Watch Rush’s New ‘A Farewell to Kings’ Lyric Video
Rush have released a new lyric video for the classic song “A Farewell to Kings,” tied to the 40th-anniversary edition of the album that arrived last year.
Discussing the making of A Farewell to Kings, which came out in September 1977, frontman Geddy Lee told Prog last year that the LP was "quite a different piece for us, because of the way the intro’s structured, and then it comes in with a bang and there’s this weird time signature going on. It’s a tough song to play.”
“It was a complex song to write," guitarist Alex Lifeson added. "In many ways, it’s simple and direct, but we could never accept that, so dropping a note here or inserting a weird note there made things more interesting for us and for the listener. Odd time signatures were a great way to keep the listeners scratching their heads and counting on all fingers.” You can see the new video below.
The band recalled the experience of recording the album's title track in the open air at Rockfield Studios in Wales. “I remember Alex was walking around this mic … while he was playing,” Lee said. “He was just like a troubadour – he was playing as he walked around and, naturally, every troubadour has his guy trailing behind him playing a Minimoog! So I’m playing the Minimoog outside and Neil [Peart]’s hitting the twinklies or whatever he was hitting off the front of that – he was always hitting something – and Alex is walking around this mic recording the opening to ‘A Farewell To Kings,’ so it was quite fun.”
“I liked the organic nature of that recording and it was one of the few days that it didn’t rain," Lifeson noted. "Though I think it did start again later.”
Rush recently ended speculation about their future, when Lifeson described the band as “basically done” in the aftermath of drummer Peart’s retirement. Saying they had no plans to tour or record again, he added, “After 41 years, we felt it was enough.”