In the spring of 1993, the Canadian band Rush gathered at Le Studio in Morin-Heights to record their fifteenth studio album, Counterparts. Before a single note was taped, the three members already had a fight waiting for them. The guitarist Alex Lifeson had made a simple request: no keyboards. The singer and bassist Geddy Lee brought them into the studio anyway, and the result, as the band later recalled, was an immediate atmosphere. Rush released Counterparts on October 19, 1993.
From synthesisers back to guitar
That tension was not just a squabble between old friends. It was the sound of a band deciding what kind of group it wanted to be. Through the 1980s, Rush had built its songs around synthesizers, layering them over the rhythm section on albums like Power Windows and Hold Your Fire. The shift back to guitar-driven rock had started on Presto four years earlier, but on Counterparts Lifeson wanted to finish the job. For the first time since Moving Pictures in 1981, he consciously gave the guitar the leading role.
For the first time since Moving Pictures in 1981, he consciously gave the guitar the leading role.
The producer Peter Collins, who had worked with Rush on those two synth-heavy records, understood what the band needed this time. He brought in the engineer Kevin Shirley, known for his raw and natural sound, and Shirley pushed Lifeson in a direction the guitarist had refused for twelve years. Instead of recording his parts from the control room, Lifeson played in the live room, and his guitar parts went onto analogue tape while the rest of the instruments were captured digitally. The result was a tone that felt closer and more physical. Shirley also persuaded Lifeson to record his guitar parts in the live room rather than the control room, a method the guitarist had rejected for twelve years. The change gave the album a more immediate and raw character.
Riffs, singles and studio finds
That physicality shows up all over the record. The first single, Stick It Out, grew from a Lifeson riff and spent four weeks at the top of the Billboard Album Rock Tracks chart. Animate was built on an old amplifier found in the studio's junk and repaired by a technical assistant. In Between Sun & Moon, Lifeson played a riff that Lee thought sounded nothing like him and more like The Rolling Stones, and the bridge before the solo, Lifeson noted, came out very much in the spirit of The Who. Peart recorded his drum parts for eleven tracks in just three days. The album's total running time came to fifty-four minutes and twenty-four seconds.
Not everything on Counterparts was a battle of amplifiers. The drummer Neil Peart wrote lyrics that roamed across themes such as the differences between the sexes and Carl Jung's idea of anima and animus. One song, Nobody's Hero, came from the memory of a gay friend who had worked with Peart in London and later died of AIDS. For that track, the arranger Michael Kamen wrote and conducted a string section, giving the album a moment of careful, deliberate tenderness.
Before the album was released, it got its first public airing on a radio special on CILQ in Toronto on 14 October 1993. A few days later, on 19 October, Counterparts appeared worldwide on Anthem Records. It entered the Billboard chart at number 2, kept from the top only by Pearl Jam's Vs. That debut position said something about the moment: a veteran band from the previous era was still competing directly with the new leaders of rock.
The band toured for four months in support of the record, but the tour was limited to the United States and Canada. After it ended, the members took a long break. Lee planned to spend time with his family, and Lifeson turned to a solo album. Counterparts was not the start of a long new chapter of constant activity, but it was the album where Rush argued its way back to the guitar and left behind a record that sounds like a band remembering what it does best.