The Big Money
by Rush

Album: Power Windows (1985)
Charted: 46 45
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Songfacts®:

  • Rush take on income inequality in "Big Money," calling out the rich who have fallen out of touch. Unlike many of their songs that contain dissertation-worthy lyrics, this one is a lot more straightforward. Released as the lead single from their 1985 album Power Windows, it was a pretty big hit for the band and often made it into their setlists.
  • The song is heavy on synthesizer, which is par for the course in 1985 when the song was released. Geddy Lee told Bass Player magazine about programming the opening sequence: "Usually I'll do a basic sequence as a direction of a part, and then when (keyboardist) Andy Richards comes in the studio he listens to what I've done. If he can improve on it, he has full license to go ahead. And the nice thing about working with him is he's very open to everybody's ideas. I can think up an idea that I don't have the technical ability to play, but he does, and he'll take that idea even farther than I imagined it. That's a real bonus for me."
  • In the first verse, what sounds like a guitar with a vibrato arm is actually Lee playing a PPG synthesizer with a guitar sound sampled into it.
  • The music video, directed by Rob Quartly, was one of the first to use computer animation, which at the time was painstaking. It shows the band playing the song on a Monopoly-like game board. The effects look very basic today, but they were cutting-edge at the time and took days to render. The "Money For Nothing" video by Dire Straits was released around this time and also used computer animation.
  • On their Rush In Rio DVD, Rush have some fun with the song, slowing down the tempo for a brief pause, when we hear Homer Simpson say "Doh!" then Lisa Simpson say "A Deer!" followed by Marge Simpson saying "A female Deer," as the band kick it back up a notch to finish the song.

Comments: 11

  • George Pope from Vancouver - CanadaEric from Beaverton, OR Maybe he meant sandwich as in a guy wearing a sandwich board advertising thing? As in the guy wearing one attacked him -- he probably told it as he did because it sounded more zany. . . :) but was still a true story.
  • Alex Lifeson from TorontoWhat key is this in - B major? It says A major everywhere but that is wrong because of the tuning up
  • Nickster from Minneapolis, MnOne of the first music videos on MTV to make significant use of computer animation.
  • Drake from Huntington Beach, CaBig Money as an overall song tells about money's opportunities to people and when it doesn't. The Power Windows album is really about power hungry ideas people push out like the atom bomb in Manhattan Project. In my view and few others its perhaps the final great RUSH album of their old music. To me I understand the lyrics but I don't follow them all the time though, sorry. Having a lot of dough sounds good, but it just seems like trouble to others including to me, it can lead to devastating devices and ideas that are dangerous. Money does have a good side though, it help others who don't have any.
  • Connor from Dallas , TxPower Windows is a favorite Rush album. The theme of power hungry people is shown in The Big Money and Manhattan Project.
  • Eric from Beaverton, OrDavid from Mesa: Rush can be a bit wacky at times. A long time ago, I heard a rumor about Alex Lifeson's stage antics, acting like he's drunk sometimes. I went to my first Rush concert in 2002, and there was a part where they were jamming along, and then Alex starts going into a silly story about him being attacked by a sandwich while walking along a sidewalk. I saw Rush during their 2007 Snakes & Arrows tour, and although it was a good concert, they didn't do anything wacky like that.
  • Chuck from Houston, TxOne connection I can make for you David, is that when Neil Peart first met his newest band mates, Alex and Geddy back in 1974 prehaps, right after John Rutsey left... one of the things they talked about, to get to know each other, was there faviort Monty Python videos. I'm guessing they used it in there tours not to connect to the song, but as a tribute there comical influnce growing up in there younger years.
  • David from Mesa, AzThere have been a few occasions where the song has ended with a riff from Cheech and Chong's hard rock parody "Earache My Eye".
  • David from Mesa, AzRecent live versions of this song have been interesting for the soundbite which appears near the end (as documented in the above RUSH IN RIO songfact). To date, Rush has used the Simspons "D'oh! A deer! A female deer!" as well as Monty Python's "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!" and "Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second time!" I don't see much connection with the song itself. I suppose Rush has to let out some steam while doing Peart's heady lyrics. They certainly seem a bit wackier in their later years.
  • Greg from Oakville, CanadaBeing a huge rush fan and a bass player for 7 years, I love this song because of Geddy Lee's bass playing and solo. Even though Hemispheres is by far his best bass song hands down, he gives the bass in this song a distinctive sound by playing a Stienberger bass guitar which is the only bass he used for the whole Power Windows album!
  • Dee from Indianapolis, In"Power Windows" was the 1st cassette I ever bought. I got my 1st job at McDonalds and was hooked on Rush by listening to "Exit Stage Left" till I wore out the copy I had. To me, this is the last "GREAT" all around Rush album. Not that I don't like some of their newer stuff, but it was the end of an era in my book. "Big Money" ranks as one of my all time favorite Rush tunes, but it's hard to choose a best when there are way to many great ones throughout the ages.
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