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Rush - Hemispheres CD (album) cover

HEMISPHERES

Rush

 

Heavy Prog

4.38 | 2703 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

Hector Enrique
Prog Reviewer
5 stars Hemispheres is the second album of the second stage of Rush, in which the increasingly intense and complex use of nuances and sounds, the result of the incorporation of more musical instruments (synthesizers, pedals, and percussion elements) shows us a band consolidated in its most progressive aspect.

The album starts off great with Cygnus X-1 Book II Hemispheres, a continuation of Cygnus 1, the ending song for A Farewell To King. In its 18 minutes we have a very intense development, a spatial and atmospheric suite, in which the god Cygnus X-1, turned into a divinity that balances the friction of the rational part with the affective part, represented by the gods Apollo and Dionysus . In the style of 2112, combining moments of tense tranquility and moments of intense rhythms and dramatic evolutions, it is a theme that is among the best of his repertoire, and one of his latest extensive compositions. The entire suite completely encompasses side A of the album.

Circumstances, starting the B-side, is inspired by the time when Neil Peart lived in his 20s in the British Isles, it is a beautiful song of less than 4 minutes and the shortest of the album, followed by The Trees, a critic where Neil Peart reflects, although he has always denied that it has any particular political connotation, aspects of human reality, of the complex and the constant struggle between its different social structures with a simple and fabled example of nature, using the trees of maple and oak. An excellent song and constant and highly acclaimed presence in their live shows.

The album closes in a spectacular way with Villa Strangiato, and its more than 9 minutes, an instrumental composition that combines a number of styles and musical influences, all linked by the progressive thread, where both Lee, Lifeson and Peart show off of their enormous qualities as musicians. An essential song in the group's catalog.

Hemispheres, in summary, places Rush as one of the most representative bands of the genre, which without leaving its very rocky initial roots, quite the contrary, they add it and complement it very well by adding a greater range of musical textures. Excellent album.

Hector Enrique | 5/5 |

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