Power Windows (album)

Production

In February 1985, work started at Elora Sound in Canada for three weeks, in a barn with a 24-track studio. Vocalist and bassist Geddy Lee and guitarist Alex Lifeson were working on songs that could fit the lyrics drummer Neil Peart wrote at a small desk there, with Peart at the same time trying to write lyrics adaptable to Lee and Lifeson's music. During his time there, Peart researched the Manhattan Project to prepare to write lyrics for the song of the same name. He also wrote rough outlines for "The Big Money," "Mystic Rhythms" and "Marathon". Lee and Lifeson sorted through jams and Lifeson’s riff tapes to write music for these songs, with each song taking up to a week. They then began on "Middletown Dreams", "Marathon" once again, and then "Grand Designs".

Peart went through tapes to the five new songs in a Miami hotel room in March, getting ready for the warm-up tour gig in Lakeland, Florida. At this point, the band met up with engineer James "Jimbo" Barton, recommended by producer Peter Collins. Later at Elora, the songs whose lyrics Peart was formerly struggling with, "Territories" and "Manhattan Project", began to come together. Peart was also working on lyrics to a ballad called "Emotion Detector", which seemed to work perfectly with the music they were jamming on at the time. The music to "Territories" was also arranged, and a tape of seven songs was created. They had trouble with writing the music to "Manhattan Project", but Collins contributed ideas to this and other songs.

In April, at The Manor Studio in England, basic tracks were recorded more quickly than usual, in the span of a few weeks, to capture more spontaneous performances ready for overdubs. Andy Richards was brought in to provide extra keyboard programming and performances. The drum tech was sent to London to pick up African and Indian drums for use on "Mystic Rhythms", and bongos were also used on "Territories".

Lifeson began recording guitar overdubs in May at AIR Studios in Montserrat. Next, in June, at Sarm East Studios in London, he began on guitar solos, and Lee did vocals. They moved to a townhouse in July for mixing, a decision on the track listing, and the artwork, credits, and photos. Strings were recorded for the album by a 30-piece orchestra in Studio 1 at Abbey Road Studios in August. A 25-piece choir was also recorded at Angel Studios for the ending of "Marathon". In September, Lee oversaw the mastering in New York, and proofs were approved for the album cover.

Themes and lyrics

Power Windows lyrics are focused primarily on various manifestations of power. For example, the song "Manhattan Project" explores the origins and consequences of the U.S. military's development of the atomic bomb, and "Territories" comments on nationalism around the world. Like "Subdivisions", from the album Signals, "Middletown Dreams" explores suburban monotony and the average person's attempts to temporarily escape it. As well, "Grand Designs" was partly written to criticise mainstream music, which the group felt was too superficial. The song also echoes individualistic themes, such as non-conformism.

After the 1985 Power Windows Tour had concluded, Peart told an interviewer that Rush's sound "is changing from having been progressive to not being progressive." He said that Rush's recent musical style might "seem simpler" to an outside observer who is focusing solely on performance technique, but that the simpler-seeming music was just as difficult to compose and perform.

Cover

The pictures on the front and back covers were taken by photographer Dimo Safari, and the model is Neill Cunningham from Toronto.

Critical reception

Power Windows has been met with mostly positive reviews from music critics. AllMusic's Eduardo Rivadavia described the album as Rush's coldest album, citing the sparse, horn-like guitar playing of Lifeson, the prominent synthesizer of Lee and Peart's crisp, clinical percussion and stark lyrical themes. However, he also described the album as one that rewards patience and repeated listens. Rolling Stone magazine, in a positive review of the album, highlighted a number of bands that seemingly influenced Power Windows, such as The Police, U2, Genesis and Siouxsie and the Banshees. The review concludes that Power Windows may be the missing link between Yes and the Sex Pistols. In 2005, the album was ranked number 382 in Rock Hard magazine's book The 500 Greatest Rock & Metal Albums of All Time.

Track listing

All lyrics written by Neil Peart; all music composed by Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee.

Rush

Additional Personnel

Production

Remastered edition details

Although the original recording had a SPARS code of DDD and was considered to be of good quality, a remastered edition was issued in 1997. The remastered edition follows the trend of newer albums, as it is considerably louder.

Power Windows was remastered again in 2011 by Andy VanDette for the "Sector" box sets, which re-released all of Rush's Mercury-era albums. Power Windows is included in the Sector 3 set.

Power Windows was remastered for vinyl in 2015 as a part of the official "12 Months of Rush" promotion. The high definition master prepared for this release was also made available for purchase in a 24-bit/48 kHz digital format at several high-resolution audio online music stores. These remasters have significantly less dynamic range compression than the 1997 remasters and the "Sector" remasters by Andy VanDette. Sean Magee remastered the audio from an analog copy of the original digital master, using a 192 kHz sample rate. But since Power Windows was originally mixed on digital equipment at 16-bit/44.1 kHz, no audio above 22 kHz exists in the original digital master or any of the remasters, which is why many digital music stores are only selling the album at a maximum sample rate of 48 kHz.