Gateway Acts: How a Rush to judgment ultimately led to more affecting music
Aaron Thackeray
I'm not sure exactly what music meant to me when I was younger, but I realize it must have meant less then, only because I recognize how much more it means to me now. I'm reminded of a quote by Fry from Futurama: "I can't wait til I'm old enough to feel ways about stuff." I wasn't looking to Rush to articulate the mature feelings I didn't have; I was looking to them as the instrumentalists I wanted to be, and in the process, I learned how to listen to lyrics closely, so I knew what they were saying, even if I didn't know necessarily what they meant yet.
Britt Chester The grating voice of Danny Brown is music to the ears of Noah Hubbell.
Now, more than the story of the lyrics, I listen for the overall feeling that a song gives me. If I heard somebody singing in some ungodly, grating fashion (a characteristic which some may attribute to Danny Brown, my favorite rapper) over nails on a chalkboard, if it relates to me in a powerful way, that's all I need. "Like a Rolling Stone," "White Man (In Hammersmith Palais)" and "Strawberry Fields Forever" are three of my all-time favorite songs, and though I still adore Rush, technically great playing and rich literary writing isn't as important as the hairs on my neck sticking straight up. It's indescribable, something no number of notes, no matter how fast they're played, can replicate.
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