HOLD YOUR FIRE

The whole of Rush's synth period took a good while to grow on me, and whilst Signals and Grace Under Pressure were able to win me over comparatively quickly, it's only lately that I've really warmed to Power Windows and Hold Your Fire, and Hold Your Fire is certainly the one I've warmed to least.

Power Windows was at the end of a day a solid album where it felt like they were beginning to repeat themselves as far as their post-Signals sound went, but they were still able to pull out a few more tricks here and there to keep things fresh. By comparison, Hold Your Fire comes across as a formulaic Rush-by-numbers album from their mid-1980s synthesiser era - and the fact that any Rush album could be called "formulaic" illustrates the magnitude of the problem.

It's still an entertaining enough release, but for the most part what's good about it is also what was good about the three previous studio albums - it's not bringing much new to the table which we haven't heard before. Some sections of Time Stand Still are downright repetitive - a word I'd never have applied to any prior Rush song.

At its best, Hold Your Fire manages to attain this chilly, cybernetic 1980s sheen, a combination of futuristic production methods and deft composition creating an icy, spacey aesthetic which feels very much of its era (in a good way). Then again, even that is something which they did better on Grace Under Pressure. It's good if you like Rush's synth phase - and I do - but probably the least of the studio albums from this era.