Unlike most a lot of rock bands, Rush is composed of only three members, giving it the nickname of a "power trio". Instead of having a dedicated singer, the bassist, Geddy Lee, sings high-pitched Robert Plant-esque wails while at the same time pounding out complex bass riffs. Each member of the band is responsible for playing ridiculous amounts of intrumentation; for example, the drummer, Neil Peart, is completely surrounded by the massive amount of parts in his drumset. Geddy Lee, in adition to bass AND singing, also plays most of the syth parts in Rush's music.
Poor roadies...
Performing their song "Xanadu" in the past, each member of the band has had to utilize multiple instruments in order to get the full song out to the audience. Each guitarist had double neck variations of their instruments, with guitarist Alex Lifeson using a 6/12 combo similar to my own, and Geddy Lee using an unusual 4-string bass 6-string guitar combo in order to play the rhythm of the song.
Each member of the band is a virtuoso of their respective intrument, meaning that they're pretty much at the top of their level; each is a well-respected player.
So far, my complaints with Rush involve the complexities of their songs. Many of the songs present odd time signatures, making playing along very, very, VERY difficult to play to. It even gets to the point of 15/8 sometimes, and by then it's just ridiculous. The average non-musically inclined listener wouldn't even pick up on the odd times, so it just stands as some sort of "trolling" maneuver towards anyone trying to learn their songs.
As with Zeppelin over the summer, it's probably going to take quite some time to be able to name every Rush song by name; with a week of progress, I've only managed to learn a handful of songs. This is the necessary first step to throroughly learning a song, and the challenges/dares from my jamming drummer aren't necessarily helping either...
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