The Enemy Within (song)

Last updated
"The Enemy Within"
Song by Rush
from the album Grace Under Pressure
Released12 April 1984
Genre
Length4:33
Label Anthem
Songwriter(s)
Producer(s)
  • Rush
  • Peter Henderson

"The Enemy Within" is a song by the Canadian rock band Rush. It was released on their 1984 album Grace Under Pressure .

Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as "rock and roll" in the United States in the early 1950s, and developed into a range of different styles in the 1960s and later, particularly in the United Kingdom and in the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, a style which drew heavily on the genres of blues, rhythm and blues, and from country music. Rock music also drew strongly on a number of other genres such as electric blues and folk, and incorporated influences from jazz, classical and other musical styles. Musically, rock has centered on the electric guitar, usually as part of a rock group with electric bass, drums, and one or more singers. Usually, rock is song-based music usually with a 4/4 time signature using a verse–chorus form, but the genre has become extremely diverse. Like pop music, lyrics often stress romantic love but also address a wide variety of other themes that are frequently social or political.

Rush (band) Canadian rock band

Rush was a Canadian rock band consisting of Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson (guitars), and Neil Peart. Formed in 1968, the band went through several configurations until arriving at its longest and most popular line-up when Peart replaced original drummer John Rutsey in July 1974, two weeks before the group's first tour of the United States.

<i>Grace Under Pressure</i> (Rush album) 1984 album by Rush

Grace Under Pressure is the tenth studio album by Canadian rock band Rush, released in April 1984 on Anthem Records. After touring for the band's previous album, Signals (1982), had come to an end in mid-1983, Rush started work on a follow-up in August. The band had decided to not work with its longtime producer Terry Brown, who had worked with Rush since 1975. The new material attenuated the group's change in direction towards a keyboard-oriented sound as per the previous album. After some difficulty in finding a suitable producer who could commit, the album was recorded with Peter Henderson.

Contents

Composition

The song is in the key of B minor, and is played in common time. [3] [4]

Greg Prato of AllMusic wrote that "The Enemy Within" is one of the band's first "funk-based" songs.<refname=allmusic>Prato, Greg. "Grace Under Pressure – Rush". Allmusic . Rovi Corporation . Retrieved 2012-03-11.</ref>

AllMusic Online music database

AllMusic is an online music database. It catalogs more than 3 million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musical artists and bands. It launched in 1991, predating the World Wide Web.

Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when African-American musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of soul music, jazz, and rhythm and blues (R&B). Funk de-emphasizes melody and chord progressions and focuses on a strong rhythmic groove of a bass line played by an electric bassist and a drum part played by a drummer, often at slower tempos than other popular music. Like much of African-inspired music, funk typically consists of a complex groove with rhythm instruments playing interlocking grooves that created a "hypnotic" and "danceable feel". Funk uses the same richly colored extended chords found in bebop jazz, such as minor chords with added sevenths and elevenths, or dominant seventh chords with altered ninths and thirteenths.

Christopher Thelen of The Daily Vault wrote that the song's rhythm has "a touch of a reggae feel". [5]

Reggae Music genre from Jamaica

Reggae is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, "Do the Reggay" was the first popular song to use the word "reggae", effectively naming the genre and introducing it to a global audience. While sometimes used in a broad sense to refer to most types of popular Jamaican dance music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that was strongly influenced by traditional mento as well as American jazz and rhythm and blues, especially the New Orleans R&B practiced by Fats Domino and Allen Toussaint, and evolved out of the earlier genres ska and rocksteady. Reggae usually relates news, social gossip, and political comment. Reggae spread into a commercialized jazz field, being known first as ‘Rudie Blues’, then ‘Ska’, later ‘Blue Beat’, and ‘Rock Steady’. It is instantly recognizable from the counterpoint between the bass and drum downbeat, and the offbeat rhythm section. The immediate origins of reggae were in ska and rocksteady; from the latter, reggae took over the use of the bass as a percussion instrument.

"The Enemy Within" is the first part of the "Fear" series, which consists of 4 parts and deals with the topic of fear. Drummer and lyricist Neil Peart said: "'The Enemy Within' was more difficult, because I wanted to look at how it affects me, but it was more than about me. I don't like to be introspective as a rule. I think I'm gonna set that down as my first rule, as "never be introspective!". [6]

Neil Peart Canadian-American drummer , lyricist, and author

Neil Ellwood Peart,, is a Canadian author and retired musician, best known as the drummer and primary lyricist for the rock band Rush. Peart has received numerous awards for his musical performances, including an induction into the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1983, making him the youngest person ever so honoured. His drumming has been known for its technical proficiency, and his live performances for their exacting nature and stamina.

Bill Banasiewicz said of the song in the book Rush Visions:

Neil plays a drum part on the song that reminds listeners how dexterous he really is. At one point during the chorus, he plays the high-hat with his left foot, then kicks his foot over to the closest bass drum, throws in an accent, then it’s back to the high-hat. On the next measure, he hits another accent on a claptrap in an odd time. His left foot moves back and forth between three percussive instruments, while his right foot plays the other double bass, his right hand rides the bell of a cymbal, and his left hand plays the snare, with drum fills thrown in to top it all off. [7]

Music video

The song's music video was the first played by the Canadian music television channel MuchMusic, which launched in August 1984. [8]

Reception

Ultimate Classic Rock ranked the song number 50 on their list of "All 167 Rush Songs Ranked Worst to Best", writing "this one's essentially a cocktail of early Police and Blue Oyster Cult's "(Don't Fear) The Reaper", with an added splash of synth and ska". [9]

Odyssey rated "The Enemy Within " 5/5, and wrote: "Geddy Lee's vocal delivery is iconic and fits the track perfectly. The overall feel of this track is somewhat upbeat for a song dealing with phobias, but I do not mind, as it is another very strong track from this album". [10]

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References

  1. ↑ "Revisit: Rush: Grace Under Pressure". 16 February 2016. Retrieved 12 July 2016.
  2. ↑ "Grace Under Pressure (1984) Stereogum" . Retrieved 12 July 2016.
  3. ↑ https://www.musicnotes.com/sheetmusic/mtd.asp?ppn=MN0063255
  4. ↑ https://findsongtempo.com/artists/rush/songs/the-enemy-within-8530b976-2572-4023-b209-32a84a89b168
  5. ↑ Thelen, Christopher (2019). "The Daily Vault Music Reviews : Grace Under Pressure". dailyvault.com. Retrieved 16 February 2019.
  6. ↑ https://www.songfacts.com/facts/rush/the-enemy-within
  7. ↑ https://rushvault.com/2011/02/06/the-enemy-within/
  8. ↑ "Remembering MuchMusic's birth days". Toronto Star. Canadian Press. Retrieved 31 October 2015.
  9. ↑ http://ultimateclassicrock.com/every-rush-song/
  10. ↑ Clouse, Matthew. "Rush: Grace Under Pressure Album Review". theodysseyonline.com. Retrieved 9 January 2019.
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