Rush - Chemistry

Like A Vapor Trail

In two years, Neil had not even considered drumming, or even picked up a drumstick. “Everything that had been the centre of my life before was obviously not good for me emotionally, so I wanted nothing to do with it,” he said. Instead, he had travelled, neither escaping nor arriving, the thousands of miles from Northern Canada to Mexico acting as a buffer to reality. Eventually however, and not before the time was right, reality closed the gap.

Perhaps it was a fax from Liam Birt that was the turning point, sent at the beginning of March 1999. It was “innocent enough” – Liam had been tasked by the others to ask Neil, what to do with the drums he had left in storage. For Neil, this triggered a whole bunch of thoughts. While Neil felt unable to suggest any answers, he was at least prepared to start raising some questions. “Yesterday I was thinking up all the conditions I could demand in return for going to work,” he wrote to his friend Brutus, who was still in prison.

In May came another galvanising incident, when Neil had his tarot read. “After great tragedy and tribulation you are trying to build yourself and your life,” began the tarot reader, whose complete reading was so accurate and insightful, it was all too much for the grounded, rationalist sceptic. It took another few months before Neil realised that his self-imposed exile was never going to offer a route back to reality. After an ill-fated romantic interlude, Neil found himself without any choices. “I was at the very lowest point. I was so desperate,” he said. “It was like, what can I do now? But the answer came to me: I’ll play the drums.” At the end of June 1999, Neil booked a session at a nondescript Toronto studio, and he took his sticks to his drums once more.

Neil had been visiting photographer and friend Andrew MacNaughtan in Los Angeles, and Andrew had been introducing Neil to the friends he was making. “I had just moved down there when Neil started visiting, it was a new, scary city,” says Andrew, who was keen to help Neil mingle. “There is no hill that never ends,” went the Masai proverb, and so it was November 1999, that Andrew introduced Neil to Carrie Nuttall, a professional photographer and a native of southern California. “Was I matchmaking?” asks Andrew. “Absolutely – I wanted him to meet people, and I wanted him to meet someone he could fall in love with.” While Carrie could never replace what he had lost, she gave Neil hope for the future. On 8 September 2000, and as predicted by the Tarot reader, the pair were married in “a fairy tale wedding” in Montecito, near Santa Barbara. As a final break with the past, Neil and Carrie decided to stay in California, the land of new beginnings. To Neil, whatever had come before, Carrie was the catalyst for the future.

Shortly before the wedding was to take place, in the early summer of the first year of the new millennium, Neil decided to call Geddy and Alex. “I think it’s time that we sat down and started talking about what we’re going to do as a band,” Neil had said, according to a euphoric Alex. “My heart soared,” he said, and not just about the possibility of working together. “It said so much about his recovery, that he was coming back to the world of the living.” So they came, and they sat, and they talked. And they decided it was time to make a go of it, to see what developed. They set the timescale for six months, starting in January of the New Year. Over the months, the threesome got their lives in order and set towards working together once again.

Publicly anyway, things came together more quickly than anyone could have imagined. By the end of 2000, Rush was officially an item once more and the publicity machine was rolling back into action. The band went official about the regrouping on 12 January 2001. “We are just getting to know each other again,” Geddy told reporters. “Everyone’s kind of sniffing each other out.” The first thing to do was just to spend some time together. “The first two weeks we spent just talking about everything,” said Alex. “I don’t think we played a single note while we were in the studio.” There was a rumour that Geddy was working at a separate studio to the other two, which was quickly dispelled.

The first priority was on ensuring stress levels were as low as possible. Initially, crew members were around to set up equipment, but before long only the three players remained with their instruments. Nobody quite knew what to expect, surmised Geddy, “I would expect the writing sessions to be unlike any we’ve ever done.” There was no timetable, no pressure on anybody apart from the uncertainty: as noted Neil, “Would we really be able to put together enough songs to fill a new album?” While Geddy and Alex started jamming together, Neil retreated to a back room to see what lyrical content he could assemble. Though he had been away from the drumming, writing was one thing he had kept going. Inevitably the songs that emerged were a lot more personal than they had been in the past. “The old Neil thought the world was a wonderful place and that people were kind of annoying, and the new Neil thinks that the world is a terrible place and that people are beautiful, people are wonderful,” says Paul Northfield. These sentiments were reflected as lyrical themes covering loss and re-emergence, and the indifference of the heavens to the trivial to-ings and fro-ings of mankind. There was no overall concept, more a shared feel as Neil fell back on authors such as Joseph Conrad, Oscar Wilde and Alex’s own muse W. H. Auden, for lyrical sustenance.

After a couple of weeks Neil emerged from his room. Geddy took the job of chief arranger, working with Alex to pull the growing pool of musical segments together into Logic Audio on the computer. Then it was time for all the players to review, rework, rearrange – finally at least, the software and equipment was up to the job. The first song to emerge from this process was ‘Out Of The Cradle’, closely followed by ‘Vapor Trail’, ‘The Stars Look Down’ and ‘Earthshine’. “It took a little while to get going, but once we did it took on a life of its own and we were just along for a ride,” said Alex. “It felt very much like it was just us getting together and playing and having fun with it.”

There were to be no keyboards, however. “Geddy knew full well by the time that we got to this record that I really wanted to get away from keyboards entirely,” Alex explained. Geddy wasn’t that upset, according to Alex anyway. “His feeling is: if keyboards work for something, fine, let’s use them, but if they don’t work, fine, I don’t care. I really don’t want to play them.” Neither were there any guitar solos, for that matter. “I’d much rather spend time creating sounds on the guitar that are organic, that would do the same job that keyboards do. It is so much more fun to create these more unusual sounds.” To support these textures Geddy added layers of vocal harmony, a process he had developed during ‘My Favourite Headache’. “He used his voice more as an instrument to create those same sort of backdrop sounds that we used keyboards in the past with,” said Alex.

Towards the end of the sessions, songs like ‘One Little Victory’, ‘Ceiling Unlimited’ and ‘Nocturne’ started to emerge. “The newer songs started to get weirder,” noted Neil, adding that “daring comes out of confidence.” ‘Ceiling Unlimited’ was one of the most optimistic songs on the album. Explained Alex, “Anything is possible, and even out of the darkest darkness there’s light. And, just reach for it.” Following a brief yet necessary pause (while Alex produced Lifer’s self-titled debut), by June it was time to involve some other people. For an objective ear the band selected engineer-turned-producer Paul Northfield. “He had really got his production shots down and was very much into the guitar-based bands,” says Peter Collins. Paul had also worked on the Buddy Rich tribute albums, so clearly he had a broad palette he could offer; most of all however, he was a friend. “I think they wanted someone on this occasion they did know because of all the emotional stuff, they didn’t want someone new,” says Paul. “I was still very cutting edge which they liked, after 30 years I was still doing records that were relevant and different and unusual so they were quite enthused by that aspect of it.”

Paul’s first job was to work through the raw arrangements with Geddy – not that they were particularly raw. “They were really quite far in advance,” says Paul. “There would be lots of overdubs on there and lots of vocals as well, and sometimes there would be some guitar parts that were inspiring or vocals that were great, or backing vocal layering that Geddy had done.” Lorne Wheaton, who had been Max Webster’s drum tech many years before, was also brought in to help. “I was Neil’s ears in the control room,” he says.

The recording process was very different from the past. Rather than writing the cook book then following it assiduously, as they had done for the previous albums, each player developed his parts independently. Every evening the trio would get together (generally after supper) to check how things were going. There were many reasons for this – not least, everyone wanted to keep the pressure on the others to a minimum. “It wasn’t because they didn’t want to talk to each other, they were trying to allow each other to have lots of space,” says Paul. In addition, as Neil remarked, “both Geddy and Alex had produced their own projects, and each of them was used to being the Supreme Boss of Everything.” The evening review was very important psychologically – “even if we worked in isolation, we were working together,” commented Neil. Not that the threesome were working apart, all the time – “There were some very passionate, very emotional writing sessions,” commented Alex.

Lastly of course, whereas Neil would have traditionally recorded his pieces first, this time round he hadn’t fully worked out what he was going to play, let alone whether he could play it with sufficient gusto. Paul’s role became more hands on than for any past Rush producer: he worked from late morning until tea time with Geddy and then evenings with Neil, while Alex was spending time developing his own material. Once the rhythm section was worked out, Alex took over the evening slot; meanwhile, Neil started to rehearse, tweak and arrange what he’d worked out to play. While he wasn’t at his kit Neil started writing a book, collating the many notes, letters and musings of his two-year journey. ‘Ghost Rider’, it would be called, a modern-day Geisterfahrer.

For Neil, “rehearsing” was like starting from scratch again, requiring all of his single- mindedness and focus to develop the skills he needed. His muscles were far from toned, his rhythmic ear was lacking an edge, his hands lacked the calluses he needed to play for any length of time. Having lain dormant for five years, the muscle memory was still there and before long he started having fun. “He enjoyed himself very much playing, that didn’t seem to be too difficult for him,” says Paul. Amongst other things, Neil had to learn to rock again – but this was a challenge he was up for. “There’s also a new level of freshness for me, coming back to the instrument with a new sense of rededication,” he remarked.

After the first, tentative steps, Neil played with enormous energy. Nearly twenty years before, in an interview, Neil had discussed the physical approach to drumming of his friend and mentor Tommy Aldridge. “It’s a satisfying thing, it’s not something you have to do, but it’s something that you really want to do,” he had said. “It feels great to hit ’em hard.” So hit ’em hard he did, recording all the way and playing back the two or three best takes to the others, after dinner. With the others working in the same way, the final version of a song would represent the first time it had been heard in that exact form, by anyone. “That’s something we love about this record,” said Alex. “It’s so spontaneous and instinctive and it’s captured a moment that just happened once.”

Slowly, but surely, song by song, it all came together,. “We wanted to make something that was intense,” said Geddy – and they had, undeniably so. “By the time we got to the final performances, there was a real intense build up,” says Paul, whose influence on the production process was, according to Neil, “strong.” He was there for the band as it nurtured its collective soul and felt its way towards an album that would be as dynamic and full of energy as possible. “He saw possibilities that sometimes escaped us (urging ‘Ghost Rider’ from the verge of abandonment to its glorious realization, for example). He also encouraged our ‘eccentricities’ in the later emerging songs like ‘Freeze’ and ‘Peaceable Kingdom’.”

The isolated production approach isn’t always going to be the best way to make an album, admits Paul Northfield. “It’s a double-edged sword, because sometimes there is a creative tension that comes from kind of rubbing up against each other,” he says. In this case it worked, which was as much as anyone could hope for.

The final task was to put the songs in order. One in particular stood out as the opener – ‘One Little Victory’, conceived to leave the listener in absolutely no doubt: Neil and the rest of the band were, in his own terms, “ba-a-a-ack!” Neil had originally been working out the in-your-face drum section for towards the end of the song, but Geddy suggested it went right up front. “Frankly, I wouldn’t have done it that way,” said Neil, “I don’t think I would have been so assertive.”

Everything was going so well. Mixing started, and then it was time for another break – this time, for Christmas. When the players and producer came back however, nobody was quite as happy as they had been before they left. There appeared to be too much compression in the mix, but even with a change of studio nobody could quite pin down why, or what to do about it. Eventually, tempers started to fray and even Paul was starting to have difficulties seeing the wood for the trees. “We had become too deeply immersed in the material, and we could no longer step back and hear the songs whole,” remarked Neil. It was time to sit down and talk, and the conclusion was to get someone else involved, a fresh pair of ears. On the shortlist was David Leonard, fresh from working with Geddy on ‘My Favourite Headache’, to get the final mixes back on track.

David was available, a major additional factor in his favour considering the short notice. “They had worked on it for so long, and they just needed someone to just come in and put it into perspective without remembering all the baggage that got them to that point,” says David. “I just came in and said, oh, I like that and I like that and I like that, and what do you think of that? That’s what a mixer often does, anyway.”

The troubles weren’t over however – everyone was shattered, ground down over the months, and there was still the mastering to go. “We were all so toast,” says Paul. Having sent the tapes to a number of people, Geddy and the others opted for mastering engineer Howie Weinberg, who had done such a good job on ‘My Favorite Headache’. “The mastering was nightmarish,” says David Leonard, who attended the sessions with Geddy. “An ugly distortion appeared on a track. My first thought was that something in the mix was being brought out and aggravated by the mastering process, so I went back to the mix room and recalled the mix. I never found any distortion of that nature. I reprinted the mix at very reasonable levels. There was no distortion in the mix at the time it went back to mastering. But the same thing happened.”

Perhaps, put simply, Howie was putting the compression back. Not that he was to know this was the wrong thing to do – it was the fashion of the time, and an aggressive mastering approach befitted the raunchiness of some of the songs. “On certain levels everybody liked it,” says Paul. “There was a lot of excitement that it was a powerful record coming out of a very, very difficult time. I didn’t hear it until it was all said and done, at which point the record company was over the moon with it, saying it was fantastic, let’s get it out there.”

While initial reviews of the album were very positive, it took a few weeks for the more careful listeners to feed back. “The audiophiles, amongst the lovers of Rush they started to go, why is it like this? To me it’s guilty as charged,” says Paul. “All you can say is decisions were made at the time, everybody was just really tired and we did what we felt was right, and then given a month or two’s hindsight we found it was wrong.”

In some ways, the album served as much as a statement of intent, as a musical piece. When the band came up for air in February 2002, they were overcome by the amount of interest they were getting. Said Alex, “We were barraged with all this press and promotion to an extent we’ve never done before. It bowled us over. I mean we’ve been around a long time and we’re used to this sort of thing. A little bit out of touch maybe, but we’re used to it. But this is just crazy!”

‘Vapor Trails’ was released eighteen months after the process had started, in July 2002. Who else could there be to produce a cover but Hugh Syme, who once again opted for a painting. Initially the idea was to build on the concept of vapour trails, and everything from the serious to the seriously silly was explored, not least the idea of a dragon. This was quickly rejected: “It kind of tipped the scale way too much into the era of rock music that is ‘Wakemanesque’, that grand and terribly British folklore kind of thing,” says Hugh. Instead, Neil agreed with Hugh that a comet would work, so the cover artist set about putting together a conceptual piece, in oil on canvas. “It was a real quick and dirty rendering,” says Hugh, but when Neil and the others saw it, they loved the image. “What was a study became the original for the cover!”

Following the album release, conversation turned inevitably to the idea of a tour. Alex was up for it; Geddy was reluctant, but up for it; Neil was apprehensive. But his musician’s instinct to perform outweighed any desire to scuttle back under his rock. “Touring was a difficult concept for him to come to grips with,” said Geddy, himself and Alex gently broaching the subject to see what happened.

As the threesome started to discuss set list possibilities, emailing rather than faxing each other this time, the excitement levels grew. Initially Neil agreed to a 38-date tour of the US and Canada, possibly with some overseas dates. As the bookings came in however, the number grew rapidly, reaching 67 shows, and Neil was still up for it. Most of the dates were arenas and amphitheatres, despite the indication that the band could probably fill stadia, if they wanted to. The bandwagon nearly made it all the way to Europe – but in the end, the trio decided that would be a step too far – they were unsure about interest levels, and left things too late. Half the problem (as ever) was that they were not prepared to put on a cut-down show. However, they did plan some dates in South America for the first time, particularly as their attempts to book dates on the previous tour, had not come off. International agent Neil Warnock had negotiated a few shows – stadium shows at that – and had somehow managed to convince the band that they’d enjoy the experience. So they agreed, not really expecting a huge reaction – record sales had never been that great in Brazil.

When the band started to rehearse, they realised they had a little way to go before they got their tour legs back. “The first week of rehearsal we sounded like a very bad Rush cover band,” said Alex. “There was definitely that period of having to get back on the horse.” The issues were as much physical as anything – none of the three had what it took to play a half-hour set, never mind one that went on for two or three hours. Family matters were equally important, particularly for Geddy who was finding himself wrenched from his home routines.

Given the intervening years since the last tour, there were some inevitable changes of crew, as past stalwarts had found other bands to work with. In addition, the hiatus had occurred during a period of much development in live sound. Front of House engineer Robert Scovill was not available, so they decided to bring in Brad Madix, who had taken over from Robert for a short while back on the ‘Roll The Bones’ tour. On arrival, Brad introduced the use of “line array” speakers (that could project sound much better than traditional speaker configurations), a digital mixing desk and a range of mics. “We played with different vocal mics in rehearsals until we were all happy and away we went,” says Brad.

As well as planning to include an abbreviated ‘2112’ in the set again, the threesome went right back to ‘Working Man’ as they considered what to play. The band even listened to their fans when it came to deciding the set list, paying attention to what was reported on the website RushPetition.com. “I think we actually looked at that site and took four or five songs from the Top Ten,” said Alex – a job well done for the site instigator: perhaps the Web had its uses, after all. Indeed, the band did everything they could to fit as many songs in as possible, but as they approached the three-hour mark, they had to call it a day. “We have unions to answer to ya know!” laughed Alex.

Like old times, the rehearsals were also the opportunity to work out who was going to trigger which samples. “The samples can be mapped to anything, so it depends on who’s convenient for what,” says Tony Geranios. In particular, the Roland 5080 samplers could do pretty much everything that used to require an array of equipment. “It’s come full circle, from one, to many, to one!” Well, two – the equipment was replicated to minimise the risk of failure. The no-trappings, tech-limited approach was something that appealed to everyone. Remarked Alex, “We’ve been trapped by the technology for quite a few years and we’d like to feel a little freer and have fun, you know? And feel like we’re making a little more contact.”

One way to achieve this was through a revamped set of visuals, so Geddy went to Norm Stangl and asked him what he could come up with. “Beyond a doubt, collaborating with Geddy is and has been very rewarding,” says Norm. “He is always looking for something different, something more edgy, often with a little tongue in cheek.” The dragon idea, rejected from the album cover and with the addition of a cigar, was the perfect icon. Ironically it was called ‘Nebbish’5 – nobody was feeling particularly weak-willed by this stage.

In the spring of 2002, the band and SRO agreed to work with a past collaborator of Jimbo Barton, Dan Catullo, who had proposed making a live DVD of the tour. Larry Jordan, who had directed ‘A Show Of Hands’, was invited to join the team as a consultant6. “When I went to meet Geddy, I hadn’t seen him in eight years, but I felt there was going to be a comfort level,” says Larry. The film shoot was planned for the 8 November performance at the Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, Connecticut.

The final gig, at the Maracaña stadium in Rio de Janeiro, was kept as an option for additional footage.

The opening night of the tour was at the Meadows Music Center, in Hartford Connecticut, on 28 June. For the band as for everybody else, it was a truly unforgettable experience. “It was a bit of a blur and things were just so exciting yet tense,” said Alex. “I truly had doubted it would ever come again.” One by one, the dates passed, every venue filled, every audience rapturous. “I don’t think there was one night on the last tour when it felt like a job,” remarked Alex. The use of layered vocals caused a bit of a problem on the tour, but Alex picked up some of the harmonic lines, “with the aid of some electronics making his voice sound groovy!” according to Geddy.

In preparation for the video shoot, Larry and Dan went to see the band play in San Diego. As the Uncasville gig approached however, it became clear that the live recording could not go ahead, not there anyway. “Connecticut was all pre-produced, ready to go, but SRO couldn’t agree terms with the casino, they wanted to plug the casino,” says Dan. There was little time to fix any other venue but one – the last night of the tour and the third date to be spent in Brazil, just twelve days later, at the Maracaña stadium in Rio de Janeiro. “So, we went from a 20,000 capacity casino to the largest stadium in the world!” With no time to spare, the shoot became an order of greater magnitude – more cameras, bigger consoles, better lenses. “In eight days we had to get work permits and equipment together,” says Dan. “The biggest problem was shooting in high definition. We were under the gun, we had one day to find out the equipment for the shipping manifests.” In addition the camera crew had to take account of the band’s own needs – in particular Neil, who didn’t want the distraction of cameramen.

As Larry had shot in Rio a few times before, he was familiar with the location and its special requirements, and he knew how to recruit a crew. “I had some key people I knew,” says Larry. Nobody was in any doubt about the logistical issues of working in Brazil, however. “Any show in Brazil is likely to be kind of a mess,” says mixing engineer Brad Madix. “Things just don’t happen there the way they do in the US, Europe or Japan.” It wasn’t even clear that there would be much of an audience, as advance ticket sales had been poor. “Everyone was very concerned,” admits Larry, but he needn’t have worried. “At the last minute they bought thousands and thousands of tickets.”

The first night south of the border, things went as well as could be expected. By the second night the tensions were palpable, and that was before they counted on the weather. “We had been through a couple of days of horrible load-ins, load-outs, weather, technical difficulties, and so on,” says Brad. A final straw was when the monitor console (the one the band uses to hear what it is playing) stopped working due to water in the power supply units. “The crew all got together, got out the hair dryers and blew hot air into the thing until it came on!” Not even the rain could diminish the joy, not to mention the size, of the Brazilian audience: Sao Paolo drew a crowd of 60,000, and over 40,000 tickets had been sold for the Rio gig, the biggest headline audiences the band had ever played to. “We were completely surprised by it,” said Alex, his excitement tempered with apprehension: the next night would be filmed.

The plan was to start unloading at 8 am sharp, with the band arriving at 10, but the previous day’s issues had culminated in huge delays leaving Sao Paolo. Further hold-ups on the road meant the crew and equipment didn’t reach the stadium until after noon, and still more complications delayed the load-in until 2.30. With brave faces the crew set about constructing the stage, assembling the lighting rigs, unpacking and connecting instruments and backline to desks and PA. At least they didn’t have to worry about the rain.

For the video team, things were even more tense. They had gone straight to Rio four days before, but faced no end of technical challenges of their own. “Only about fifty per cent of the planned facilities actually existed,” says Larry. “We had four days of utter panic.” The team worked day and night, co-ordinating with translators to brief the camera crews, and creating a production facility virtually from scratch using whatever was available. “We built a video control room out of a garbage dumpster, using a chainsaw to cut the windows,” says Dan. Also on the scene was Jimbo Barton. “There was a feeling of panic the night before,” says Jimbo. “It was a complete mess.”

Despite every probability that they would not be able to get things together in time, the video crew and the stage crew brought the two sides together. For the first time anyone could remember there was no time for Rush to have a soundcheck – the band didn’t even arrive until five in the afternoon, and things were not ready in any case. “We didn’t get finished until about 20 minutes before the show,” says Brad: things were not helped by the fact that the pressure was causing unnecessary mistakes. “The audio cables caught fire at four in the afternoon, because someone put DC down the cables,” says Jimbo.

That was just getting things plugged together: there was barely time to test the masses of cabling that linked the trio with the audience. Continues Jimbo, “It was hell! Up until 30 seconds before we rolled tape, someone was on top of the truck trying to gaffer tape the timecode feed7.” Within the team, stories of heroism were rife. “Kooster McAllister from Record Plant Mobile was a genius, he single-handedly saved the day,” says Jimbo.

Finally, with doors opening three hours late, in front of 44,000 fans and 40 cameras, the band had to get on with the last show of the tour.

No pressure. “We went on dead cold,” said Alex. “What was our very comfortable environment up there, suddenly was transformed into this very hectic and tense place so I had to really, really concentrate in the first set.” The trio rose to the occasion, riding the pressure like a wave. “Without a soundcheck, and without being totally sure everything was working properly, the show was absolutely great from the first note! It was magical in a way, and a huge relief,” says Brad. “I was really prepared for the worst, but it was just… well, maybe the best show of the tour!” Agrees Dan, who was watching backstage with SRO’s Pegi Cecconi, “Pegi and I were praying that it would all work, and it did… this thing should never have come together, and it did!”

Of course, the performances of cast and crew would be nothing without the audience, and the Brazilian crowd came up trumps. “We had all these Brazilians who don’t speak very much English sing every word to every song and even sing through the instrumentals, it just blew our minds. It’s such an amazing thing to watch. There were moments where I just had a lump in my throat. Seeing the audience singing and hearing even through my in-ear monitors how loudly they were singing,” said Alex. Agrees Larry Jordan, “40,000 people jumping up and down, it just made them play harder!”

The ‘Vapor Trails’ tour came to an end with nobody in any doubt where the band stood. The drum-beat announcement to whoever might listen, played at the start of the album – “We’re baa-a-ack” – was proven true, 67 times over. “I think the way we feel right now; there’s certainly more music in us,” said Alex, as he looked back on the experience. “There’s certainly more tours.”