Bang The Drum Slowly

Bang on the drum all day.
Go ahead. You could do it for weeks, months, even years, and you would never approach the brilliance of Neil Peart.
If you finished that last sentence with a "who?" feel free to spend the next few minutes clicking on cat videos and don't waste your time reading this. Neil was the drummer for Rush, who were only recently inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. They're Canadian, and while they rock as hard as any band, it's their national trait of politeness that kept them from stirring up the fuss that they might have. Their fans, on the other hand, have and continue to obsess on the sounds these men made over the span of forty-five years and twenty albums.
I was not originally among them, I confess. In those years that might have been considered their initial heyday, I was tracking a very different void. My punk/new wave era coincided with Permanent Waves, Hemispheres, and the seminal Moving Pictures. I callously filed this music in the "Oh Wow Rock File" and ignored it.
Until my freshman year in college. The guy across the hall had a record collection that rivaled my own in terms of eclecticism, and there was plenty of Rush in his rotation. I sat in his room, and after a rerun of Star Trek (the original series), he went to his stereo and cranked up "Tom Sawyer." Which was followed by "Limelight." Which was followed by my surrender to this power trio from Ontario. I found myself remembering all the times my good friend from high school, a drummer, had sung the praises of Neil Peart. This was back when I wasn't listening.
I was listening now.
My previously installed "greatest drummer" had been Carl Palmer, of Emerson, Lake and. My older brother had introduced me to his ferocious technical precision ten years earlier, and I hadn't had the time or inclination to worry about checking into this category since.
Now I was ready to hand over that top spot to Neil Peart. There were drummers whose licks I had pretended to play in the air in front of me, but I could not fathom how all these rhythms and noises came from one person: two arms, two legs, and a whirlwind of sound that not only provided some of the most intricate beats I had ever heard but melodic riffs from drums that took his sound out of the realm of strictly rhythm. I set aside my previous obnoxious sniping about Geddy Lee's voice and focused on the drumming of Neil Peart. Furious bursts mixed with delicate ringing of cymbals, he played with a delicacy and purpose not necessarily associated with rock drummers.
Oh, and he wrote the lyrics, including the song that I used to introduce my son the car nut to Rush, Red Barchetta. Telling the tale of a young man who flees an oppressive anti-automobile regime in a vehicle "from a better vanished time," Neal drew his inspiration from a science fiction story originally published in a 1973 issue of Road and Track. It was Neil's song Trees that finally got my wife to stop turning down the car radio every time a Rush song came on. Which allowed me a chance to air drum in the passenger seat.
It was reported that Neal died from brain cancer, but I think it is much more likely that he simply ascended to the heavens because he was just that good. He will be missed. He pounded, stomped and rocked the Terra. Aloha, Neil Peart.