Rush: Rush

My copy of this is in storage. I can't imagine I've listened to it for nearly a quarter of a century.

The truth is I never bought it in the first place. There was a the three-LP set Archives that packaged Rush's first three albums in a plain grey cover for much less than the cost of buying them separately. I bought that. But this was during my six-month adolescent shoplifting period, so I also half-inched the original sleeves from the racks of assorted retailers. I put the LPs from Archives into the stolen sleeves to create the effect of having bought all three albums.

This album was never more than a curio, since Rush didn't really become recognisable as Rush until Neil Peart joined for the second album, bringing an approach to drums and lyrics that was, whatever else you could say about it, distinctive. At it's best, it's second-rate Led Zep.

Remarkably, after this album, Rush produced several more that could claim to have worse covers than this one.

MusicBrainz entry for this album