Working Man
by Rush
- 157
- BPM
- A major
- Key
- 11B
- Camelot
- 21
- Danceability
- 1
- Acousticness
Donna Halper, then a disc jockey and music director at WMMS in Cleveland, Ohio, is credited with getting Rush noticed in the United States by playing "Working Man" on the air. The song went over especially well in the working-class city. The response led to a record deal for the band, who dedicated their first two albums to her and gave her special thanks.
Geddy Lee has said in an interview on the Rolling Stone YouTube channel that it is his favorite song to play live. The guitar solo made the Guitar World list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Solos.
The music game Rock Band offers two versions as downloadable tracks. One is a cover based on the original recording, and the other is a previously unreleased master with an alternate guitar solo. That one proved so popular that the band put it on the iTunes Store as "Working Man (Vault Edition)." The song has been heard in episodes of Fargo, My Name is Earl, That '70s Show, Supernatural and American Dad!, in the 2011 film Goon and in a 2014 Walmart commercial. New York Mets player Pete Alonso uses it as his walk-up song.
Working Man runs at 157 BPM, the tempo of hard techno, punk and fast rock. In classical terms it sits in vivace territory. A bar of 4/4 lasts 1.53 seconds, and a quarter-note delay is 382 ms. It is in A major, Camelot 11B, which shares its notes with F# minor and mixes cleanly with D major and E major.
We use multiple sources as part of our online research for the song story including Wikipedia.