Songfacts®:

• Clockwork Angels is a concept album about a young man's quest to follow his dreams, in which he encounters an anarchist during his travels across an alternative world. Explaining during an interview with Rolling Stone what gave Rush the initial idea to make a concept record, drummer and lyricist Neil Peart said: "The nice thing is that it sort of grew in the telling. It started with a conversation in 2009. We got together in Los Angeles and started to think about our next year. One of the projects we discussed was doing a compilation of all of our instrumentals, which [bassist] Geddy [Lee] suggested. I said, 'Yeah, maybe we could make a new one to go with it. Maybe something a little more extended.'"
  
  "Those words 'a little more extended' in the course of this comfortable conversation got me thinking," he continued. "I said, 'Well, I've been thinking lately about this setting ...' And I explained this whole steampunk thing to the guys and they seemed kind of intrigued. So I started working, and the story came together organically."
• Producer Nick Raskulinecz told MusicRadar.com why this boisterous rocker is one of his favorites on Clockwork Angels: "To me, it's all about the riff," he said, "and this riff takes me back to the old days. That was one of the cool things about working on this record, helping Rush to know that it was OK to be like this. 'You guys can do this. You guys did it a long time ago, you can do it again. You own it!'
  
  There's a lot of interplay happening between everybody," he continued. "There was a demo, but we added a keyboard and the high strings – it morphed. Vocally, it was about getting Geddy up in that high register where he belongs. His energy level is pretty cool here."
• During his November 15, 2023 My Effin' Life In Conversation appearance at Théâtre Maisonneuve in Montréal, Geddy Lee revealed that "The Anarchist" is the hardest Rush tune to play on bass on while singing. "I wrote that song on bass first, obviously, and when we put the kind of bed track together in the demo stage, I wrote this melody without thinking about what the bass part was," he explained. "And it wasn't till after we finished production of the record and I was in rehearsal where I realized they're so completely different rhythmically - there was no meeting in the middle."
  
  "Usually, my bass part would follow a pattern and the voice sort of slips into it, but that one was just impossible," Lee continued. "So, I spent weeks, literally, playing the one song, just on bass, didn't try singing it, until I didn't have to think about the bass part at all. And then I would have to really concentrate, and then I could do it. I figured out a way I could do it. So when I started playing it live, it's the one song I have to sort of split myself like a drummer does. Drummers have independence. Bass players not always have independence, so it was a real challenge."