Neil Peart, one of the greatest if not THE greatest rock and roll drummers of all time, died after a three year battle with cancer. He was 67.
I have been completely amazed by the outpouring of appreciation for Peart from people I would never have expected in a million years. I am just genuinely surprised by the diversity of the people in my timeline on twitter, on fb, and elsewhere, who have all mentioned his death and the loss. I mean, I knew he was amazing, but I had no idea he was this widely appreciated by so many others. Peart like to state that Rush always wanted to stay the disaffected 16 year old teenage boy- I guess there are a lot of us out there, male and female alike. Perhaps my favorite quote regarding his death was “Your favorite drummer’s favorite drummer has died.”
***
One of the things about getting older (and I am still relatively young at 49), is watching the waves of events that seem to surround you. Early 20’s, the first round of friends marrying, grandparents dying; late 20’s and early 30’s, first rounds of friend’s kids and divorces; late 30’s and early 40’s, people’s parents and cultural icons from your youth, friend’s second marriages, friend’s kids graduating from college; late 40’s, your teenage heroes dying of natural causes, your friends start to die prematurely, and the generations ahead of you start to die off rapidly. In my small town of 300, four people in their late 70’s and early 80’s have died in the past few months. Harry Chambers, proprietor of the general store in town, and I were talking, and we noted that a couple more obituaries and we’re going to be the next generation under the gun. I said that I am not sure I am ready for that, and we both agreed that we don’t have much of a choice.
***
That’s kind of what is so remarkable about groups like Rush, for me. I understand that they are not for everyone, and that’s fine, but for me, all of the world has changed in the past four to five decades, but when I put 2112 on my earphones, I am again lying on the floor of the college radio station, lights turned out, speakers turned to 11, escaping from it all.
Thanks, Neil.
BruceFromOhio
Yet another indicator we’re the old guys now.
2112 changed the music I listened to, and the way I listen to it, for good.
Just think of what my life might be
In a world like I have seen
raven
I’m so old Rush didn’t mean anything to me.
johnnybuck
Rush sort of got me through my first year of college. I moved on to more diverse music, particularly alternative by the end of ’83, but it was a pretty intense fandom while it lasted. Neil Peart had no peer. RIP.
trnc
I started getting into Rush just as Moving Pictures came out, and I loved Limelight and Tom Sawyer when they were all over the radio but I didn’t get the album right away. I heard Vital Signs a few times and didn’t know it was their song, so I had a weird moment when I saw them on the MP tour where they played Vital Signs and I thought, “That’s weird – why are they playing a Police song?” Took me about a minute to realize what was happening.
mrmoshpotato
@trnc:
Hehe
geg6
I never cared for Rush but I know a lot of men that do. Your musing is what I was thinking back when Bowie and Prince died. A lot of my youth went with them, it seemed. But thankfully, I have their music to take me back any time I want.
dlwchico
I’ll be 55 this year. About 2 years ago one of my oldest friends died. He was a year younger than I.
He had finally gotten out of the toxic marriage he had been in for too long. He was engaged and super happy with a new lady. He was physically in the best shape he had been in for years.
He was in Hawaii with his fiance, snorkeling, and got some sea water down his throat. He didn’t really drown, but it caused some sort of reaction that basically stopped his heart. Somebody else referred to it as ‘dry drowning’.
He was 51. Kind of crazy to think about. I honestly always thought I’d be the first to go.
Hildebrand
Neil was a phenomenal drummer, an excellent writer (his books, not always his lyrics, though some of those are bang on), and he grew as a human being – moving on from his early Randian blatherings to really understand the need for compassion, empathy, and hope. His friendships with Alex and Geddy were marvelous examples of what it means to be good to those close to you – even if miles and days stand in the way. He lived through real tragedy and hoped to try to help others work through that kind of pain so that they could still carry on.
It sucks that someone who grew that much died far too young.
The Dangerman
I have no particular musical talents, and couldn’t sing to save my life, which presents for some interesting scenarios like when I went to the Handel’s Messiah performance before Christmas – which was an audience participation singalong kinda event – and was told, ooooh, you have a nice voice (watch out, James Earl Jones!), but I don’t think I can sing a note (no Karaoke for me!)…
…but I can appreciate talent and Peart was brilliant. I don’t make it a practice of rating musicians as “the best” – it’s good or it’s not, because, again, I’m not talented enough to make an evaluation of better or best – but Peart was very, very good. I think what really impressed me was he was studious in his craft and was comfortable in a lot of genres. I read about some jazz he performed last evening (which shouldn’t be a surprise, I suppose, as Prog Rock and Jazz are close cousins).
It’s sad when anyone passes along young. This morning, after the Movie Mustang sold, I looked up Steve McQueen and, holy hell, he passed at 50.
Paraphrasing EFG, Fuck Cancer.
raven
@geg6: It’s funny because Petty and I are the same age and his “Live” album has all kinds of music that I was into, Pickett, Mac when they were a blues band, Them and all kinds of stuff from the early to late 60’s. By the time these “glam” or “progressive” bands came around I was into country (via Garcia & co).
raven
@The Dangerman: Better than Keith Moon, Ginger Baker, Jaimoe and Butch Trucks? Nah.
mrmoshpotato
Leave That Thing Alone (Live in Cleveland 2011)
Shake your bones in celebration of a live well lived!
trollhattan
@The Dangerman:
Yup. Fuck cancer, fuckety-fuck.
Sorry to hear of his demise–too young obviously. While I never found Rush approachable they had some goddamn chops, guitar and drumming both.
Omnes Omnibus
@geg6: Rush never spoke to me at all. I remember people in high school writing 2112 on their notebooks, etc., and I see a lot of high school and college friends reacting to Peart’s death. I’ll join in on a round of “Fuck cancer!” though.
raven
@Omnes Omnibus: Yea, my 60 year old rock and roll brother was very impacted.
Another Scott
I first heard 2112 in the AV room in high school. “Wait? How can he play a rhythm like that! WTF??!!!”
I saw them a few times in concert. Excellent shows.
I started, but was unable to finish, his Ghost Rider book. Excellent prose and photography about a very painful time in his life.
RIP.
Cheers,
Scott.
delk
My husband is a percussionist. His hands were hurting yesterday from drumming on the steering wheel as he drove home.
Peart was a massive talent. Very few are capable of what he was able to do.
theturtlemoves
I’ve seen them every tour since Vapor Trails. One of the first CDs I ever bought with my own summer job money was Hold Your Fire in high school. That album and the one before it, Power Windows, got me through years of being a smart kid who dressed weird and had glasses. They have always been and will always be my favorite band and yeah, the man grew immensely over the years and seemed liked a genuinely decent, if painfully private, person. The world is definitely a lesser place without his 20 minute drum solos in it. RIP, Professor.
Kent
I’m a 55 year old white guy and never really got into the Rush thing. Somehow it passed me by. By the time I was getting music aware (beyond the top 40) in late HS and college I was more into the Who, Clash, Rolling Stones, Springsteen, Neil Young, U2, and then later more faster paced new age and punk influenced stuff by the 1980s.
I mean I was “Rush Aware”. Everyone my age was. But not really any sort of fan. I don’t have any of their albums in my huge legacy collection from those days that is currently sitting in my daughter’s bedroom.
Omnes Omnibus
@Kent: I am the same age and it sounds like we followed a generally similar path. When I started to reach back into older stuff, I went toward Bowie, Roxy, Modern Lovers, and VU.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I went to a lot of funerals last year, and I’ll likely go to a lot more this year. My oldest uncle is 88 (my mom’s brother) my oldest aunt, my dad’s sister, was in his high school class. My mom is 84 and some days when I talk to her I get very nervous, and other days (like today) she sounds fine.
The Dangerman
For those that live in the Redding (CA), Hayward (yeah, there’s a few of you in that neighborhood, and if you aren’t too hanged over after the 49ers), or San Luis Obispo, go listen to some fine music tonight or this upcoming week with the Travis Larson Band, who would basically be Rush if there was singing (they don’t). I don’t think they would mind the comparison since I’m positive that Rush influenced them all heavily (they were on the same bill once as I recall at some Festival). I wish I could go see them Tuesday, as they always put on a helluva show, and are all virtuosos with their respective instruments, but I can’t; they might crank it up a little in Peart’s honor (and they already go to 12 on a normal night).
Cacti
Geddy Lee’s vocals are what kept me from ever really enjoying Rush’s music.
guachi
My college roommate played Rush and 2112 in particular all the time. So I perfectly understand being transported back to college when hearing it.
Our dorm room was 112 and we stole a ‘2’ from a room on the second floor and added out to our room number.
raven
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: My 50 year old neighbor died last month.
raven
@The Dangerman: Which One’s Pink is in Ventura tonight.
eclare
Kent
@Omnes Omnibus: Yeah. There was a certain type of music obsessed guy I knew in college who was super obsessed with the Rush style instrumental progressive rock of that time. The band Yes as well as Emmerson Lake and Palmer, Pink Floyd, and I think Genesis were also huge with the same crowd. I guess that was just never my scene. My Freshman college room mate was an immense Yes fan. Would sit there for hours listening to their stuff with headphones as well as lots of Rush and early U2. This was early 80s….say 82/83
I kind of skipped from the Clash/U2/Springsteen to Pearl Jam and Nirvana and pretty much missed Rush.
different-church-lady
But it helps a lot when that 16 year old is also thoughtful, introspective, philosophical, and extremely creative, rather than merely disaffected.
raven
@Kent: UGH, shoot me now.
trollhattan
@The Dangerman:
Kiddo is going to visit Cal Poly SLO next weekend because the track coach is recruiting her. I like the area and I like the price (compared to a lot of other schools).
different-church-lady
@eclare: Those two things should never need to be in opposition.
The Dangerman
@raven:
Damn, I wish I knew. Mighta gone…
…but I’ve seen a LOT of Floyd stuff lately. WOP was in my neighborhood not too long ago, then House of Floyd (SF area based) came to Morro Bay, with Brit Floyd in the middle in July (an exciting night as that was the night of a 7.1 not TOO far away; a helluva ride in the balcony).
Still, might have gone. That’s not too far away tonight. They are one of the few (maybe only) bands that cover “Fearless”, one of my favorites.
raven
@The Dangerman: They are at Discovery Ventura whatever that is?
Kent
@raven: It was VERY MUCH alienated white boy music. This was way after the black pop and soul of the 1960s and way before Hip Hop and Rap era of the 21st Century. Black music at that moment in time (at least as we knew it) was Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston.
raven
@Kent: Double UGH!
trollhattan
@Kent:
Pondering drummers I’ve seen (and, uh, remember seeing) Bill Bruford stands among the very tippy-top. Phenomenal skill. Funny thing is I can’t recall which group it was with, not Yes but maybe Brand X. There have been so many.
The Dangerman
@trollhattan:
San Luis Obispo is paradise. I fell HARD for SLO in Graduate School. If I had to do it over again, I would have done Cal Poly for Undergraduate (and I loved, absolutely adored, UCLA; still, as an older and wiser, hopefully, Guy, I would come to SLO).
If you have any SLO questions, let me know. I know it well. I’m not as familiar with what’s happening on campus these days beyond that which can be seen at Open House (which is always fun).
Kent
@trollhattan: I think he played with both Yes and King Crimson and maybe also Genesis.
raven
@Kent: God what a nightmare. Fifty years ago Thanksgiving I went from Champaign to Palm Beach for their “Pop and Arts Festival”. The Stones, Janis, Johnny Winter, Chambers Brothers and. . . .King Crimson as the “house band” and they must have played twice a day. I never got over that.
Felanius Kootea
Never even heard of Rush. Heading home from a funeral for a wonderful colleague who was only 39. Cancer is so aggressive if you get it young.
Watched Just Mercy last night. It’s about the 1980s Alabama death row case that put the Equal Justice Initiative on the map. Jamie Foxx and Michael B. Jordan star. It should have surprised me that the Sheriff who framed an innocent black man for murder got re-elected 6 times after the framing was revealed on 60 Minutes but I guess it is Alabama.
trollhattan
@Kent: Yup, he played with all three and wrote most of Yes’ early songs. I saw him either under his own billing or one of his several other projects, which meant sitting close in a nice auditorium and not balcony 3 in a fvcking arena.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@The Dangerman: I’m just thankful you didn’t step on me and crush me like a bug when we were at UCLA.
Kent
@The Dangerman:
Hey CA people. Speaking of CA colleges and universities. I have a very bright 11th grader who will most likely be attending college here in the Northwest at UW, UO or one of the local liberal arts colleges like Reed or UPS. But we are going to do a college visit swing down to CA this summer. Probably to mostly visit private schools as the UC schools seem out of reach for out-of-state folks. We haven’t really started the real research but Occidental, USC, and Pomona are on the radar. Anyplace else we should visit? She is a bright liberal artsy type interested in a lot of things but also digital arts and animation.
Another Scott
@trollhattan: I saw him and Adrian Belew in the reformed King Crimson in college. Good show!
There were/are so very many good drummers out there. Buddy Rich was amazing for his time. I have memory of an old clip of him playing with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, just making it all look so easy. The original drummer for Cheap Trick seemed to be doing a homage to him.
Of course, Moon, and Baker, and Bonham. And Starkey isn’t too bad either.
Cheers,
Scott.
trollhattan
@The Dangerman:
Thanks, I’ll know if she’s serious after the trip and have a gazillion questions. Also has an app in at UCSB, which also would not suck. I’m telling her to consider going to school somewhere she’ll never afford as a regular person. :-)
Dad gets to visit for four years!
debbie
@raven:
Seconded. I know nothing about Rush, but I can’t imagine anyone being a better drummer than Keith Moon! Just for this alone!
The Dangerman
@trollhattan:
For drummers I’ve seen … Phil Collins backed up Eric Clapton one night long ago, so he might take it. Very underrated. For percussionists, I’ve always enjoyed watching Ray Cooper. Yeah, names you’ve all heard about.
Bassists would be easier (and, recall, I don’t really say better or best generally) but Victor Wooten, full stop (who, BTW, did a song with Travis Larson, referenced above).
I don’t know about guitarists. That would require some thought…
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Another Scott: Starkey, never heard of him. //
EmanG
I got grounded for 6 weeks for defying my parents refusal to let me go see Rush on a school night in 1978. It was the Hemispheres tour and as a rock obsessed fledgling bass player I wanted nothing more than to see my heroes for the second time. The first being when they opened for Nugent the Asshole on the “All the World’s a Stage Tour”, my introduction to them. That album was like pouring cayenne pepper directly onto all my brains and Farewell to Kings and Hemispheres only added to my fervor.
I’d gone as far as to compose and typewrite a letter to my parents explaining why is was so important to me, that I’d make it to school no problem, etc. They couldn’t see it and declined.
Cut to day of the concert. My parents worked late, I was at my friend Kurt’s house. His brother had volunteered to take us to the show and something in me clicked and it was suddenly “Fuck it, let’s go anyway”. My first serious refusal to acknowledge my parents authority and I’d never been so simultaneously thrilled and terrified.
Totally worth it.
It’s an odd feeling mourning the death of a stranger so deeply, even if their work touched you so profoundly and informed your life in ways innumerable. Godspeed Ghostrider and thanks.
raven
@Kent: My niece is a Banana Slug and she loves it. She got accepted to Reed but, damn $$$$$$$$.
Kent
@debbie: My 8th grade daughter is a drummer and obsessed with old classic rock so she knows of all those old guys. Keith Moon she says is just insane and impossible to copy because doesn’t keep the beat, he just does his own crazy thing. All the other famous drummer she can mimic except Moon.
raven
@Another Scott: Belew moved to Champaign just as I left.
debbie
@Kent:
Every time my boyfriend cued up Yes on his stereo, I shrieked, “NOOOOOOOO!”
PsiFighter37
@Kent: Reed is where Steve Jobs went to school for a little bit, if memory serves me right.
The Dangerman
@Kent:
As Glendale Bill will know, in UCLA lingo, this would be North Campus (not sure about digital arts, actually), and I only visited North Campus to go to URL (Library) or to be in the area of an extremely high density of gorgeous women (Boelter Hall, Engineering, had a few, but North Campus was legendary and for good reason).
Anyway, mostly out of my area of expertise. As much as I detest saying it, USC might be worth looking at as I think Lucas gave them a gajillion dollars (from spare change he found in his sofa I understand).
Amir Khalid
@Another Scott:
Do you mean Zak Starkey, or his dad Ringo?
Kent
@raven: Yeah. If I want to retire before age 70 I need to steer her towards UW or maybe Western Washington in Bellingham. The UO in Eugene has pretty decent merit scholarships for OOS students that she already qualifies for based on grades and her first attempt at the SAT. That would close most of the gap between in-state and out of state tuition at the UO. She has a decent chance of getting into Reed which is kind of scary as we’ll not likely qualify for much if any need-based aid. And it is my alma matter. But back when I was going there tuition was about $8,000 per year and the average student could swing it with student loans, a campus and summer job, and a little help from the parents. These days it is just ridiculous.
We haven’t honestly looked into the prospect of CA public schools because the impression is that they are out of reach for OOS students, at least the UC schools. Stanford is ridiculously out of reach. As probably is USC these days. She just isn’t interested in doing that hyper competitive admissions game. So it’s kind of a question of what else is there down south of us in CA.
trollhattan
@Kent:
You have to bribe your way into USC [kidding, but had to say it].
Several CSUs are part of the WUE, so have her look at those for possibilities. CSU is far larger than the UC system and she would pay the in-state rate.
Cal and UCLA are impossible, while some other UCs are not nearly as hard to enter but the out-of-state rate is pretty high.
Santa Clara is an excellent school to consider. Saint Mary’s? My kid may apply to Oxy and they have access to Cal Tech classes, which is pretty cool. My head is swimming in colleges and I can hardly remember which ours has applied to, is still considering applying, or has booted off the list. There’s a spreadsheet.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@raven: I hear it’s a nice campus(I’ve only been to Berkeley, Irvine*, and of course UCLA), but I when I was applying, UCSC graduates were having problems applying to grad school because they didn’t have grades, so no GPA. I think they moved away from written evaluations to grades when I was in college.
*Just to help the kid buy books for what turned out to be a short tenure at Irvine.
trollhattan
@debbie:
But you said “NOOOO!” in a Roundabout way, Yes?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Amir Khalid: Zak Starkey didn’t learn to play the drums from his dad, Kieth Moon taught him the drums.
raven
@Kent: I just retired. . .at 70.
Another Scott
@Amir Khalid: I meant Richard. ;-)
But his kid Zack is great in the Who tours, also too.
Cheers,
Scott.
debbie
@Kent:
A roommate was a drummer and he said he could do Moon’s Happy Jack solo for maybe a minute before his arms fell off.
raven
@debbie: Have him try Train time!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wX9muArmeFg
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: You know who went to Oxy? I’m not talking about Jack Kemp.
debbie
@trollhattan:
More like a shrieky Lightning Hopkins.
CarolPW
@raven: I’m a slug too, and it was life changing. I grew up on a small farm so any college was going to be life changing, but UCSC was perfect for me. And since it was only three years after it accepted its first students it was still small enough (although way bigger than the community closest to where I grew up) to be not a huge shock. You actually got to know most of the people on campus.
Kent
@trollhattan: Santa Clara is one I think we need to put on the list. Honestly this is more of an excuse to take a week or so road trip through CA with the kid while my wife stays home and works. Prerogative of being a teacher.
I did the same thing with my older daughter but we were living in TX at that time so it was a summer road trip and cultural safari across the deep south to mostly SEC and ACC schools. She wound up at University of Arkansas and is 1 semester away from graduating. It was the right choice for her as she was a very median student, not academic at all. And really wanted the social sorority thing which she eventually grew out of but had to do.
Middle daughter is super bright 4.0 student who hit 1450 on her first go at the SAT without prep (770 verbal) so she is in the running for most of the selective private schools but isn’t interested in angling for the really competitive stuff like the Ivies and Stanford. But she is probably Reed or Occidental or Pomona material which are all equally ridiculously expensive.
She should be able to pretty easily get into the UW in Seattle and their Honors College so if we are going to go the big university route that is probably going to be the most logical option over any of the CSU options. The other WUE option that is vaguely interesting is University of Utah. I think the Arizona schools are also part of it but I don’t think any of them are as highly rated as UW in Seattle. And if she wants to make her home here in the Northwest after college then UW is probably a better choice anyway.
debbie
@raven:
Now that’s endurance!
The drummer for Santana also had impressive endurance, drugs or no.
Brachiator
@Kent:
In Southern California, USC and yes, even UCLA are worth checking out. Also, ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena.
Barbara
@Kent: If interested you should check out schools committed to need blind admissions and no student debts. Swarthmore, Williams and Amherst are all in this camp, I believe but there are others.
Patricia Kayden
Shed a few tears when I heard of Neil’s passing. He will be missed.
CarolPW
@?BillinGlendaleCA: The written evaluations got me my first real job, because when you have no prior job history you don’t have a lot of options for recommendations, and a lot of employers don’t care what your GPA is. Five years later, I got into graduate school (something I had never imagined doing) and my job history and interviews was all they cared about.
raven
@CarolPW: This young lady was. . .troubled for a while. She has blossomed there and is an absolute delight.
Patricia Kayden
Great thread by Chuck D re Peart.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
I listened to many Rush songs last night that I hadn’t played since early high school. Neil’s lyrics and drumming really made Rush stand out. Lots of great songs on albums from the 80s, even Roll The Bones (’91) which was new when I got into them. Soundtrack of my adolescent yearning…
“I believe there’s a ghost of a chance that we can find someone to love… and make it last…”
RIP Neil.
trollhattan
@Kent:
Grew up in Seattle so have a soft spot for UW and especially its campus. Is there a more photogenic stadium setting than Husky Stadium? Not in the States, there ain’t. Was accepted into the UW honors program but decided I had to go out of state. Ultimately it was the decision but we always wonder about the path not taken.
For many 18YOs, a truly fresh beginning is just what they need.
burnspbesq
Peart had extraordinary chops, to be sure. But to my ears, he never found the secret to saying more with fewer notes. That’s what keeps him off the top of my list of the great drummers (which starts, FWIW, with Tony Williams and Jack DeJohnette).
CarolPW
@Kent: Don’t forget the National Merit Scholarship. I got one, and it would have paid full tuition for 3 years anywhere I wanted to go. Since I went to a UC, which at the time had no tuition, it didn’t make any difference to my choices (and Reed was interested in me).
Jeffro
Grace under pressure
A show of hands
vapor trails (remastered, of course)
and clockwork Angels
plus A few other great songs here and there ?
Kent
Our problem is that we are unlikely to qualify for much if any aid. My wife is a physician and I’m a teacher so our combined income puts us in a pretty high parent contribution category. We didn’t even bother to even fill out the FAFSA for my older daughter’s 4 years at the Univ. of Arkansas. Just sent them full tution checks every semester.
But what one can do on paper isn’t always what one can do in real life. My wife’s family is from Chile and we have various family obligations down there that we support. Full time live-in help for elderly parents and lots of trips back and forth between Portland and Santiago and occasional leave without pay for my wife to go down. So while Reed or Pomona might think we can write an annual $75,000 check for college, that isn’t necessarily our reality.
This is what makes me what to fucking scream when I hear Buttigieg and Klobuchar with all their means testing nonsense for college. Yes I know there are a lot of folks in more difficult circumstances and we have it pretty easy. But still. Knock it off with all the means testing crap. Other more civilized countries don’t play those games and we shouldn’t either. I a social benefit is worth doing, it’s worth doing for everyone.
Kent
@CarolPW: I was a national merit scholar back in the dark ages. But unfortunately dear daughter didn’t score that high on the PSAT. She just got the scores back and was 1440-something. Which is good and maybe would have been national merit level in the past. But today the threshold is up in the 1540 range. They haven’t announced this year’s crop of semifinalists. But I’m pretty sure she isn’t there. But yeah, that would have been nice. There are some schools these days that give full rides to national merit scholars in an attempt to bump up their rankings.
CarolPW
@raven: I wasn’t exactly troubled, but a complete loner because everyone around me were pieces of shit – the boys in my high school started the Nazi worship in 1966, and you will appreciate that they all said they were going to go to Nam and kill “gooks.”
So when I got there and there were actual interesting and not ghastly people to interact with, I think blossoming is a good description.
trollhattan
@Kent:
What you said. A professional couple living in Santa Barbara pulling down half a mil are probably mid-middle income once housing costs are factored. I suppose Mayor Pete thinks if you only work hard enough you, too can meet Caroline Kennedy and get a Rhodes Scholarship! Easy-peasey.
Brian
@trollhattan: Wikipedia lists five songwriting credits to Bruford on the first five albums, only one of them solo (Five Percent of Nothing).
D Gardner
Rush came into my life when I was a high school sophomore, a year or so after I bought my first drum set. Their clinical mastery of difficult time signatures, wall of sound, and rhythmic complexity combined with their interesting lyrics to mesmerize me. This was the Moving Pictures album, and Tom Sawyer, Red Barchetta, and Limelight have been embedded in my brain ever since. I saw them 5 or 6 times in concert, and I was astonished at the fidelity of their live shows to the studio performances.
Obviously, I considered Peart the ultimate master of his craft, and his lyrics always interested me.
Thanks Neil – you have no idea how much joy you’ve brought me for decades.
Chris Johnson
@trollhattan:
Big Bruford fan here: I’ve even met him, attended a talk he gave. I gave him a bent cymbal like a treasured one he used to have, which confused and dismayed him, but he was nice and went ‘do you want me to have this?’ and yeah, I did.
Bruford played with Yes, King Crimson, Genesis, Gong, Brand X, Chris Squire, Allan Holdsworth, King Crimson again, Earthworks, King Crimson even more, Al Di Meola, Jamaaladeen Tacuma, etc, etc… and, he played on Burning For Buddy, the tribute album for Buddy Rich organized by Neil Peart. :)
Immanentize
@Another Scott: Also:
Leon Helm
Don Hemley
Pete Thomas
Stewart Copeland
Larry Mulland
Chuck Ruff
Billy Ficca.
Etc.
trollhattan
@Kent:
Mine finished in the whatever category is below semi-finalist. Semi-semi-finalist? Ah well.
Good grades, good test scores, gobs of AP, high-poverty level high school, and sort of a jock. We’re cautiously optimistic. She’ll have choices, but budgets loom.
Immanentize
@Another Scott: I saw Robert Fripp doing Frippatronics in a record store in Pittsburg.
CarolPW
@Kent: Do they (National Merit) still do a separate test? When I made it the test was called something like the NMSQT. My PSAT was good but not great, but the NMSQT made the difference.
Kent
@trollhattan:
I grew up in Oregon and went to UW for grad school back in the 90s. We live in the Vancouver WA area so right across the bridge from Portland. Funny thing is that since this area is mostly a Portland suburb it is more UO and OSU country rather than UW. So going to UW is “amost” out of state for her even though it actually is in-state. Most of the affluent Vancouver suburbs are populated by recent Oregon transplants and Californians so you see alot more UO and OSU swag around here than UW or WSU. It’s strange. Even at our local Costco in Vancouver you see UO swag out on the tables but no Husky stuff.
I will be super happy if she chooses UW. It would be a convenient 3 hour Amtrak trip to send her up there as she wouldn’t need a car to live in the U-District. But we are still going to do our due diligence and visit all the options. So far we have visited UW, WSU, WWU, Reed, and Lewis & Clark.
We are also going to go visit UBC in Vancouver and UVic in Victoria just for kicks. Going to Canada as an International student is about as costly as attending an US state school as an OOS student and nowhere near as costly as paying full freight at a prestigious private school.
Immanentize
@Another Scott: I saw Adrian Belew at his first ‘public’ appearance with the Talking Heads in Mossport, Canada at the Heatwave festival.
Kent
@CarolPW: These days it is based 100% on the PSAT score. Although to move from the semifinalist to finalist stage you also have to do well on the SAT. But there is no additional separate step or test.
Immanentize
@raven: Reed is a very cool school….
raven
@CarolPW: I bet they got over that shit.
Barbara
@Kent: There has been massive disinvestment from public education at all levels and it is unjustified. I support higher funding of state schools that materially reduces tuition. But I think people need to understand that European largesse for higher education is accompanied by a lot of other policies that might work in Europe but are likely to perpetuate discrimination here, such as early vocational tracking.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@CarolPW: It depends of the field, for the professional schools(medicine and law in particular) UCSC was a problem at the time.
Immanentize
@Kent: Don’t worry about yourself or retirement. Spend every dollar you have or can find on the best college for your kid. My view, to be sure….
Felanius Kootea
@Kent: You already have Pomona and Occidental on your list. Take a look at Loyola Marymount/LMU. I have some non-Catholic friends who attended and liked it.
On the East Coast there’s also Sarah Lawrence, Vassar and Smith has a decent Digital Art program headed by Joseph O’Rourke.
raven
@Immanentize: I’m sure but he’s just a lowly lawyer and no way could he afford that or the northeast schools where she was accepted.
If the lightning stops we’re off to the party hosted by the Federalist Society lady!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: The Rose Bowl’s no slouch on visual atmosphere, you have the San Gabriels as a backdrop. As a UW alum, it’s a nice campus.
Immanentize
@Barbara: Yale is one, too
BruceFromOhio
@mrmoshpotato: was there. Great show!
Kent
@trollhattan: I think “National Merit Commended Scholar” is the next step down which earns you a nice certificate and maybe mention in the local paper but nothing else.
Our kids sound pretty similar but mine is more artsy and less jock, although she did run cross country this fall. I expect both our kids will have plenty of options outside the super elite HYPS type schools. It’s just a matter of finding the right place we can afford.
Immanentize
@Kent: Best advice my son gives seniors? Take the ACT too. He did great on the SAT. Crushed the ACT. It tests different skills.
Immanentize
@CarolPW: The National merit scholarship ain’t what it used to be. It never came with any $$$ but schools used to compete for Scholars more back when. And every state is different. A score that lands you a NMS award in Indiana is several points less than what gets you one in Massachusetts, for example.
phein60
Rush played the KSHE Kite Fly in St Louis in ’75, and there was something about them that made them stand out from the other opening acts that came through town. “Fly By Night” was their big hit locally. Next time I heard of them was the following year in Alaska as a 17 year-old paratrooper, and they were big among the audiophiles in the barracks. I lost track of Rush after Farewell to Kings, but I can still hear that bass line on “Xanadu,” and Geddy’s vocals on “Closer to the Heart.”
The best Rush critique I ever heard was that they were like a garage band where everyone gets to play solos, all the time. Not true, but it reflected the virtuosity of all three members of the band.
Kent
@Barbara: The other thing people don’t understand about Europe or Canada or frankly the rest of the developed world is that most students outside the US mostly just go to school close to home and often just live at home during college. The whole thing about applying to 25 colleges across the country and then going off to live in the dorms, join sororities, and go to football games is very much an American experience and not what the rest of the world does.
If you peel away all the athletic programs and the posh dorms and sports facilities with lazy rivers and yoga studios. And get rid of 90% of the overpaid administrators like the $250,000/year dean of student experience” types then tuition starts getting more affordable already.
Immanentize
@Kent: The SAT has nothing to do with the National Merit Scholarship. It is pure PSAT plus a second level of ???? But no further test scores are ever considered.
CarolPW
@Kent: Poo, unfortunate.
Kent
@Immanentize: Thanks. We might do that. Her SATs are already probably more than high enough for the majority of schools she is interested in. But it can’t hurt. For some reason her HS really focuses on the SAT and ACT.
CarolPW
@raven: A couple of them may have, but most probably got bone spurs.
Immanentize
@raven: Talk to me sometime about this, I have ideas. If you want to help the lawyer, I mean. ,?
Immanentize
@phein60: My BiL, a huge Rush fan, named his cat ‘Geddy.’. He went to see Rush at Red Rock. Claims he is in the picture on the album cover
CarolPW
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Understood, and it was talked about at the time I went there. But the evaluations were priceless when applying for a chemists job with a bachelors, and the GPA didn’t matter.
Mr. Mack
I’m a little tired, so forgive if i make no sense. All of the other drummers mentioned in this thread are great artists, and I’m not one to rate art on any kind of scale. I’m 63, and have been a drummer for 55 years…not professionally, just a layman trying to get better. Neil was such a craftsman that at an advanced age, (too lazy to look it up) but he was nearly 60, he completely re-tooled his style because he knew he could be even better. Better he got. I cried when I heard. Seen him live 8 times. I’m sorry, no one came close to his matching his work.
Kent
I studied this a bit. What they do is award the same percentage of students the NMS in each state based on population. So Mississippi gets as many NM finalists per capita as Minnesota even though a much higher percentage of kids take the exam in MN. To achieve this they have a separate score threshold in each state to generate equal percentages based on population. This means high achieving states like MN and MA have higher score thresholds than states like MS or LA.
But there are quite a few schools that do award full ride scholarships for all national merit scholars. Two that I have come across in our college visit tours were University of Alabama and University of Oklahoma. Which are both state schools that are trying hard to push themselves up in the national rankings.
Another Scott
@Immanentize: I did much better on the ACT than the SAT as well.
Back in my day, I didn’t appreciate how important the PSAT was before I took it. :-/ These days around here (Fairfax Co, VA) I’ve heard stories about 7th graders taking the SAT. It’s nuts. :-(
Cheers,
Scott.
trollhattan
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
True. The one time I went to the Rose Bowl for the…Rose Bowl (Warren Moon, represent!) the San Gabriels were out in all their glory. And sitting with 100k of your closest friends? Priceless. Nothing like it.
raven
@Immanentize: I’m not sure there is anything do be done. I guess most people, except local lawyers, have no idea of her association with the FS. We don’t see them very often, usually just at this party, and I don’t know that it’s worth it for me to care.
Kent
Not true. The College Board which administers the National Merit Scholarship program only uses the PSAT to screen for NM semifinalists. That is indeed true. But they aren’t the body that grants the actual scholarships. The great majority of National Merit Scholarships are administered by individual colleges and universities as part of their merit aid scholarships. And they can put on any additional requirements they want. So a college or university might well have a National Merit Scholarship in which you can be a semifinalist based on your PSAT scores, but that you need to jump through additional steps like SAT scores, grades, and recommendations to earn an actual scholarship. They can do anything they want.
Omnes Omnibus
@Immanentize: Unless it has changed, the SAT is involved. The PSAT score determines Semi-Finalists, but an SAT score that does not come in the same general range can eliminate someone. I came out of a fairly special high school class where we had 12 Semi-Finalists, 11 of whom became finalists, and 7 were Scholars. It was a class of less than 250 in a small central WI city. We were very aware of the selection criteria.
Immanentize
@Another Scott: That is just too crazy. My wife was a NMS and got a free ride to UT Austin in the late 80’s. My son, the Immp in MA, was a National Merit commendation fellow. Would have been a NMS in Texas where his Mom was…. Oh well. He was high on the SATs, but ended up at 36 on the ACT. Best move he has made so far.
Immanentize
@raven: understood. Times 10
Jim, Foolish Literalist
me neither
WTF? For practice?
Mnemosyne
@Kent:
I mean, if you’re dreaming big and will be in So Cal anyway, why not make an appointment at CalArts? It’s still THE top animation school. Other folks have already recommended Art College in Pasadena, which is relatively close to Occidental do you could probably see both in one day.
If she’s thinking more about film in general, my grad school LMU is a top 10 film school that flies under the radar. Not as many resources as USC or UCLA, but produces a lot of graduates who actually get industry jobs after graduation.
(I mean, not me, but that’s the tough thing about getting an arts degree in your 30s.)
Kent
@Another Scott: Here in Camas WA (affluent suburb of Portland) all Sophomores automatically take the PSAT. Many freshmen also take it. The only one that actually counts for anything is the junior year PSAT, anything earlier than that is just for practice.
The PSAT is administered by ordinary teachers in classrooms during the school day with much lower security than the SAT which is usually on weekends at specific test centers with much higher security and College Board hired proctors. As a teacher I have given the PSAT many many times, but never the SAT.
But 7th graders taking the SAT? That’s a level of crazy that we haven’t gotten to yet out here.
James E Powell
@Kent:
As long as you’re going to Pomona, you should check out the Claremont Colleges.
CarolPW
@Kent: Well, I luckily met whatever was required at the time but that was a world far away now.
Very nice to see families so informed about testing and supportive of their kids college plans and aspirations. Neither of my parents went to college, and since my high school counselor thought the only possible career for me was to become a beautician (no rag from me on beauticians but my aptitude for that is less than zero) I had to figure it all out by myself.
The Dangerman
@trollhattan:
These days, any place remotely close to the Ocean in most of California is insane. Maybe you have to go as far North as Eureka to have affordable near the water (admittedly, the Lost Coast has a long stretch of basically unbuildable). Maybe you have to go as far as Crescent City (which is basically Oregon by that point and is a fairly depressed area by anyones standards). There are then those enclaves that are just outta control like Santa Barbara.
UCSB is a great campus (any campus with it’s own beach scores high in my evaluation). The only negative I would say about UCSB and Isla Vista is there are some monster parties there (Halloween is particularly out of control there). There used to be big parties in SLO, too, but after the last Poly Royal Riot, the campus (and the city) laid down the law. Mostly the campus (oh, yeah, wanna get booted, start a problem at a party). Mardi Gras used to be huge here, but, again, the city said no more.
Baltimore Ravens might be in a little bit of trouble here. And they go to commercial to Rush (Distant Early Warning, I think, but I’m not at 100%).
Immanentize
@Kent:
@Omnes Omnibus:
Ok, I just looked it up. There is no further testing necessary to become a finalist, but, to get a scholarship from a school:
I did not know that there was an additional step. I guess lots of slips between cup and lip.
EmanG
@Immanentize: I always try to use “envious” instead of “jealous” when referring to another’s experience. I am so jealous right now ;)
Immanentize
@James E Powell: My son’s bestie is at Harvey Mudd. The Immp thought it oppressive. But he has friends at Claremont and they love it!
Kent
@Mnemosyne: She is 16 and an anime-freak. If she was left to her own resources she would just want to go to some animation school and then work for PIXAR or LAICA studios up here. But of course we parents know better what the real world is actually like. So I’m trying to steer her towards some sort of more comprehensive liberal arts school where she can study a lot of things and get a more marketable major while still picking up the digital arts stuff on the side. UW in Seattle has a really top Digital Arts and Experimental Media program through their immense college of computer science and engineering. It’s not an undergraduate major per se, but something you can attach to another degree. So that is on our radar. UO has something similar but after that there aren’t really any other similar programs here in the PNW. The art programs are mostly all conventional (non-digital) arts.
USC and UCLA programs are famous but also famously impossible to get into without a world-class portfolio and everything else. So we will just have to go down and poke around. LMU was not on the radar so we’ll have to add that to the list. Seems like most of the good options are in LA rather than the Bay Area.
Immanentize
@CarolPW: My wife hated her high school counselor til her dying day for that reason. She should have gone to an engineering school, but “executive assistant” was all the fucker could come up with.
My test: Have you ever known a high school college counselor tell a kid they should be a high school college counselor?
Another Scott
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: There are some very selective public high schools here, like the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology. Lots of high-stakes admissions testing for 8th graders who want to go there. I thought that the SAT was considered/required, and so that would make sense for 7th graders to take it (for practice), but it appears they use different tests.
It’s still kinda nuts that 7th graders are taking tests designed for 11th-12th graders… :-/ That story talks about parents trying to get their kids into the track to go to TJ with tutoring starting in 3rd grade.
Cheers,
Scott.
(“Who heard Ronan Farrow on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me today talking about going to college at age 11…”)
Kent
I thought Pomona was one of the Claremont colleges. There is what, 5 of them? When I say Pomona I really mean it as a placeholder for all of them. I don’t know the area. My only actual time in LA was 30 years ago when I visited a friend on the way home from the Peace Corps in Guatemala. Been to the Bay Area a bazillion times and through LAX a bunch but know nothing else of LA except what I’ve seen on TV. That’s kind of why a road trip with the kiddo is in order. Just for kicks mostly. I love road trips and we have never really explored Southern California
It might be the last chance I have to do something just the two of us before she leaves home.
Immanentize
@EmanG: It was one of the greatest concerts I ever attended.
Rockpile with Edmunds and Lowe
Holly and the Italians
Elvis Costello
B-52s
Pretenders
The Kings (switching to Glide)
And,
The brand new big band version of the Talking Heads
The Rumour were also there, but no Graham Parker because he was famous that summer.
Getting there and back was a trip too. I’ve got great pics.
Kent
@CarolPW: My parents were very middle class teacher and nurse who were both the first of their families to go to college in the 1950s. So they were supportive of college for me but within their limited notion of going on to become a doctor or lawyer. I had to figure the rest out myself.
I’m now on my second career as a teacher after spending a decade working as a marine fisheries biologist for NOAA in Alaska. It is really depressing to see the enormous disparity in expectations between the affluent class who are immensely competitive about college (go to a dinner party around here with parents and the talk is about nothing else). And the working class who seem to have the Trump skepticism of college to begin with and generally only support the notion of “getting your basics” at the local community college for cheap and then transferring to some 4-year school, maybe.
We are really turning into two separate countries. I guess it has always been that way to some extent, but it seems worse now.
CarolPW
@Immanentize: Shit, that’s terrible, even worse than beautician. And yes, I will hate mine until I die for making everything so hard. The only reason I would ever go to a high school reunion was if he attended so I could tell that idiot I had a Ph. fucking D. in agricultural and environmental chemistry, and I still don’t care what my hair or anyone else’s looks like. I take some satisfaction in thinking that almost certainly he is dead by now.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Immanentize: I’m not much for big concerts, being crowd-phobic, but that’s a line-up I would’ve loved to see.
The Pale Scot
@The Dangerman: Bassiests?
Bootsy Collins, Stanley Clarke, Victor Wooten, Alissia Benvenist in…
Bass-Rigged System
Bootsy’s studio puts out a lot of good stuff mixing new talent and friends.
Omnes Omnibus
@Immanentize: Okay. I was going off nearly 40 year old memories.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@raven: True.
@Immanentize: @Another Scott: Also true.
Steve Gadd as well, I believe.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: I think it only seats around 90K now, much more intimate. Here it is this year.
Martin
I’m not aware of any school that admits based on NMS. Certainly no public university. But NMS is used pretty broadly to reach out to potential students to encourage them to apply.
ACT is generally more strongly based in what students learn in class, SAT is more strongly based in problem solving, it tends to be a bit more abstract. Different students tend to do a bit better on one kind of test than the other. Almost all universities have a very minor preference for one over another. We’ve never seen any meaningful difference between them, but we have more data around SAT so we use SAT as the baseline and use the concordance to equate the ACT scores – we really don’t care. Mostly, they scores aren’t predictive to start with, so why get hung up on which mostly useless test they take?
The key takeaway for parents and students applying to public universities is that we pretty universally weigh admissions in the local context. What matters most is how many of your schools educational opportunities to took advantage of, how many extracurricular opportunities someone of your household income took advantage of, and how you stack up against other individuals like you or at your school. As such, you’re much better off being the best student in a meh school, than a meh student at the best school.
And in the extracurriculars we’re looking for initiative and independence. When you school says ‘here’s an extracurricular opportunity to volunteer for special olympics’ yeah, go do it, because special olympics is worth supporting, but we’re not going to care that you, like 1000 other students, signed up for something that wasn’t really your idea or initiative. We’re looking for individuals that have their own interests. It doesn’t need to be related to your major or even something that looks amazing. You have a cow that you’re excited that you enter at the state fair. Ok! That’s not something we see every day. You and your dad rebuilt a car engine and you learned a bunch of car shit? Again, not something we see every day.
Basically, we’re all interesting people, just not always in the ways one another appreciate. Admissions officers job is to recognize your interesting thing. Your job is to tell us about it. If you look like the last 15 students I read, your SAT scores aren’t likely to sway me. You know how to fly a plane or volunteered for your house reps campaign? I’m gonna go easy on those test scores.
And we know that hard works makes up for a lot of test shortcomings. Show us you’re a hard worker.
Another Scott
@The Pale Scot: OO has pointed me to Bootsy before. I need to listen to him more. But my favorite will probably always be Entwistle.
(repost) Won’t Get Fooled Again – Isolated Bass (11:10)
Cheers,
Scott.
Immanentize
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
It was a perfect thing in that moment. Damn! I am so lucky to have decided, fuckit, let’s go! I am a big Talking Heads fan. Saw them a month after their first album can out in ’77 sitting on a foosball table in a shitty college bar in upstate NY called the “Other Place.” Saw them a dozen more times here and there, but the Heatwave performance was: Mind. Blown.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@Another Scott: Booty’s is an incredibly nice guy; I have friends who played with him and introduced. 2 years later he remember my name and how we met. Makes lots of charitable donations, quietly, in his hometown.
@The Pale Scot: Vic’s also a really nice guy in addition to a great talent. He mistook me for Crystal’s mother when he first saw me at a show, and apologizes still. Fun fact: he and Steve Bailey bought a gorgeous (looking and sounding) upright from Stanley Clarke to help him in a divorce, and then declined to sell it back.
But let’s not forget Chuck Rainey. And Jaco, who was a monster on bass.
Immanentize
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho:
Hey you! Waving! ??
Omnes Omnibus
@Another Scott: Marcus Miller.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kent: Pomona is also a city in southern CA, CalPoly Pomona is there.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@Immanentize: Howdy!! I think you have mail.
But it’s been insanely busy at work, so I may not have actually sent any…
James E Powell
@Kent:
When you said you were checking out Pomona it clicked in my aging brain as Cal Poly Pomona rather than Pomona College which is a Claremont College.
I don’t know anything first hand. I went on a couple of tours with students and I know people who went to Pitzer and Harvey Mudd.
Kent
@Martin: Hi Martin: My daughter who is a Chilean/American dual citizen and daughter of an immigrant mother is volunteering to tutor English to Central American refugees here in the Portland area. She is kind of looking to recover her Latino roots and acknowledge her vaguely immigrant and Hispanic roots. And is becoming something of a junior political activist.
I’m kind of curious if that sort of thing is vaguely unique or interesting to admissions counselors these days or just ordinary. One never really knows. If she stays in state it won’t make the slightest difference. I don’t know yet how much she is going to really pursue admissions at highly competitive private schools.
sheldon vogt
@trollhattan: King Crimson?
CarolPW
@Kent: It is much worse now. The farming community where I grew up was completely and thoroughly republican, but everyone wanted their kids to go to college. They funded the schools well, always came to the PTA meetings and were very involved.
My parents couldn’t help me with filling out the college applications or taking the tests, but they paid for them when money was tight and let me use the car to get to the site where they were giving the NMSQT 45 minutes away. And the best thing my dad ever said to me was he didn’t care what I grew up to do as long as it was interesting.
Immanentize
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho:I’ll look tomorrow. Had a rather detached holiday week or two. I’m officially on sabbatical now, but one would never know. I think I’ve been in to the office more than usual since January started.
Kent
@CarolPW: I’m a HS teacher not a counselor so I don’t directly advise students about college. But I usually have a lot of seniors and so do a lot of it informally and write lots of letters of recommendation.
It really depresses me to see how much anti-intellectualism has seeped into the working class. Or maybe mostly the white working class. I have so many parents who basically think academic college is a giant waste of time and money. Narrow tech schools in some highly “practical” practical technical field like say aircraft mechanics. OK. But just “going off to college?” Not so much. The recent GOP has just poisoned them.
Thinking about it, I think this is mostly a white phenomenon. The Vietnamese single mother who works at the local nail salon? Yeah. She wants her kid to go to Stanford and become a doctor for sure. And the working class black and Hispanic parents? They want their kids to go farther than they did but tend to be more practical about the path.
The GOP and it’s racist know-nothing evangelical wing have just poisoned this country in so many ways that will take generations to repair.
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
chopper
@Kent:
i live near u-dub and my wife is faculty at the medical school, so if either of my kids end up there i’ll be happy at least because they’re close.
The Pale Scot
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho:
Are they from Metuchen?
P-Funk still does their free show in Plainfield I here, used to live there
Martin
@Kent: Pomona College is one of the Claremonts. Cal Poly Pomona is just up the road a bit, as is Mount San Antonio Community College (MtSAC).
Martin
@Kent: It’s almost entirely a white phenomenon. Only white people are privileged enough to choose to be dumb and poor.
Avalie
@Kent: UC Santa Cruz might be a good fit.
mrmoshpotato
@BruceFromOhio: Nice! I saw them in Chicago.
Martin
@Kent: Of course! I would put the volunteerism in as extracurriculars and write about her involvement and desire to reconnect with her roots in one of her personal statements.
Privates are tricky because they’re all looking for different things. Publics are a lot more consistent in that regard.
One of the reasons we want to see that side of students is that about half of students change major, and it’s pretty common to see those interests play into that decision. We want students to find their right place, and that kind of requires students to know (or are at least working on knowing) who they are.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@The Pale Scot: No; they just did local fooling around for fun.
My pals who played with Adrian Belew recorded and toured with him, and he still plays tracks on the guy who does solo recording.
Another Scott
@debbie: I love, love, love what Moon did with “Doctor Jimmy” on Quadrophenia v2.
The last “Doctor Jimmy and Mr. Jim” stanza – that single “boop” – after all the frenetic drumming in the entire rest of the song…
:-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Martin
@Kent: I don’t think you can go wrong with any of the UCs. They’re all very different, though. Some are more urban, others more rural, and so on. I’d at least swing by as many as you can so she can see if a campus looks like a place she can see herself at – that’s really the biggest determinant of success. You can come down the 5 and hit Davis and Merced. Hit UCLA when you’re near LA. Run out to Riverside, head down to San Diego, up to Irvine, then head back out via the coast – hit Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, Berkeley.
Depending on how much time you have, of course.
Keep in mind that it’s easier for out of state students to get into UCs than it is for California students, entirely due to the state not subsidizing enough in-state students and there’s no mechanism for us to give any extra seats we have to in-state students.
Kent
I absolutely did not know this. That instantly changes perspectives quite a bit. If we are going to be paying full freight anywhere then places like Berkeley and UCLA will still likely be considerably cheaper than Pomona or Occidental, even with the out of state tuition.
Oregon offers merit scholarships of $15,000 per year for any OOS students with a 1450 SAT and 3.8 unweighted GPA which she already meets and that cuts out 75% of the difference in price between in-state and out of state. So UO is a reasonable alternative only slightly more expensive than staying in-state in WA. We haven’t even looked at anything in the UC system.
EmanG
@Immanentize: My goodness, where was that? (I know you mentioned but too lazy to go back and find out). The TH big band continues to be one of my favorite ensembles ever. “The Name of this Band is Talking Heads” 2nd album will forever be on my list. Were you lucky enough to know what you were witnessing or did that awareness come later? Also, Rockpile?!!! You found a lucky open window indeed :)
Ruckus
@The Dangerman:
I go by the USC campus on the Metro quite often and it looks like there has been a lot of rebuilding going on over the last 10 yrs or so and the campus looks a lot better than it did 12 yrs ago when my sister taught there and it wasn’t bad then. We had a memorial there for here when she passed. Which brings up – Fuck Cancer.
Death Panel Truck
@raven: “He (Ginger Baker) was really at the forefront of rock. It’s hard to find fault with the notion that he was the pioneer of a rock drummer. There was no context for him, no archetype. He is the archetype.”
–Neil Peart, Beware of Mr.Baker
Lavocat
Word.
WaterGirl
@trollhattan:
I have only skimmed the thread, but it looks like no one has expressed their appreciation for this. I cannot leave that unsaid.