VAPOR TRAILS

After the horrible tragedies of Neil Peart losing both his wife and daughter within a year's time, RUSH was put on hold for a few years but after the dust settled they put out their 17th studio album VAPOR TRAILS. This album has been criticized for its horrendous production but I disagree with these critiques finding this "alternative" production to lend a totally different kind of sound for RUSH that has that loud distorted 90s feel to it. This album seems like it should have been released after "Counterparts" (thereby skipping "Test For Echo") because it rather continues the same sound, feel and songwriting. Unfortunately it also continues the now too frequent tradition of one good side and a second side that just painfully goes on too long. In fact it probably would have been better to take side one of "Counterparts" and combine it with side one of this album to make a really good album.

Once again, I was expecting more from this one. After the life changing events that took place it seems like they would have made more of an impact on this music this time around, but VAPOR TRAILS doesn't sound significantly different than the other tepid outputs of the 90s, however, the first side is fairly interesting and it is an album that does make it into the player now and again unlike some of their absolute weakest members of their discography.