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Rush: Why do (most) Women not click with this band?
- Thread starter eddieout
- Start date
(Grrrrr ... embedding doesn't work. Watch at 1:25.)
Most women don't like Prog - any form of it including the Hard Prog of Rush. It's their loss for the most part.
DiabolusInMusic
Functionless Art is Merely Tolerated Vandalism
I don't know how many of you have ever played prog music but when you throw a packed dance floor two bars of 9/8 it really throws a pipe in the gears, trust me. I have no questions as to why girls do not like Rush.
I remember the first time I saw Rush in concert. I was floored they sold a Rush thong.
I remember the first time I saw Rush in concert. I was floored they sold a Rush thong.
A lot of women do like Rush.
I'm a woman and I love Rush (and I am not alone) - Salon.com
Someone else tweeted my review and tagged it with the flippant note: "A woman went to a Rush show!" The latter quip in particular rankled me: In fact, this was actually the third time I've reviewed a Rush concert for a professional publication, and at the Columbus show, there were couples composed of men and women everywhere. (I wasn't the only woman in the photo pit on assignment, either.) It was far from a sausagefest or any kind of gender-imbalanced event.
Perhaps my irritation about all this also stemmed from the fact that I know so many women of all ages who are Rush fans. Today, the perception that the band's supporters are still just nerdy, prog-loving guys is a yawn-worthy, outdated stereotype.
Here's a girl who blogs about her love for Rush:
And there's this:
Proving the existence of Rush's female fans - Home | q | CBC Radio
I'm a woman and I love Rush (and I am not alone) - Salon.com
Someone else tweeted my review and tagged it with the flippant note: "A woman went to a Rush show!" The latter quip in particular rankled me: In fact, this was actually the third time I've reviewed a Rush concert for a professional publication, and at the Columbus show, there were couples composed of men and women everywhere. (I wasn't the only woman in the photo pit on assignment, either.) It was far from a sausagefest or any kind of gender-imbalanced event.
Perhaps my irritation about all this also stemmed from the fact that I know so many women of all ages who are Rush fans. Today, the perception that the band's supporters are still just nerdy, prog-loving guys is a yawn-worthy, outdated stereotype.
Here's a girl who blogs about her love for Rush:
And there's this:
Proving the existence of Rush's female fans - Home | q | CBC Radio
This post confuses me...A lot of women do like Rush.
I'm a woman and I love Rush (and I am not alone) - Salon.com
Someone else tweeted my review and tagged it with the flippant note: "A woman went to a Rush show!" The latter quip in particular rankled me: In fact, this was actually the third time I've reviewed a Rush concert for a professional publication, and at the Columbus show, there were couples composed of men and women everywhere. (I wasn't the only woman in the photo pit on assignment, either.) It was far from a sausagefest or any kind of gender-imbalanced event.
Perhaps my irritation about all this also stemmed from the fact that I know so many women of all ages who are Rush fans. Today, the perception that the band's supporters are still just nerdy, prog-loving guys is a yawn-worthy, outdated stereotype.
Here's a girl who blogs about her love for Rush:
And there's this:
Proving the existence of Rush's female fans - Home | q | CBC Radio
Maybe you would like Blotted Science and Spaztic Ink but it is more metal than Dream Theater could ever be. A lot of interesting idea like doing serialism with less rules or playing something that would go over a movie
Using the broadest strokes possible, I would say that Rush, like a lot of technical or instrument driven music, lacks a certain something that women are looking for. Being a metal guy, I would use the example of the different genres within that category to make some observations.
First, women (speaking in generalities here) tend to like progressions they can easily identify; meaning sing along with, hum, or has a predictable beat they can dance too. They like choruses they can remember and sing along with. Glam/Hair Metal was popular with women because of this. Very few women don't like Warrants Cherry Pie, Def Leppard's Pour Some Sugar On Me, or Poison's Every Rose Has Its Thorn because they are easy to identify, are catchy, and can be sung along with. Rush isn't very catchy or memorable as far as riffs or choruses. Tech Metal band, Death Metal band, and Prog Metal band shows are sausage fests because they lack these, while Stone/Doom/Desert shows have more women because of "the riff."
Second, it seems that women want to have fun when they are listening to their music. They want to dance to upbeat music. They aren't looking for music that challenges their ears and has interesting tones to pick through. The music to them is secondary to the whatever is entertaining them. Again, Rush is many things, but fun isn't one of them. Neither are the metal genres I mentioned that they don't like, while the exceptions I mentioned can be very fun while drinking or smoking.
Third would be subject matter. The most popular songs ever are love songs. Rush and many other bands don't do love songs in the classic sense. The songs about romance, sex, breakups, etc are usually steeped in intellectualized imagery and back story. Funk is popular with woman because of the groove and because its about getting it on. Country has a lot of songs about the various states of a relationship.
Lastly, and while this seems lame but it is important, looks. The guys in Rush are fugly and Geddy's voice would never be considered sexy. Country is full of middle American "cowboys" that have good features. 90% of the guys in Rap/HipHop are ripped. Tween pop artists look like their should be hawking jeans for Hollister. Looks were important to the Glam/Hair scene, but these days most metal bands are ugly as #%$&. If a woman is into the bad boy biker look, they are down with some of the chunky guys because they look tough.
So I guess the question isn't why don't most click with Rush, it is why does any woman like them.
I like the overall gist of your post...but feel compelled to paste this-
People (a lot of them) having, what looks like fun, at a Rush concert.
I think I even spotted 2 girls in the crowd.
I like the overall gist of your post...but feel compelled to paste this-
People (a lot of them) having, what looks like fun, at a Rush concert.
I think I even spotted 2 girls in the crowd.
People are having fun a death metal shows kicking each other's @$$es, but its not quite the same kind of fun that woo-girls like to have.
I love them. My wife... not so much. It's Geddy's voice that puts her off. So I took my son to Clockwork Angels and R40 tours. He loved both.
This thread wins the all time TB dumb stereotyping award.
Please, some dude tell us again why the chicks don't like cerebral music.
Please, some dude tell us again why the chicks don't like cerebral music.
My fiancee likes Rush fairly well, even has a couple songs on her workout playlist. Ditto for Dream Theater.
Rush is tied with one or two others as my favorite band. I, like many other ignorant souls on display in this thread, paid much lip service to the early (pre-Signals) era of Rush and dismissed the rest. Growing up, I let my tastes dictate themselves (instead of having them handed to me on a platter etched with the words groove and soul) and found the Rush really does have heart - it just happens to be the heart of a few middle-class Canadian guys who really love playing music.
Rush is tied with one or two others as my favorite band. I, like many other ignorant souls on display in this thread, paid much lip service to the early (pre-Signals) era of Rush and dismissed the rest. Growing up, I let my tastes dictate themselves (instead of having them handed to me on a platter etched with the words groove and soul) and found the Rush really does have heart - it just happens to be the heart of a few middle-class Canadian guys who really love playing music.
My wife never paid attention to Rush in high school in the 80's because that just seemed like guy/nerd music to her and didn't fit in with the Duran Duran, Depeche Mode, etc... she listened and got into at the time. What's funny is that over the last 10 years she's grown to love Rush and we've gone and seen them together twice now (recently for the R40 tour) and she's the first one to put up an argument when someone says Rush isn't for girls.
Woah dude, I didn't even have enough time to put my helmet on.
You might surmise from this I'm not a Rush fan. And you'd be correct.
But even without the added hyperbole (IMHO) most ladies would rather listen to songs with a good rhythm and good singer than not.
Oh, I've had this discussion a bunch of times. I wasn't into Rush at all growing up. I listened to a lot of either pop music or metal and hard rock, a lot of which you can dance or move to. Rush is not all something to dance to, LOL. It's not that I disliked them, but was more of a, *meh* type of reaction.
It surely wasn't intentional, but I don't think they were writing to or about women. I actually liked their music a lot more after learning to play some Rush songs. Fun.
I think guys pick up on the epic lyrics and moodiness, chord progressions, and the complexity. There are lots of other examples of successful/good/great bands with this kind of gender gap especially in Prog: Dream Theater, Tool, Korn, Pink Floyd, ELP, old Genesis, etc.
It's not that I disliked them, but was more of a, *meh* type of reaction. It surely wasn't intentional, but I don't think they were writing to or about women. I actually liked their music a lot more after learning to play some Rush songs. Fun.
I think guys pick up on the epic lyrics and moodiness, chord progressions, and the complexity. There are lots of other examples of successful/good/great bands with this kind of gender gap especially in Prog: Dream Theater, Tool, Korn, Pink Floyd, ELP, old Genesis, etc.
