An Homage to Neil Peart

It Built Our Lives Because
The Music Matters

In Memoriam, Neil Peart

(of Rush, 1974-2015;
of our time, 1952-2020)

“If we burn our wings,
flying too close to the sun;

If the moment of glory is
over before it’s begun;

If the dream is won,
though everything is lost;

We will pay the price,
but we will not count the cost.

When the dust has cleared
and victory denied;

A summit too lofty,
a river a little too wide;

If we keep our pride,
though paradise is lost;

We will pay the price,
but we will not count the cost.

And if the music stops,
there’s only the sound of the rain;

All the hope and glory,
all the sacrifice in vain;

And if love remains,
though everything is lost;

We will pay the price,
but we will not count the cost.” (“Bravado”)

One day, you’re seventeen years old and waiting...really, really waiting for WDVE in Pittsburgh to play the newest song by a band you really dig. Two decades later, you are teaching college theatre and telling a crew of your students to shut the hell up because you’ve been waiting… really, really waiting for WDVE in Pittsburgh to play the latest song by what has become your favorite band of all time. So, 1987 has become 2007. Then, suddenly, you’re approaching 50, busy raising kids and you’re not waiting, really not waiting, because you don’t want to believe the messages on Facebook. You cannot hear the words on WDVE in Pittsburgh that will verify the news. The most influential rock-lyric writer of your life may have passed away. And 2007 has become 2020, and...Neil...Peart...is...dead.

During the years in between you memorized each verse, discovered depth in countless metaphors, and posted just about anything you could in order to influence friends, students, family members, and fellow fans -- to just listen! Even if half the people humored you when they “liked” what you had typed, you often shared lyrics anyway.

One such post decried, “If you don’t get Rush by now, maybe you never will” when you shared “The Camera Eye.” That subtle social commentary nicely ties off a phase of Rush’s mini-saga period, the beginning of which was “By-Tor and the Snow Dog” and which ran through “2112,” both “Cygnus” variations, and a spate of others. You honestly believed that your lense into the music could transport others through a powerful and perfect portal to understand the band’s greatest aptitude. You knew very few would get it, that they’d just never take the time to comprehend the sheer brilliance that is Neil Peart, Geddy Lee, and Alex Lifeson. You developed a mantra, somewhat serious / somewhat flippant, to recruit fans: “When you recognize the truth, we will welcome you to the light.” Laughter has yet to convert. But onward you rocked.

For over 40 years, heavy-drum rhythms filled the rock-n-roll airwaves to define the Rush sound, and certain songs (“Tom Sawyer,” “Freewill,” “Spirit of Radio”) became radio favorites while arguably not even being among the band’s best work. All along, Rush relied time and perfectly-syncopated-time again on the mastery of Neil Peart’s lyrics to build upon every style from art-rock to anthem, from eulogy to elegy, from morals to morasses and yes, even a ballad and a rap! The trio are masterful musicians with Neil Peart the maestro behind the words.

~ ~ ~

The passing of Neil Peart signifies a moment in my life as others might think of the death of a civic leader or a profound actor. His work has inspired me as an artist and a thinker in ways that are difficult to explain. One might scoff at the very notion -- as if pausing to pay tribute to a rock-and-roll celebrity is the work a sophomore. But one would then dismiss the wave of change that rock-and-roll has brought to our society between 1950 and 2020. Influenced by 60s fusion, no-doubt pushed internally by 70s rock gods, motivated to surpass the experimental 80s, and recharged by a 90s guitar-rock resurgence, Peart sculpted an understanding for generations, and has left a lasting profundity yet to be fully realized. In the new millennium, he gifted us perhaps his greatest lyrical accomplishments in the band’s lesser-known final three albums. (Listen first, and if you agree, send thanks later.)

Peart was a musician whose talents I will never reach. I possess absolutely no musical skill, and would be called tone-deaf by many, but his lyrics reached me through a communal need for words. Vocabulary expresses the best and the beautiful, the weakest and the worst, the heroic and the hopeful, and the rough-hewn Canadian measured his choices with precision matched only (somehow) by the finesse of his own percussion.

One day, someone will write a book that explores the wordsmith’s many layers and secrets, but a few tracks demand attention upon his passing. Within his meaning lies the power of interpretation -- one thing I can do. Some fans in 1987 heard “I know you’re different, you know I’m the same; we’re both too busy to be taking the blame” as an ominous environmental concern from “Second Nature,” yet something suggested to me a commentary on kinship.

On some level there is a drug-addiction recovery theme to be found under “The Enemy Within”: “I’m not giving in to security under pressure, I’m not missing out on the promise of adventure. I’m not giving up on implausible dreams - experience to extremes.” Yet my take heralded a refusal to surrender to society, as if every obstacle was placed before us to build character and to discover our truest selves.

Buried within so many songs, the tiny nuggets are vast:

“They seem oblivious to this quality, equality.”

“It’s a far cry from the world we thought we’d inherit.”

“Can any part of life be larger than life?”

“Some half-forgotten stranger doesn’t mean that much to me.”

“I’m so full of what is right, I can’t see what is good.”

And the utterly effusive, “Why are we here? Because we’re here.”

Still, my personal motto hollers, “Don’t ask me, I’m just improvising my illusion of careless flight,” during the esoteric and layered “Presto.” It might be read as a musical romp through improvisation, yet I sensed a visionary reality to which I applied my art as a stage director. It inspired me to trust style over the limitations of structure. And it goes a step further: “If I could wave my magic wand...I’d make everything all right” considers the best of being better people together.

Throughout Peart’s exploration of the world’s words, we have learned wisdom, patience, insight, introspection, and a deeper connection to our humanity. But we also find a devotion to integrity and to science, and to the mystery and wonder of both. “Science like nature must also be tamed...Art as expression, not as market campaign, will still capture our imagination.” (“Natural Science”) “But I still cling to hope, and I believe in love; and that’s faith enough for me.” (Faithless”) I can’t discuss them all -- do your homework!

Rock and roll has been the throbbing beat of my artistic heart. It has allowed me to balance Literature with my own minimal contribution to the Arts as they represent us and will come to define our own time on this earth. While we are saddened to place 2020 on a man’s tombstone who only became alive in 1952, we cherish the grace by which he penned complex lyrics that challenge us as much as they must have confounded his musician-best-friends Geddy and Alex when they wrote accompanying music to construct and perfect their songs.

And now we reach the very moment of legacy. When a life ends and memory begins; where we hold true to the reality that every song, every fill, every word, every thought, every counter-rhythm, and every pun, reinvented cliche, and clever phrase now stand as a testament to a life well-played. Most sadly, The Professor wrote words he possibly did not realize would come to be so profound when he chronicled Rush’s entire career in “Headlong Flight”: “I’d never trade tomorrow for today...Some days were dark...some nights were bright...I wish that I could live it all again.”

As long as there is electricity to harness and speakers to connect, the music of Rush, driven by the impulse and wisdom of Neil Peart, will forever rock our souls and roll our emotions down a tireless road, much like the one Mr. Peart himself wrote of in “Ghost Rider” as a method for his own mourning and coping: “Show me beauty, but there is no peace for the ghost rider.” Please, somewhere, may Neil Peart truly rest in peace now.

“Suddenly, you were gone, from all the lives you left your mark
upon...I hear the voices...I remember.
I tried to believe, but you
know it’s no good. This is something that just can’t
be understood.” (“Afterimage”)

(All lyrics are property of Rush, Neil Peart, and their musical catalog.)