TEST FOR ECHO

Hmmmm....... I was positive raving about this album when I got it on it's release date. But a lot of water har run into Loch Life since then. This is the final Rush album before the big earthquake that hit Rush and in particular; Neil Peart. It could easily had been the final Rush album too. Rush disbanded for a while when Neil Peart was recovering from his personal losses, harrowingly documented in his own excellent books.

Rush continued from where they left the studio at the end of Counterparts. Intelligent crafted guitar based medium length songs. Always relevant and always interesting. Test For Echo is one of their harder albums and it really pulls a punch. Alex Lifeson's guitars takes no prisoners.

From this album, the title track, Driven and an acoustic version of Resist is the ones they tend to do live. Of the songs here though, I don't think there is any great Rush classics. The album is only interesting because of the power trio sound and the details every Rush is so full of. Their musicianship is top notch and this album can only cement's their position as one of the technical best bands this planet has ever seen. But the songs are only good in my view and this album is not high on my list of best Rush albums.

3 stars