have a Problem, or, What Goes Up Must Come Down
Chapter 2 - Barenaked Death Metal Trip-Hopping on Industrial Strings
The Pair of Most-Often-Covered Rush Songs
Tribute Versions of “The Spirit of Radio” and “Tom Sawyer”
A “Meta-Remix” of Rush’s “Tom Sawyer”
Coda
Chapter 3 - The Groove of Rush’s Complex Rhythms
In the Heat of the Beat and the Lights
Philosophies of Musical Time
Musical Time and Individualism
Rush Grooves
Close Listening and Move-Your-Body Rock
The Heart and Mind United
Chapter 4 - Nailed It!
Rush’s Aesthetic of Replicability
Dealt a Losing Hand
Taking Individualism to Extremes
Technical Display Is Primary
Class Bias of Rush’s Critics
Celebration of Diligent Effort
Non-Mainstream Whiteness
No Heart to Lie
Chapter 5 - Can’t Hear the Forest for the Cave?
I Have Not Left This Cave for Days Now
We Are Merely Players
Test for Echo
He’s Adept at Adaptation
Respond, Vibrate, Feedback, and Resonate
He’s Got to Make His Own Mistakes

PART II - The Ebb and Flow of Tidal Fortune
Chapter 6 - Rush’s Revolutionary Psychology
Archaic Looks at Thought and Mood
Thoughts Alter Perception
Recognize the Real Thing
Counterexamples
Show Don’t Tell
Let It Go
Do What You Love
Enjoy These Moments
Chapter 7 - Rush’s Metaphysical Revenge
Rush Judgments
When a Tree Falls in a Forest
Drummers in (Geek) Heaven
Aristocrats and Critics
A Farewell to Kinds
Smashing Critics’ Pumpkins
Chapter 8 - Ghost Riding the Razor’s Edge
Seems We’ll Never See the Sun
A Thinking Man’s Band
You Can Choose . . .
Christ, What Have You Done?
I Do Not Know Who I Am
Blame Is Better to Give than Receive
Brought Up to Believe
Each of Us, a Cell of Awareness
A Spirit Breaking Free
The Time Is Now Again
Let Your Heart Be the Anchor and the Beat of Your Own Song
Chapter 9 - Honey on the Rim of the Larger Bowl
Such a Lot of Pain on This Earth
Why Such Different Fortunes and Fates?
Our Better Natures Seek Elevation
You Can Call Me Faithless
. . . The Songs and Stories of Vanished Times
Hope
Chapter 10 - How We Value a Gift Beyond Price
Signs and Signals
The Big Money
Value Without a Price Tag
Time Stand Still
Concert Hall
I Can Hold the Future in My Virtual Hand
Infinity, the Star that Would Not Die
The Words of the Profits are Written on the Studio Walls
Tallying the Total
Chapter 11 - Free Wills and Sweet Miracles
Peart Discussing No Small Matter
Assume Free Will, Choose Autonomy and Responsibility
Drag Your Dreams into Existence
I Must Help My Mother Stand Up Straight
Experience Slips Away
Fate Is Just the Weight of Circumstances
What Is the Meaning of This?
Sweet Miracles of (Secular) Faith, Hope, and Love

PART III - I Want to Look Around Me Now
Chapter 12 - A Heart and Mind United
Heart and Mind Divided
The Gods of Love and Reason Battle It Out
Blinded by Apollo
Passion and Reason Find a Balance
A Single, Perfect Sphere
Chapter 13 - More than They Bargained For
“Subdivisions” (Signals, 1982)
“Countdown”
“Distant Early Warning”
“Red Sector A”
“The Body Electric”
Interlude: Influences, 1984–86
“The Big Money”
“Manhattan Project”
“Mystic Rhythms”
“Force Ten” (Hold Your Fire, 1987)
“Time Stand Still”
“I Want to Look Around Me Now”
Chapter 14 - Contre Nous
How Does Music Mean?
Evoking Other Places
Evoking Outer Space
Evoking Evil
Listen to My Music, and Hear What It Can Do
Chapter 15 - The Inner and Outer Worlds of Minds and Selves
Inner and Outer Worlds
Pain and Internal Experience
Ludwig Wittgenstein Tries to Understand Pain
Does Rush Offer a Way Out?
Chapter 16 - Cruising in Prime Time
Getting Help from Roland Barthes
Catch the Spit
As the Wheels of Time Just Pass You By
Cruising in Prime Time
“Tom Sawyer”—The Distracted Audience
Counterparts: Lee’s Voice and Peart’s Drums

PART IV - The Blacksmith and the Artist
Chapter 17 - What Can This Strange Device Be?
I’m Working All the Time
Artisanship versus Mass Production in “2112”
Handle with Kid Gloves
Video Vertigo
Technology . . . High
Emotion Detector
All This Machinery Making Modern Music
Straining the Limits of Machine and Man
Chapter 18 - Enlightened Thoughts, Mystic Words
Rush’s Love Affair with Eighteenth-Century Revolutions
Living (Mostly) for Yourself
Spirits and Visions
Humanism Needs Its Evangelists, Too
Chapter 19 - Rush’s Libertarianism Never Fit the Plan
Let Them All Make Their Own Music
With Acknowledgment to the Genius of Ayn Rand
And the Meek Shall Inherit the Earth
Just Think about the Average
We’ve Taken Care of Everything, the Words You Read, the Songs You Sing
Just Think of What My Life Might Be
There’s Something Here that’s as Strong as Life
Chapter 20 - Neil Peart versus Ayn Rand
Dystopias
“2112”—Rush
Hardly Rand-y Peart
Chapter 21 - How Is Rush Canadian?
CanCon