𝘯𝘦𝘪𝘭 𝘱𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘫𝘰𝘩𝘯 𝘣𝘰𝘯𝘩𝘢𝘮: 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘱𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘥𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘺𝘴𝘪𝘢𝘯 𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘤 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘦𝘱𝘪𝘵𝘰𝘮𝘪𝘻𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘯𝘪𝘦𝘵𝘻𝘴𝘤𝘩𝘦'𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘺𝘴𝘪𝘴 — 𝘢 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥 ❧

✧ john bonham & neil peart were without a doubt two of the greatest rock drummers of all time, & additionally two of my absolute favorite musicians and biggest inspirations. in studying the dichotomy of dionysus and apollo in greek myth and culture that has been explored +

by philosophers all the way from the enlightenment to today, i realized some parallels between the work of these legendary men and musicians & the mythical figures that birthed certain distinct, but equally and extremely important divisions of thought +

that were identified by their relation to these gods from this point on. ✧ these two divisions of thought and human nature were held not only by the greeks in the highest regard, but also analyzed & admired by enlightenment philosophers and later on, most importantly to this +

thread, friedrich nietzsche, in the late 1800s. his views on how this dichotomy should be discussed and implemented with regard to studying ancient grecian culture as well as universal human nature will be discussed in relation to the legacies of peart & bonham towards the +

end of the thread, & were a huge part of my initial connection of this dichotomy to them, as a main point of nietzsche's analysis was that the two divisions should be present in equal amounts & therefore should be equally admired as essential parts of the human experience. +

✧ this view resonated especially deeply with me because of the immense & equal respect & admiration i along with so many other fans have for both peart & bonham as individuals and as musicians, and this thread stems purely from this respect and love for their work +

in combination with my curiosity & interest in myth and ancient culture. ✧the information i will be providing regarding the apollo/dionysus dichotomy itself will be sourced from a university class i am currently taking in classical (greek/roman) history and literature, so +

obviously i do NOT in any way claim to know everything there is to about the subject, this is just a compilation of similarities to peart & bonham that i found touching & interesting, & that stood out to me because of how special both musicians are to me personally! +

✧in ancient greek myth and religion, apollo was first & foremost the god of reason & rationality. he is often misidentified as a sun god, which is not the case, though he is often depicted alongside it or made to represent it in art and literature. this actually stems from +

the fact that he is heavily associated with reason & therefore *light* of any kind, not just specifically the sun. +

✧to be clear though before going forward, the ancient greeks themselves did not see the opposite of rationality to be “dark” in any connotation of the word just because reason was supposedly “light.” this was a common mistake made by enlightenment philosophers who attempted +

to analyze this dialectic. reason was associated with light as it could uncover things that could not previously be seen without careful & rational consideration, a testament to apollo’s importance in his patronage of both of these things +

but never considered by the greeks to detract from the importance of dionysus’ more emotional significance. this misconception by enlightenment philosophers was cleared up later by nietzsche in “the birth of tragedy” and later works which emphasized the indisputable importance +

of both divisions of thought in classical worship and culture. ✧apollo is also associated in mythology with inspiring artists in conjunction with the muses. like dionysus, he is a patron of art, but because he is associated with reason, his specific kind is art which +

has a structure or specific system to it. in this way he is associated with music theory and music in general. but more specifically he is heavily associated with lyrical poetry, a type of epic poetry performed as a song (accompanied by a lyre) for an audience. It usually +

dealt with *one person’s* emotion or experience, in conjunction often with history or legend. ✧neil said in an interview (titled “obsessed”) that with regard to drumming he thought of the snare and bass drums as the “verbs and subjects” of the “sentence,” and the hi hat & +

ride cymbals were a kind of “connective tissue.” the structured and methodical way he viewed drumming calls to mind not only the the kind of precisely structured art the apollonian division of thought represents, but also the intricacy of lyrical poetry: +

“they have a beautiful contrast to each other...you can have a nicely controlled verse and then open up to a wide washy effect...again what you notice are the subjects and verbs, the hard words of the sentence.” the way he relates this structure to that of a story or spoken +

sentence is similar to the structure of lyrical poetry which was often laced with repeated epithets (repeated series of words used to describe one particular phenomenon/person/object, eg: cloud gatherer zeus, ox-eyed hera, etc.) to add a structure throughout the song/poem. +

this is especially utilized in homer’s iliad, which was an epic lyrical poem often performed right before its “sequel” the odyssey & are often called homeric epithets for this reason. these descriptors are meant to give a pattern and tune to the poem, much like the +

“subjects and verbs” of the snare and bass. neil’s lyrics also remind one of the content of lyrical poetry in that they often not only deal with a personal experience (limelight, lakeside park, etc) as lyrical poetry often did +

but also often were epic in length and told a story (by-tor and the snow dog, 2112) &not only dealt with other literature (references to don quixote in cygnus x-1 book 1 is just one example) but also history (eg the black hole itself) & myth (for instance the balance +

between emotion and reason with regards to greek myth and gods in book 2). all of these are the fundamental basis of lyrical poetry. in fact, all considered, neil’s lyrics & the way he played are about as close as one gets in rock music to the truest form of lyrical poetry +

& the way it was performed. in my opinion, there is no other drummer or lyricist, let alone both, that has employed these aspects of the apollonian division in such a sophisticated yet relatable manner to either lyrical writing or the way his drum parts were +

structured, & i don’t believe this unique and beautiful fusion of all these elements is likely to occur again in one human being, which is a testament to not only his skill, but his intelligence & wisdom & his ability to +

bring out the same in all of us via his art, which could be argued to be the purest form of apollonian expression. +

✧extras: apollo was mainly depicted in ancient art with his bow and arrow, whose arrows could either heal or create plagues depending on his intent. +

there’s no deeper meaning to this in relation to neil except perhaps the healing effect his lyrics have for many fans, but i did find it interesting after making these other connections that neil would often shoot arrows to get his head clear before a show +

✧the other division of thought, dionysian, stems from the attributes of the ancient greek god dionysus. though some write his presence in myth and culture off to simply being the god of wine, that is in NO way his most important characteristic especially when it comes to +

philosophical analysis of the dichotomy to explain human nature/behavior. dionysus was above all else to the ancient greeks the god of drama. the most important theater in ancient greece was named for him & the delian league, which could be argued to be the “glue” that held +

the grecian city states together with athens at their head, sprung from attendance of a festival honoring dionysus with theatrical performances held at the theater of dionysus that spanned multiple days. a patron of the arts like apollo, his kind of art was based in raw +

emotion or tragedy—described as art that came from the soul. ✧ if there’s one thing bonham is famous for besides his thunderous sound, it’s bringing soul and swing to rock drumming: +