2/23: The Loser

In which Baby!Alex plays showy and fast just for the hell of it. Also, Geddy scats.

Why did I ever wonder
That you would ever change?
But now I’m a loser,
And I’m always losing your game.

Today we have another deep, DEEP cut from the Laura Secord Secondary School performances featured on the R40 Box Set. It’s called “The Loser” and, well… what can I really say about this one?

The song is forgettable. I can’t bring myself to criticize it further than that, because the guys are so young in this performance, and anything I’d say feels like I’d be picking on grade schoolers. Which. I guess I sorta would be.

The performance isn’t much better. I don’t know if it’s nerves or a lack of conviction, but Geddy and Rutsey seem sedated throughout the performance. (Despite all the scat-esque ‘doo-doo-doos’ and fast drum fills, respectively.) Alex is the only one with any vim—possibly because he gets to absolutely shred it about midway through the song on his solo.

Yet it’s so obvious that this sound is absolutely the wrong fit for him. In my opinion, one of Alex’s greatest qualities as a musician is that he knows how to let a solo breathe; even when he plays fast, he knows how to leave space inside the music—whether it’s at the end of a measure, or at the end of the note, or in the middle of a phrase just to make you sit up and pay attention. He does beautiful things with timing (“Limelight” is an excellent example), once he realizes that he doesn’t have to speedrun his way through a solo in order to be considered Good™.

But here? He’s rushing it. On purpose, I think. It’s showy and fast for the sake of being showy and fast, and that’s so alien to my understanding of Alex Lifeson’s artistry that it’s kind of cool, in the abstract sense, to see him attempt it.