“We all liked the book ‘Anthem’ [by Ayn Rand – Ed] which is the book that inspired 2112.”Geddy Lee (1264)

“I dreamed up this story of music being invented against a dystopian, totalitarian society. I felt this great sense of injustice, that this mass was coming down on us and telling us to compromise and compromise was the word I couldn’t deal with. I grew up as a child of the sixties and was a strong individualist and believed in the sanctity that you should be able to do what you wanted to do (without hurting anyone). When I realized that the story was paralleling ‘Anthem’, I felt I had to say something about Ayn Rand and the association with 2112 so, at the bottom of the lyrics, just put “With acknowledgement of the genius of Ayn Rand” [which led to a media turn-off amid ridiculous accusations of Nazism – Ed].”Neil Peart (1264)

“The end of that story is a little ambiguous, and there’s obviously some sort of war going on.”Geddy Lee (1264)

“That’s the good guys, that’s the cavalry coming in at the end so it actually, to me, had a happy ending as it were that the Solar Federation was going to be shut down by the vision that our hero has of this other way of living, the people coming at the end, that’s how I intended it.”Neil Peart (1264)

“The nature of the story itself that evolved in ‘2112’ was the individual against the mass.”Neil Peart (1291)

“It was those times, a lot of things can only be appreciated in the moment, but in those mid-70s there were things like Thai Sticks [weed – Ed] coming around. We were just traveling around the US at the time and hearing about these exotic things and we’d never been to any of these places. It was really just this sense of the exotic, sense of the unknown, it was romantic in a way.”Neil Peart (1264)

“We did want to pay respect [to the TV program ‘The Twilight Zone’ – Ed] by writing a song.”Alex Lifeson (1264)

“We did want to try to capture the atmosphere of the show a little bit.”Geddy Lee (1264)

“Neil makes mention of a number of the episodes in the lyrics.”Alex Lifeson (1264)

“The two narratives were probably just vivid enough and brief enough that I could get them into a singable verse.”Neil Peart (1264)

“The story itself called ‘A Nice Morning Drive’ had been published in ‘Road and Track’ magazine several years before and just stuck in my mind. The car I loved at the time and still do was the Ferrari 166 Mille Miglia Barchetta.”Neil Peart (1264)

“He just had this fantasy about a time when cars were not allowed. Tell this little story, this cautionary tale, about beating the car police.”Geddy Lee (1264)

“We were in an airplane flying into Toronto listening to the morse code, which is YYZ – the airport. The rhythm stuck in my head.”Neil Peart (1264)

“[Going into ‘Moving Pictures’ – Ed]. We had come to a new level of fandom, we had new kind of encounters with fans and I think this very uncomfortable for Neil. He tried to make sense of it lyrics and explain his point of view.”Geddy Lee (1264)

“I used to go see The Who in Toronto but I would never have dreamed of hanging around backstage or chasing them to their hotels, never mind going to their homes, and I was shocked to see that kind of behavior and people chasing us around, and people coming to my house.”Neil Peart (1264)