[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_code module_class=”custom-cat” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
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[\/et_pb_code][et_pb_text module_class=”article-title” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_font=”||||||||” header_text_align=”center” header_text_color=”#111111″ header_font_size=”68px” custom_margin=”40px||||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”intro-text” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_orientation=”center” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
Identity crises, futuristic dystopias, and accusations of Nazism \u2013 Rush\u2019s Geddy Lee reveals the wild story behind the band\u2019s 1976 epic 2112<\/em>.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/11\/gettyimages-84887369-594×594-1.jpg” title_text=”gettyimages-84887369-594×594″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n All The World’s A Stage: Rush’s Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee performing live onstage<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n After their third album, 1975\u2019s LP Caress Of Steel<\/em>, tanked commercially, Toronto trio Rush feared they were washed up. With nothing left to lose, the band \u2013 bassist Geddy Lee, drummer Neil Peart and guitarist\/lyricist Alex Lifeson \u2013 decided to go out in a blaze of glory, with an album featuring a side-long dystopian concept piece based on controversial writer Ayn Rand\u2019s novella Anthem.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Far from being their swansong, however, 2112<\/em> proved to be Rush\u2019s breakthrough, cracking the American charts and becoming the cornerstone of a career spanning 19 albums over four decades. Still beloved by the prog faithful, the album has sold over three million copies in the US alone to date.<\/p>\n 49 years after 2112<\/em>\u2019s release, Geddy Lee speaks to MOJO about the album\u2019s troubled background and the unexpected reactions to a \u201970s rock classic\u2026”<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pullquote-name” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” header_3_text_align=”center” header_3_text_color=”#111111″ header_3_font_size=”38px” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n \u201cOur record company Mercury had told us in no uncertain terms that we were a huge disappointment to them. They had signed us on the basis of our first record [Rush<\/em>, 1974], which was pretty straightforward hard rock. But we loved all those English progressive rock bands \u2013 Yes and Genesis \u2013 and on our third album Caress Of Steel<\/em> we had a song that was twenty minutes, The Fountain Of Lamneth. Mercury was like, \u2018What the fuck? Who are you guys?\u2019 And even we thought that: who are we?<\/p>\n \u201cCaress Of Steel<\/em> had bombed. The gigs were half-empty. We named it the \u2018Down The Tubes Tour\u2019. We joked about Neil [Peart, drummer] going back into the farm equipment business, and Alex [Lifeson, guitar] and I going back to painting movie theatres. When we started on 2112<\/em>, we thought this would probably be the last record we make. So we were like: fuck you, Mercury. If we\u2019re going to go out, we\u2019ll go out doing our crazy shit, not failing at what you want us to be.<\/p>\n \u201cNeil wrote a story for the song 2112, which was based on Anthem by Ayn Rand. Neil\u2019s story was set in a futuristic totalitarian state, controlled by the priests of the temples of Syrinx. One day our hero finds a device. He\u2019s not sure what it is, but it has strings, and he figures out that he can make music with it. He goes back to present it to the priests. And of course, they shut him down because they want control over everything. In the end he contemplates ending it all, because he doesn\u2019t want to live in a world that can\u2019t embrace such a thing that he\u2019s found\u2026<\/p>\n \u201cNeil showed us bits of lyric, and then we went to work at it. The whole thing came together very quickly \u2013 another twenty-minute song \u2013 but it was so much more powerful and focused than The Fountain Of Lamneth. It felt really fresh to us, like we had figured something out.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was side one. It was heavy. So with side two we wanted to show diversity, an alternative version of the band. We had Tears, the pretty side of Rush, and A Passage To Bangkok, our pot smoker song. We recorded the whole album in four weeks, at Toronto Sound Studios, which was owned by our producer Terry Brown. And it was fun \u2013 there was no desperation in the room. We were really proud of what we\u2019d made.<\/p>\n \u201cWe didn\u2019t know what kind of feedback we were going to get from the record company. We were pretty afraid of that. Our manager didn\u2019t get it at all, and when he played for Mercury everyone in the room was puzzled by it \u2013 except for Cliff Burnstein, who went on to manage Def Leppard and Metallica. Cliff thought the album was awesome, and for us that was so heartening.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/11\/gettyimages-84882658-594×594-1.jpg” title_text=”gettyimages-84882658-594×594″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Caress of Steel: (L-R) Neil Peart, Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n \u201cSales were slow at first. And then we had that terrible thing in England with the NME. 2112 was speaking out against totalitarianism, but the NME called us fascists. It made zero sense. Ayn Rand had a very controversial image as an anti-socialist and extreme right-wing capitalist, but that was a side of her work that was not of interest to us at all.<\/p>\n \u201cMy father Morris and my mother Mary were both in Auschwitz for a time, so I was really deeply hurt by that NME story. At that time in Britain, the press was hunting down anything that sniffed of fascism. I can\u2019t blame them for that. But they got the wrong guys with us. I am not a violent type, but I wanted to punch the guy who wrote that. Definitely, I could have helped educate him a little bit.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the end, what the NME said didn\u2019t matter. At first, 2112 was a slow seller, but when we went back on the road, we were getting better gigs, and even headlining some shows. It was a defining album. The artwork for the album by our friend Hugh Syme became a brand, it transcended the record and became very representational of us as a band. The album was a vindication. From that point, we were free to make our own mistakes.\u201d<\/p>\n As told to Paul Elliott.<\/em><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-names” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”14px” text_orientation=”center” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n IMAGES:<\/strong> GETTY\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_divider][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cIf we\u2019re going to go out, we\u2019ll go out doing our crazy shit…\u201dIdentity crises, futuristic dystopias, and accusations of Nazism \u2013 Rush\u2019s Geddy Lee reveals the wild story behind the band\u2019s 1976 epic 2112.All The World’s A Stage: Rush’s Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee performing live onstageAfter their third album, 1975\u2019s LP Caress Of Steel, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":1900,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mojo-presents"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"akindell","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2240"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2245,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2240\/revisions\/2245"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\u201cWe thought this would probably be the last record we make\u201d<\/h2>\n
Geddy Lee<\/b><\/h3>\n