I love to write. It's my first love.

And the meek shall inherit the earth.

I'm a big believer of daylight in the studio.

Music is all about wanting to be better at it.

I feel a little uncomfortable about endorsements.

It's hard for me to just practice without writing something.

For me, how I feel about what I wrote down turns into a song.

I have always felt I was more accurately a Hard Rock musician.

So, I really don't consider myself a fabulous keyboard player.

I would like to shift more into writing for and producing people.

I guess, we were people who just dedicated to trying to get better.

I am moved more by melodies, song structure, and evocative textures.

I like to practice on the bass, but I don't do it as often as I should.

That is what intrigues me; songwriting and song structure and expression.

Some writing and production projects will be a great way to spend my elderly rock years.

Live albums are very important for Rush, and they became sort of a closing chapter for us.

When I do a take, I very often try things that I haven't planned to try to see if I can pull it off.

With me, satisfaction is always very fleeting with our work. I always get a little restless with it.

I have a lot of hobbies and I can be very remiss in reminding myself to go down to the basement to work.

If you have some magical chemistry that actually find the music you make compelling, that is a big bonus.

For me, there is a lot of room for improvement and there are a lot of things I would like to be better at.

I prefer to think of myself as a musician who is still learning and trying to do something every time out.

Sometimes it's nice to have a song that can be taken more then one way, so it can be interpreted differently.

I do love using keyboards and I love writing keyboard parts, but I am not a player in the true sense of the word.

I was thrilled to support the Teenage Cancer Trust while celebrating the music of The Who - a band that changed my life.

I liked the fact that I was forced to get inside of my emotions and to really try to figure out a lot of what I was going through.

Playing live is such a total visceral experience, and really, as a musician, you're trained from the beginning to be a live performer.

My studio is designed for atmosphere. I have a really cozy, comfortable room that has a great, huge glass door that views my backyard.

I worry about my voice 24/7 when I'm on tour. It's like a pitcher and his arm. It's constantly the thing that my whole life revolves around.

Live records of mine are very painful to listen to because you always think you can do it better. I don't think I have a single favorite one.

Certainly my personality, my sense of humor, my outlook on life was informed by the experiences of my parents and the stories they shared with me.

With the help of modern technology, I can compose intricate keyboard parts and then I have to go back and learn them in order to perform them properly.

If I start mining for opinions on hundreds of websites that have fan forums, I'll be totally distorted in my view of myself. I'll lose myself in all that.

First of all, when you live in a country like Canada, it's quite different from America in the sense that it's very tied to traditions that were born in Britain.

I feel safe and comfortable to do that once I know that the song structure around the bass part is very interesting and it satisfies me in a compositional sense.

Invisible airwaves crackle with life Bright antennae bristle with the energy Emotional feedback on a timeless wavelength Bearing a gift beyond price, almost free

So, I don't know what is going to happen when the CD comes out, how well it will sell, etc. But, from a personal point of view, it was a very worthwhile endeavor.

I think jamming is the way we begin to communicate. In the old days, people actually wrote notes on paper and sent them to each other. I guess that's how they jammed.

I think, basically, the music industry is scattered and in a mess. I think you've got lots of people that are so-called 'experts' that have no idea where it's headed.

There was a time when fast playing and fretboard pyrotechnics on the bass were important to me and when I am recording a bass track, that is still very important to me.

Well, I've been lucky. I've never gotten a voice polyp. I've never gotten nodes. But I do get sick, usually every tour, and to varying degrees. Sometimes it's a sinusitis.

The first song that made me interested in music was 'Oh, Pretty Woman' by Roy Orbison. It was the guitar intro, that riff, that I really liked and made me listen in a different way.

Something happens when you become an elder rock & roller and you're still functioning. People start to give you awards and recognize achievements. It's the life achievement period of your career.

My emotions are very simple and always have been about the Hall of Fame. It's something that I had absolutely nothing to do with and had no control over, so I never thought much about it, to be frank.

I think you just have to cross your fingers that there's enough artists out there that keep producing interesting work, and eventually it will form a kind of wave that will force people to pay attention to it.

Music turned to digital, and suddenly you had the possibility to make things louder than loudest, which boggles the mind but it's true, and what you have are all kinds of different ways of distorting your music.

But, I would be naive not to recognize the number of musicians who tell me they have been influenced by me and sight me - as well as Alex and Neil - as a musician who has been a positive influence on their playing.

I would like to think that Ben and myself have begun a partnership that will take us into different areas of music that we can continue to write, enjoy and keep me involved with music other then what I do with RUSH.

I have such an extreme attitude about work, where I can just completely be derelict of my responsibilities and then when I am not derelict, I am completely indulged in it. I swing pretty wildly from the two extremes.

I was taking piano lessons with a very good piano instructor in Toronto, and I'm afraid due to my schedule and discipline, it kind of fell apart. One thing lead to another and I was unable to practice as much as I wanted to.

Share This Page