The Lehigh Valley News has an interview with Alex that covers work on the new album and memories of making Moving Pictures. An excerpt:

Lifeson says the band has six songs pretty much ready to go and three others almost done. The group plans to write at least a couple of additional songs after the tour. At this point, the CD is shaping up to be a musically varied work.

"There is the epic song, 'Clockwork Angels,' which is really taking shape. It's a multi-parted piece, very dynamic," Lifeson says. "Then there's some stuff that's very melodic and on the softer side, on acoustic, with a strong melody. So there's great diversity there. Honestly, I can't wait until we start really working on these songs. We've sort of got them to the stage where Geddy and I were happy with the arrangements and then Neil kind of comes in and starts working on his drum arrangements, and they go from there. So they're sort of in that pre-drum stage right now, and it's great to see them come to life."

Really looking forward to this!

Feel like I'm moving into modern times again: Just upgraded to Snow Leopard and ordered an iPhone 4. Now to upgrade the software I wanted to upgrade that required 10.6.

From a new press release issued yesterday:

The first release from Clockwork Angels, Caravan, will be released on June 1, 2010, along with the album track BU2B (which I'm guessing is an instrumental).

Rush's 20th studio album will be released some time in 2011.

More information:

Both "Caravan" and "BU2B" will also be offered as a special Limited Edition CD single, available to fans through the band's official website as well as through various pre-sale tour packages. For full details, please visit Rush's official website at www.Rush.com.

Two covers of Baba O'Riley. First was seen over on Wil Wheaton's site, the second in the comments at Slashdot.

Think Geek cover, using their products:

The other is by Blue Man Group. Check the great percussion instruments.

Been busy here at Ivory Tower, more about that in a bit.

Didn't read A Christmas Carol, but got all of the holiday music together.

Seeing Christmas stuff in a couple of stores last week got me thinking about the holidays early. Two tasks sprang to mind:

1. Finally reading Dickens' A Christmas Carol
2. Expanding the holiday music collection I've built up.

Plenty of time for both, since they can be put off for another month.

There are times when I just can't get enough of The Sundays. Wish they'd do something new.

Here's Where the Story Ends:

Goodbye:

Cry:

I'd embed more, but Universal doesn't allow embedding of official videos for some insane reason.

The band's been on hiatus since 1997—the singer and her husnand the guitarist are raising their two kids.

Been watching the new Monty Python doc over on IFC this week: Monty Python: Almost the Truth: The Lawyers Cut. Quite good so far, although spreading it out over six nights (an hour a night) is a little awkward. Found out that it'll be out on DVD soon, but since we're halfway through we'll just keep watching. Need to check and see if there's any bonus stuff on the DVD version. Glad I re-watched all the episodes this summer.

Heard about this event after the fact: A Night of Round Table With Monty Python - ArtsBeat Blog - NYTimes.com. The Spanish Inquisition story is killer.