You know, I really haven’t the foggiest why I’ve posted a smattering of things on old Rush lyrics. As I’ve said: I don’t hate the band, though I don’t necessarily like the band. The only song I never want to hear again is “Tom Sawyer”. There was an amusing “mash-up” I heard with them a few weeks that I can’t find with any immediacy… And as bad as that proggiest of prog-rock songs you hear on “Rock Block Saturdays” is from the ultimate clunker of prog-rock pretensions, it’s amusingly bad.

But something struck me the other day while listening “Closer To The Heart” on classic rock radio. It’s the age old Rush questionThat’s all well and good, but what does this have to do with Ayn Rand?

And the men who hold high places
Must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality
Closer to the heart
Closer to the heart
The blacksmith and the artist
Reflect it in their art
They forge their creativity
Closer to the heart
Closer to the heart

Philosophers and ploughmen
Each must know his part
To sow a new mentality
Closer to the heart
Closer to the heart
You can be the captain
I will draw the chart
Sailing into destiny
Closer to the heart

So, here’s the problem. Isn’t this collectivist in nature, describing the place each individual (the artist and the blacksmith and the philosopher and ploughman) must put themselves into to have society a’working? Granted, the “You can be the captain” line suggests the individuality of Randism… but that’s about it.

(And don’t miss Rick Emerson describing Bon Jovi here, a few posts down.)

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