[Published in the shadow of Neil Peart’s death on 7 January 2020.]
I was in 8th grade when Moving Pictures was released. And I can still recall sitting transfixed in front of the massive family hi-fi system in our living room, listening to “Tom Sawyer” as it played on KLOS, the rock station in Los Angeles. I was still pretty new to listening to the radio, but this was the first time any song had so captivated me.
And then it was gone.
The ephemeral nature of the radio had held it out to me and then whisked it away and I was left with the memory of something sublime. Musica universalis.
Then on my 14th birthday, my friend James gave me the cassette tape of Moving Pictures and I held the song and its six companion songs in my hands. I could play it at any time I wanted. I actually possessed this amazing music.
I have no idea what happened with that original cassette, but I’ve owned Moving Pictures several times, mostly on CD. But having it stolen when our house was burglarized or giving it away to someone who needed to experience the album left me with no copy until I was given the remastered vinyl version for my 52nd birthday.
Letting the needle drop of the album for the first time brought back so many memories and so many feelings, all of them good and rich and layered. Just like the album itself.
Music review
There’s not much to be said about this album beyond what has been written tens of thousands of times by others. Released in 1981, Moving Pictures is a close sibling to Rush’s 1980 release Permanent Waves. Both albums eschew the massive prog-rock albums of the 1970s, with their story songs which took up an entire side of an LP — these include Caress of Steel (1975), 2112 (1976), and Hemispheres (1978). At the same time, both albums include the long, not-radio-friendly songs “Natural Science” and “The Camera Eye,” keeping Rush still in the prog-rock world.
Album starter “Tom Sawyer” is easily Rush’s most well-known songs. While Peart handled almost all lyric writing from the time he joined the band before their second release, Fly By Night, he does a rare collaboration with fellow Canadian and lyricist Pye Dubois. Peart’s lyrics have always had a poetic sense to them, but Dubois’ hand is noticeable in his more evocative and more obtuse use of words and images. The collaboration between the two extended to several other songs on future albums: “Force Ten,” “Test For Echo,” and “Between the Sun and Moon.”
“Red Barchetta” is a sci-fi song about a young man escaping the Eyes in the city so he can go for a ride in an old sports car through the countryside, only to be chased by massive air cars. Because the song deals with the hum and thrum of a car engine, bassist Geddy Lee sets aside his musical acrobatics and resorts to a, well, driving bass line at key times in the song.
As always, their virtuoso instrumental skills rise to the surface, no more so on Moving Pictures than on “YYZ,” an instrumental tribute to the Toronto Pearson International Airport whose call letters are YYZ. Drummer Neil Peart even taps out YYZ in Morse code as part of the tune.
“Limelight” completes side A, dwelling on the theme of living life in the camera eye, being watched and scrutinized and possibly becoming fake as a result. And, yes, this predated the selfie and YouTube by a quarter century. The song, which came out of Rush’s celebrity status, is now applicable to us all.
Side B starts slowly as “The Camera Eye” gradually builds out of random city street noises. It reflects on the souls of cities and the sounds of humanity rushing to and fro. “Pavements may teem/With intense energy/But the city is calm/In this violent sea.”
“Witch Hunt” is tongue-in-cheek subtitled “Part III of ‘Fear’” although the band had not released any previous parts and seemed to have no plans for further parts (though the trilogy was ultimately finished on subsequent albums). The song centers on mob mentality and the role of superstition in drumming up violence in the face of the unknown. It includes a rare lyrical mistake in the line “The mob moves like demons possessed” — demons aren’t possessed, they possess.
“Vital Signs” closes the album with another play off of the theme of moving pictures. In a world where everything is moving so quickly and images keep changing, it’s hard to not become shape-shifters ourselves. We need to pause, rewind, replay. We need to process information at half speed.
Vinyl specifics
This edition of the album was released in 2015 as part of a remastering and rereleasing of the entire Rush catalogue on to vinyl. The vinyl itself is traditional black but with the heft and flatness of 180 gram weight, 50 percent heavier and thicker than the 120 grams of standard 12-inch LPs. The remastering was done from original analogue masters at Abbey Road Studios by Sean Magee in December 2014, using the Direct to Metal Mastering (DMM) audiophile copper plating process. There are arguments against DMM, but this album sounds fantastic.
I heard no pops and clicks, which are generally not flaws in the vinyl, but are debris from the pressing and packaging process. Often new records require a washing, but not this one, assuring me of the quality put into the process. I usually store LPs in antistatic sleeves, but Moving Pictures comes with an anti-scratch plastic sleeve, not the typical paper sleeve.
The album comes with a digital download card which is actually a 4”x4” sticker of the album cover. The download code expires at the end of 2020. Also included is a single-page 12”x12” insert with song lyrics on one side and the original liner notes on the other side.
Side A
Tom Sawyer
Red Barchetta
YYZ
Limelight
Side B
The Camera Eye
Witch Hunt
Vital Signs