Where words belong
There are two approaches to performance of music: improvisational and compositional, but one doesn't arise from the other necessarily. A can arise from B, but not vice-versa, although it can happen in visual art where the eye can recognize order. You can say, "That's what it is...that's what I was trying to do." That doesn't happen in music, except at the conceptual level, where even a title or an album cover can group a bunch of ideas together.
Neil Peart is decidedly a compositional artist, arising from a literary bent--a "rapper" throwing his voice to Geddy Lee. Rush would not be the band that it became without his influence. In some respects he made the music too "wordy", i.e. the rhythm of language ultimately controls the rhythm and meter in music. Arguably, if music is not literary it can be more rhythmic (or metric).
The more tightly you rewrite and revise words, the better they get, at least theoretically. Peart asserts that artistry comes through revision, even removing beloved theories. The Peart era of Rush was all about literary "theory", taking the composition of words and draping the music around it. For the next album they should reverse that and let Geddy sing over it, using few words of a more general or ambiguous nature.
Neil Peart is decidedly a compositional artist, arising from a literary bent--a "rapper" throwing his voice to Geddy Lee. Rush would not be the band that it became without his influence. In some respects he made the music too "wordy", i.e. the rhythm of language ultimately controls the rhythm and meter in music. Arguably, if music is not literary it can be more rhythmic (or metric).
The more tightly you rewrite and revise words, the better they get, at least theoretically. Peart asserts that artistry comes through revision, even removing beloved theories. The Peart era of Rush was all about literary "theory", taking the composition of words and draping the music around it. For the next album they should reverse that and let Geddy sing over it, using few words of a more general or ambiguous nature.
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