Hat-tip to Frank for this gem
Sprawling on the fringes of the city
In geometric order
An insulated border
In between the bright lights
And the far unlit unknown
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer
Or the misfit so alone
Some will sell their dreams for small desires
Or lose the race to rats
Get caught in ticking traps
And start to dream of somewhere
To relax their restless flight
Somewhere out of a memory
Of lighted streets on quiet nights…
August 24, 2008
Rush - Subdivisions
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24 comments:
excellent video! Rush was not my generation of music and I knew people who truly loved their music. I can't wait to talk to my rush friend about this song. It's nice to HP back on track.
rich in fl
Nice- I've never seen the video but the rows and rows of ugly bland tract homes are classic!
And that was back in 1982...
I liked Rush in the day, but the lyrics tended to be pedantic. This was yet another slam on suburbia and its discontents which even when the album came out was already cliche.
What a small world...
The video I believe actually shows subdivisions in parts of Toronto, which also happens to be the site of the first subdivision in North America - known as Don Mills:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Mills,_Ontario
As it turns out, this model (of a planned town) was copied and used throughout the US, Canada and Europe. All you had to do was add a Walmart and Home Despot and you're home.
I actually lived beside Don Mills for most of my life... in a little place called Flemingdon Park... Hell by any other name...
What they attempted to do in Don Mills, they perfected in Flemingdon Park. It was a mixture of all races, mostly immigrants, living in high rises beside the dregs living in Ontario housing (on welfare).
A few years before I left, the drug lords so controlled Flemingdon Park, that they told the cops to beat it... and they always did. I fondly remember this as the summer of Hell since the druggies would be usually playing their stereos until 4 or 5 in the morning. I'm still not sure how I got in to work each morning.
As it turns out, the cops sent in undercover agents to get the names of all of the suspects. After summer was over, they shut down the exits (there were only five in a neighbourhood populating over 100,000 people. You can check it out by putting "Flemingdon Park" into google maps. If you switch to satelite view, you'll actually see the high density shit hole which was made.
IB
That was awesome.I loved rush.I can remember rocking out to tom sawyer in the 80's.Can anone get that video to keith?
It is a sad projection of how easy it is to get lost in our weird society.
I swear that here in the suburbs of phoenix life is built around big box stores.It is sad that americans have to feel good buy shopping all day.I find myself asking, how do all these stores stay afloat because I never go into most of these places?Makes we wonder how screwed up people really are.I know my aunt had a house full of crap that she never even opened.
I must have seen that video hundreds of times on MTV Back in the day, back when they actually did music videos and not reality TV.
totally forgot about it.
Thanks Keith (and Frank)
The song seems to be about a hamster wheel. They want hamster wheels.
Effin awesome song, effin awesome group.
Rush is a bunch of dorks as can be observed in the video but their music is great. Good bass line, odd time signatures and generally excellent work for a trio. But for God's sake they should be wearing masks like Mr. Bungle (another great band). They are ugly mofos plain and simple. Time for them to go back home to Canada.
-Mike
Spirit of Radio, great song.
I'd like to see Neil Peart bash Lereah over the head.
orange county is one big subdivision of l.a.
I liked Rush in the day, but the lyrics tended to be pedantic.
Rush is hated and derided in the mainstream media due to their very libertarian-slanted lyrics. Check out the words to 'The Trees' and 'Anthem' for a sampling....
scottsdale frank,
I liked most of their stuff until force ten, then they lost me. The only saving grace for them in my eyes is that they went on The Colbert Report.
Great group.
You goto a Rush concert and it will exactly the same live everytime. Its that tight. Virtuosos to say the least.
Have you ever lived in the suburbs? It’s sterile. It’s numb. It’s wasting your life.
- Ed Koch
Those are some ugly snout houses. The music is okay, but lyrics are silly claptrap meant to sell albums to disaffected youth with lots of disposable income, i.e. suburban high school kids.
I had a happy childhood growing up in a subdivision. I can't remember being lonely until I moved to the big city and everyone I met was obsessed with working and "making it big". I would imagine living in a dying rural town with no options would have been much worse than either the suburbs or the city. But those people didn't buy trendy albums and watch MTV.
"Rush is a bunch of dorks as can be observed in the video but their music is great."
You should stick to Britney then.
Rush was and still is one of the most lyrically and musically talented rock bands of all time. Neil Peart the drummer is technically perfect and regarder as one of the greatest drummers ever to have lived. Geddy Lee, the singer, also plays the bass guitar and keyboards. His shrill voice is probably the one element that kept them from truly becoming a mainstream icon. And Alex Lifeson's guitar playing is awesome.
Anybody who puts down a band of their caliber truly needs to open their eyes and ears.
>> Rush is a bunch of dorks as can be observed in the video but their music is great. Good bass line, odd time signatures and generally excellent work for a trio. But for God's sake they should be wearing masks like Mr. Bungle (another great band). They are ugly mofos plain and simple. Time for them to go back home to Canada.
STFU noob!
Typical Generation Yner = What or Who's Rush?
Late to the discussion. The subdivision in the video is in Mississauga Ontario, along the QEW, just outside Toronto. When it was built it was the only thing between Etobicoke (no great beauty itself) and the shopping mall in a corn field that was Square One. Yes I grew up around those parts. Geddy Lee's house was close to a friends place. He had the first satellite dish we ever saw.
Well, despite the fact that I love the band and their music, I really don't care for their videos.
If anything, the "Subdivisions" track has a dreamy edge which allows for one to *sail away* and see different places et al, think "Red Barchetta"-like, however, the video reduces it to another loser rebel w/o a cause type of suburban gloom/doom tape reel.
The same goes for "Tom Sawyer", possibly the number one (or at least top 5 songs) of the 1980s but the video was a atrocious band shot of them practicing in a log cabin. Yuck!
All and all, Rush is the number one band out of Canada (sorry, Guess Who fans) and among the most creative acts of all time in the tier directly below Pink Floyd.
Rush is the best band to have ever been eassembled thus far on planet Earth. Yes, they are even better than The Who and Led Zeppelin, who take second and third, respectively.
And, the best part is I just saw Rush a few weeks ago will see Pete and Roger in November. Can homedebtors even afford to attend such shows?
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