Rush: Grace Under Pressure Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		3.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		5.0
Overall		4.5

Rush: Grace Under Pressure Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman April 13, 2026

Comparing the national album charts of Canada to the United States shows that Rush was/were decidedly more popular in the band's native country than "down under" (so to speak) for their first several albums, with at least a couple of Canadian Top 10 LPs (that's what they were then, young 'uns) before they started to make any significant chart headway in the United States. Starting with 1980's Permanent Waves, though, Rush began a nice multi-album streak of actual Top 5 placements on the U.S. album charts, which ended with Moving Pictures. That said, the next three Rush album releases clawed their way to Number 10 on the charts in the states, even if albums like Signals managed to claim the vaunted Number 1 position in Canada. Rush has been decently well served in the Blu-ray era, including both that initial release of Moving Pictures linked to above, but also a more recent Super Deluxe Set of the album, as well as Rush: Time Machine, Live in Cleveland. Rush - Signals, Rush: 2112 and Rush: A Farewell to Kings, among others. At least some of those linked items exist in more than one edition, with that "Super Deluxe" appendage adorning several re-releases of previous standalone Blu-rays (or Blu-rays with CDs), as evidenced by the link to that edition of Moving Pictures, above. And while this is indeed another Super Deluxe Edition outing, it looks like in this particular instance this is the first high res release of Grace Under Pressure.

Kind of like that infamous box o' chocolates one Forrest Gump memorably mentioned, you never know quite what you're going to get with regard to Blu-ray content in these often extravagant Super Deluxe Editions, but the good news with regard to this release is that there's both hi res audio and maybe slightly less hi res video (that's a joke, kind of, anyway) on this release. For clarity's sake, I'm listing the Blu-ray contents here directly below, with the rest of the disc contents and other swag detailed in the Supplements section, further down the page.

Audio Content

• Grace Under Pressure 1984 is offered in Dolby Atmos, Dolby TrueHD 5.1 and LPCM 2.0


• Grace Under Pressure 2025 is offered in LPCM 2.0.

Video Content

• Grace Under Pressure Tour: Live in Toronto 1984*
  Maple Leaf Gardens September 21, 1984 Concert Video (1080i; 1:42:20)

  1. The Spirit Of Radio
  2. Subdivisions
  3. The Body Electric
  4. The Enemy Within
  5. The Weapon
  6. Witch Hunt
  7. New World Man
  8. Between The Wheels
  9. Red Barchetta
  10. Distant Early Warning
  11. Red Sector A
  12. Closer To The Heart
  13. Kid Gloves
  14. YYZ
  15. 2112: The Temples Of Syrinx
  16. Tom Sawyer
  17. Red Lenses / Drum Solo
  18. Vital Signs
  19. Finding My Way
  20. In The Mood
  

• Music Videos

  1. Distant Early Warning (1080i; 4:58)
  2. Afterimage (1080i; 5:06)
  3. The Enemy Within (1080i; 4:16)
  4. The Body Electric (1080i; 5:04)
  

*Previously unreleased

Rush: Grace Under Pressure Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Kind of like this set as a whole, the video contents are a bit of a codec grabbag, with the concert video encoded via MPEG-2 and the music videos encoded via AVC, with 1080i presentations hovering around 1.29:1 to 1:30:1. Playing the album leads to animations accompanying each track, in 1.78:1 and encoded via AVC, with an emphasis on what might be termed apocalyptically themed visuals. Maybe a little humorously, I'd probably rank the quaintly encoded live concert as looking a bit better than the music videos, though there is an airbrushed quality to the live concert which I have to assume points to some pretty aggressive noise reduction, along with some anomalies like near blooming in brighter lighting conditions that give a slightly dreamlike, unreal appearance to the visuals. Neither the concert video nor the music videos on the Blu-ray disc is going to set videophile hearts aflutter, but both have historical interest that should help them overcome at least some quality concerns. The best looking video content here overall is undoubtedly the animated accompaniments that play to the actual album. Screenshots 1 through 5 are from the concert, and screenshots 6 through 9 are from the music videos, with screenshot 10 showing the main menu the Blu-ray disc boots to. Screenshots 11 through 15 offer a few looks at the animations accompanying the hi res audio of the actual album. I've defaulted to the aspect ratio and resolution of the videos on the disc rather than the animations accompanying the album. My score above is kind of a disc wide average. The animations are in the 4.0 - 4.5 range, while the two main video offerings on the disc are probably more down toward the 2.0 range.

Rush: Grace Under Pressure Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There's a perhaps slightly baffling array of codecs accompanying both the video and audio elements on the Blu-ray disc. The Live in Toronto 1984 concert features Dolby Atmos, Dolby TrueHD 5.1 and LPCM 2.0 options. The Music Videos feature either Dolby TrueHD 5.1 or LPCM 2.0 options. Here's where things get a little more interesting, and possibly even more baffling, because the original 1984 mix of the actual album is offered in Dolby Atmos, Dolby TrueHD 5.1 and both 192 kHz / 24 bit and 96 kHz / 24 bit LPCM 2.0 options, while the ostensibly newer 2025 Terry Brown mix of the album is offered only in 96 kHz / 24 bit LPCM 2.0. Got that? There's no doubt that the surround mixes offer some nicely spacious accountings of the music, but to my maybe "purist" audiophile ears, the actual hi res versions of the album (in either the 1984 or 2025 mixes) are preferable to the audio on the live concert or the music videos, with better clarity and I'd argue even in terms of some of the surround activity in the 5.1 and Atmos mixes in particular. The probably unavoidably interesting thing about this release for some diehard Rush fans is the fact that Terry Brown remixed the album for this release, and while my hunch is many aficionados are going to prefer the original stereo mix, this one is rather interesting in terms of an increased emphasis on the low end and what overall struck me as a less forward treatment of the synths.

Rush's website has the following kind of cheeky comments about the Atmos mixes:

A Dolby Atmos compatible sound system is required to playback the Dolby Atmos content. Please ensure your Blu-ray player firmware is up to date or certain aspects of this Blu-ray disc may not playback properly. Please consult your Blu-ray player manual and/or manufacturer for firmware update options and process. Dolby Atmos technical specs require volume levels of content to be presented lower than most audio streams are experienced on Blu-ray discs, so all audio streams volumes have been matched but thats what volume knobs are for, so crank it up!

Rush: Grace Under Pressure Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

CD 1: 1984 Stereo Mix Newly Remastered in 2025 by Abbey Road Studios*

• 1. Distant Early Warning
• 2. Afterimage
• 3. Red Sector A
• 4. The Enemy Within
• 5. The Body Electric
• 6. Kid Gloves
• 7. Red Lenses
• 8. Between The Wheels

PRODUCED BY RUSH AND PETER HENDERSON

CD 2: New 2025 Stereo Mix by Terry Brown*

• 1. Distant Early Warning
• 2. Afterimage
• 3. Red Sector A
• 4. The Enemy Within
• 5. The Body Electric
• 6. Kid Gloves
• 7. Red Lenses
• 8. Between The Wheels

PRODUCED BY RUSH AND PETER HENDERSON
MIXED BY TERRY BROWN

CDs 3 & 4: Tour Live in Toronto 1984 Maple Leaf Gardens*

• 1. The Spirit Of Radio
• 2. Subdivisions
• 3. The Body Electric
• 4. The Enemy Within
• 5. The Weapon
• 6. Witch Hunt
• 7. New World Man
• 8. Between The Wheels
• 9. Red Barchetta
• 10. Distant Early Warning
• 11. Red Sector A
• 12. Closer To The Heart
• 13. Kid Gloves
• 14. YYZ
• 15. 2112: The Temples Of Syrinx
• 16. Tom Sawyer
• 17. Red Lenses / Drum Solo
• 18. Vital Signs
• 19. Finding My Way
• 20. In The Mood

*Previously unreleased

In the but wait! you also get. . . category, this is another stuffed to the gills Super Deluxe Edition. An oversized box measures approximately 13 inches square by about 3 inches deep, with some cover art that seems to deliberately try to evoke the cover art for another Super Deluxe Edition, namely Pink Floyd: The Division Bell. Along with the discs detailed above, the box also includes a 52 page hardcover book with notes by Geddy Lee along with a ton of illustrations and unreleased photos (the Blu-ray disc is housed in a pocket inside the back cover, separate from the CDs). A separate slotted envelope contains a replicas of the tour program, a Toronto concert ticket, a Total Access Backstage Pass, a PR ("Pressure") release, three live band photo lithos and a brand new poster. In the possibly useless but still kind of cool category, there's also an acrylic LED RGB light up display (that requires 3 AAA batteries).

Rush: Grace Under Pressure Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I know a lot of Rush fans who positively hated this album when it first came out, but I never had that same visceral reaction, perhaps because I tend to be a fan of a lot of bands from that same general era that tended to traffic in the synth heavy sound that is so prevalent here (at least in the original version). I frankly think the album deserves some reassessment, and this amazing new set is a great way to begin that process. This is very spendy and obviously geared toward a very specific demographic, but Rush fans should be delighted not just with the disc contents here, but everything else this huge set offers. Highly recommended.