Producer / engineer Paul Northfield recently guested on Full In Bloom, where he discussed his introduction to Rush, recording the Permanent Waves and Moving Pictures albums, working with producer Terry Brown, Le Studio, and more.

Northfield: "Permanent Waves is the first album where they decided to try and consolidate their 25-minute recordings into five minutes, and make shorter form progressive rock tracks that said a lot in the short amount of time rather than like previously. I think Hemishperes was the previous one, which was extremely long, like the sides of it were long-sided long-form tracks and stuff, and so Permanent Waves is the first they wanted to consolidate, apart from a few tracks there were still long tracks on there. And then (on) Moving Pictures, even more so. 

There weren't any really long songs on Moving Pictures. There were some seven or eight-minute tracks, but there wasn't one with double figures. That meant the tracks themselves are very focused, and sort of spaced out; not like when you do long-form tracks unfocused, because it's a different way of approaching writing."

Permanent Waves is the seventh album from Rush, released on January 14th, 1980. It became the band's most successful album at the time of release, reaching #3 in Canada and the UK, and #4 in the United States. The album was certified Platinum in the US by the RIAA for one million units sold.

Tracklist:

"The Spirit of Radio" (4:58)
"Freewill" (5:23)
"Jacob's Ladder" (7:50)
"Entre Nous" (4:37)
"Different Strings" (3:50)
"Natural Science" (9:27)
I: "Tide Pools"
II: "Hyperspace"
III: "Permanent Waves"