A Farewell To Kings, recorded in Monmouthshire in Wales was the first album Rush recorded outside of Toronto. It was also the first album to feature synthesisers, 12 string guitars and Neil experimenting with a whole new array of percussion items to his already substantial drumkit. It begins beautifully with the excellent title track followed by the sublime Xanadu – an eleven minute masterpiece full of complexity, heavyness, delicacy, time signature and tempo changes. It was the most complex piece of music the band had written to that point. And they recorded it in one take! That’s the kind of band Rush were. The album ends with the ten minute epic Cygnus X-1. A track that tells of a voyage to the first black hole ever discovered, and ends with a “to be continued…”

A Farewell To Kings
Xanadu
Closer To The Heart
Cinderella Man
Madrigal
Cygnus X-1

Type 6 Transporter

Ah! The Type 6! Great affordable medium ship early on if you want to dabble in a bit of trading. Made a few million doing that. It also makes an excellent exploration craft as it has a respectable jump range and a great view from the cockpit. I chose Cinderella Man for this ship as the song seemed to fit the use and aesthetic of the craft.

Diamondback Explorer

“In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree…” What better small ship to go on an epic journey to discover a legendary paradise than the Diamondback Explorer? Huge fuel tank, massive jump range. Engineered and with a guardian booster I got this baby up to 75ly! And that’s without lightweighting! Perfect for landing near the guardian sites too. Marvellous, marvellous ship! The birds you can hear singing at the beginning of the track were recorded outside the studio. That’s right – you are listening to Welsh birds!

The All The Worlds A Stage Tour was the first time Rush played in the UK. It began on June 1 1977 at Sheffield City Hall and took in Manchester, Birmingham, London, Newcastle, Glasgow and Liverpool, as well as dates in Frankfurt and Stockholm. According to Geddy Lee it was rather a memorable one! British audiences were (and probably still are, I haven’t been to a concert since 2013) very different from American ones. West of the Atlantic, audiences cheer, shout and celebrate right the way through each song. It was just what Rush were used to, but when they began to play over here, they got quite the shock. There would be raucous cheers when they arrived on stage, then more raucous cheering when they began to play. Then silence, followed by another huge cheer after the number had ended. Next song: Cheer…silence…cheer, just like before. The band were totally stumped. I knew the answer straight away. Most rock and metal concerts I’ve been to have been thus, but Geddy, Alex and Neil had no idea. You see, British audiences like to listen. We stand there, thoroughly enjoying the music, living in the moment. We may jig around a bit, even dance, but we stay silent, because hearing every second of the music of our heroes is the most important thing. When the guys realised this, everything was fine. It was just our way of appreciating their incredible talent.

They came back to the UK for the Farewell To Kings tour in 1978, playing more dates. In Glasgow (of course it would be Glasgow), when Geddy sang the opening lines of “Closer to the Heart” he heard a full hall of Glaswegians singing the words back at him. They had never heard the audience singing their songs to them before. It gave the entire band goosbumps of the very best kind!

And they’ve never forgotten it!

Type 6 Corrosive Materials Collector

Well, there she is! The Cinderella Man. Amazing what a ship kit and a nice paint job can do isn’t it?

These days I use her for little collection jobs, such as taking a few dozen guardian relics down to an ancient crashed Thargoid megaship.

I take them from her hold to the centre of the structure with an SRV and turn them into green Unclassified Relics

I also use her to ferry me to the nearest barnacle forests to collect meta alloys. I make sure to send her away while collecting in case an interceptor shows up, though.

She also sports a couple of size 4 corrosion resistant cargo racks so I can visit abandoned spire sites to stock up on the corrosive materials to be found there. There isn’t currently a use for those but there might well be some day so I have a little stash of each of them on my carrier.

She has turned out to be a very handy ship!

DBX Guardian Materials Bus

As stated before the DBX excels as a guardian site material collecting ferry! It’s huge jump range renders the distances to the guardian sites completely trivial, it’s size ensures it can land very close so as to provide point defense support for those pesky sentinel missiles, and it has two top mounted utility slots in which to place those point defense systems. It couldn’t be more perfect!

They have good weapon placement in case you need to visit a guardian beacon.

Easy to shoot the pylons, then scan the middle to obtain a key for the guardian fighter blueprint sites.

Xanadu takes all these tasks in her stride and, quite frankly, there is no better ship for the job! If you need a very handy guide to the best Guardian sites and the nearest beacons I shall direct you to Cmdr Greybeard Seawolf’s Outland Industries. A wonderful guide with pictures and overhead plans of all the best structures and ruins.

Of all the sites to visit for farming guardian materials, the most beautiful and atmospheric would have to be body C2 at system IC 2391 Sector HG-X b1-8. Although to see its full allure you have to be there during its day as the soft light from the brown dwarf star peculates softly through the dust.