The full Guitar Player Magazine interview with Alex Lifeson from the March 2006 issue mentioned in this previous post is now available online. It's a really great article, touching on many different aspects of Rush's history and Alex's playing style. When asked about the lackluster reception of their 3rd album Caress of Steel and their subsequent breakthrough album 2112 Alex remarks:
We were very proud of Caress of Steel. We were experimenting with a lot of things-writing more extended songs, doing a whole theme on an album side, and so on. The record wasn't a great commercial success, but artistically it was—to us, at least. We were exploring and taking pretty big steps for the time. But management was concerned. Our record label, Mercury, was concerned, and I remember them thinking that it was probably wisest to take a couple steps back and do a record that was more like our first album with shorter, straight-ahead rock songs. We thought, "Listen, we're gonna do what we're gonna do. If it crashes and burns, so be it. At least we stuck to our guns, and did it the way we thought we should." The concept of 2112 came up, and it was our way of fighting against the establishment, and stating our creative independence. I figured that if it didn't work, I could get a job if I had to. Of course, that record came out, and it was instantly successful. It spoke to a lot of our fans, and, consequently, I think the record company thought, "You know what? These guys are doing what they think is right, so let's give them their space and hope for the best."
When asked about R40, Alex says:
I would love that. I don't play guitar as much as I used to, but, in so many ways, I enjoy playing more than I ever have. I used to really have to practice a lot to feel good about my playing, but I guess after playing for 40 years, you don't really have to think about it. Your hands just do things. That's remarkable. It's a fortunate gift to be able to play guitar. It's such a wonderful instrument. You can tune it any way you want, you can play up high, you can play down low, you can hit it hard, you can caress it. It's a great way to express yourself. I don't know what I would do if I couldn't play guitar for the rest of my life. There's really nothing like it.
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