RUSH Guitarist Alex Lifeson – “Bolder, Richer Sounding, It's Heavier, It's Stronger, Less Personal”

April 17, 2007, 17 years ago

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Special report by By Martin Popoff

RUSH’s first studio album in five years is now a couple of weeks away. Snakes & Arrows is due to drop May 1st, after which a huge world tour (or two) is planned.

Guitarist Alex Lifeson had this to say, on the subject of going with producer Nick Raskulinecz.

“I think we had five songs when Nick came up. We got in touch with a few different producers, and we were talking to one in particular at the time, but a lot of these people need a lot of notice - obviously a guy like Bob Rock or Rick Rubin, who was also on our list. In fact, Nick heard about the project through Rick. And of course Rick is booked years in advance, couldn't do the project for I think ten months or something. So Nick got in touch with us and wanted to come up and talk with us about doing the record. And at the time we hadn't decided who we were going to work with, or were we going to work with anybody; maybe we would just do it ourselves with Rich Chycki. And then Nick came out in May of last year, after we spent a few weeks with Neil in the studio getting caught up and getting him up to speed with the arrangements and the songs and all of that. We met with Nick and we sat down and talked about lots of stuff… music, song construction, songwriting, the value of the chorus, all these things, as well as the war in Iraq, family and everything. We really got to know him. And he was just so enthusiastic and he said all the right things. And he was young and his track record was fairly diverse. He had done a lot of heavy stuff as well as FOO FIGHTERS stuff, which is very, very strong, I think. And we just thought we would take a chance on his youth and the things he was saying.”

The aforementioned Bob Rock was in the band’s sights, as well as BRIAN ENO…

Well, they're so different. Brian Eno was a very interesting choice for us because it would have been something completely different. And that's kind of what we look for. That's the excitement of working with a new guy, especially somebody like him. Where we kind of know already what we want to do with the record, a direction, those sorts of things. Which is a little different from a producer who really takes control of the whole project. To have somebody like Brian Eno for example would take us into a whole different area, and bring to light certain things we would never consider. And that's always very interesting for us to work that way. Bob too is a very skilled producer. He's done a lot of great work, a lot of different work. You know, a lot of these guys are very selective about the kind of work they do, and their time for working, particularly if they've got a big family. And a lot of these guys take a long time to make a record. And Nick didn't seem to be that type of person. Things were going to happen a lot quicker. He's much more energetic.”

Look for a full Rush feature in an upcoming issue of BW&BK.;


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