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Special Edition on Rush July 2020 |
The Ultimate Companion Guide to the Lives and Work of Rush
Foreword
'The rock band at Madison Square Garden on Monday night was a trio that got together in the 1970s and has been selling out arena dates on a world tour this year. It has a bass-playing, reedy-voiced lead singer, a briskly virtuosic drummer and a guitarist who spills a variety of echoed chords over their riffs. Its songs contemplate the state of the world.
No, it wasn't The Police, the Stones or The Who - it was Rush, the stalwart Canadian band that didn't have to reunite. Without a string of pop hits or much that's even remotely glamorous, Rush has maintained one of rock's biggest cult followings.
Rush has improbable ingredients for popularity. The music is grounded in progressive rock, with odd-meter riffs from Geddy Lee on bass and Neil Peart on drums below the guitarist Alex Lifeson's power chords and pealing arpeggios. Once scorned, progressive rock has started a comeback and Rush are at the forefront of that movement.'
That review was taken from the New York Times in 2007, and perhaps sums up the longevity and significance of Rush. Despite forming over forty years ago in 1968, the Canadian rock music trio were still selling out huge venues and having chart hits as recently as 2018. In this book we are going to discover who they were, and follow their progress from an elementary school band of mates to a global phenomenon.
Rush are considered to be one of the key members of the 1970s grog rock movement in music. This developed from the almost psychedelic rock from the 1960s and incorporated heavier guitar riffs and drum beats. The movement sold massively worldwide and we will look at the impact of Rush on the genre of progressive rock later.
Rush had several significant global hits, but found their greatest popularity in America where they dominated the Billboard 200 charts throughout the seventies and in the decades since. Arguably their biggest success was the 1982 hit New World Man which reached No. 1 in the American rock charts, as well as the Top 20 in the Billboard charts and the UK Top 40. Other notable No. 1 hits were Dreamline, Show Don't Tell, Stick it Out and Test for Echo. In the UK they are probably best known for the hits The Spirit of Radio, which reached No. 13 in 1980, and Tom Sawyer, a release that reached No. 25 in 1981 and again in 1982.
The band have sold millions of records worldwide and as a group, Rush possess twenty-four gold records and fourteen platinum records, placing them fourth behind the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Kiss for the most gold and platinum albums by a band in music history. Rush's sales statistics also place them third behind the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones for the most consecutive gold or platinum albums by a rock band. Rush also ranks seventy-ninth in US album sales with 25 million units, although total worldwide album sales are not calculated by any single entity, as of 2004 several industry sources estimated Rush's total worldwide album sales at over forty-million units, a figure that is sure to grow exponentially as new generations discover the music of Rush.
Rush have also become known for their outstanding and at times eccentric live stage performances and tours that are used to promote their albums. Rush have always able to sell out huge venues like Madison Square Album in Times Square and despite disbanding in 2018 they still get extensive airplay on radio stations in the United States. The trio became well known for their ability to constantly change instruments, never appearing on stage with the same guitar as the previous gig during the 1970s. To this day members are still well-known for endorsing numerous musical brands and even creating their own range of guitars.
It is perhaps this versatility that lead to Rush receiving their own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles in recognition of their long serving contribution to music. They have been named in the Classic Rock Hall of Fame, a well-deserved accolade after five decades in the music industry.
Even the band themselves are surprised at how well they lasted in the business. When Alex Lifeson summed up the modern music industry perfectly when Guitar Player magazine asked him, 'Think back thirty years did you ever think you'd be talking to us now?'
'I was surprised to even be around that long. I remember saying in 1974, when we started our first American tour, that if we could get five years out of this thing it would be quite remarkable. That was about the extent of a band's longevity at the time. Now we're twenty-five years beyond that. A lot of great bands have come and gone in that time. Are there any bands out now that can last thirty years? I don't know if they'll get a chance. Based on talent, there are bands that probably could, but the way record companies work is completely different than it was thirty years ago. Record companies have become speculators, rather than developers. Nowadays, you have to come in with a completed record, and it's released on spec. If it instantly does okay, you might get a deal. If it doesn't, you'll get dropped. When we got our deal in 1974, it was for five records. We were a young, unknown band. The record company looked at it like, "Let them work their stuff out for the first couple of records, and, hopefully, when the third record hits and is successful, then we've got two more records to capitalise on that success." Opportunities like ours just don't seem to be around anymore.'
SO, WHO ARE THE OTHER TWO PLAYERS IN RUSH?
GEDDY LEE
Born in Ontario in 1953, Geddy Lee is best known as the bands lead vocalist, bassist and keyboard player. Lee joined the group towards the end of 1968 as a replacement for the bands previous short-term lead singer Jeff Jones. Lee was a childhood friend of fellow band member Alex Lifeson and the two even went to school together and stayed at each other's houses as youngsters.
Geddy Lee was born Gary Lee Weinrib but his stage name, Geddy, was inspired by his mother's heavily-accented pronunciation of his given first name, Gary. This later became his high school nickname before he adopted it as his stage name. Lee's parents were Jewish refugees from Poland that survived the Nazi concentration camps Dachau and Bergen-Belsen during the Second World War. In 2004, Canadian Jewish News featured Lee's reflections on his mother's experiences as a refugee, and of his own Jewish heritage. Lee married Nancy Young in 1976 and they have two children, a son called Julian and a daughter called Kyla.
In addition to his composing, arranging, and performing duties for Rush, Lee has produced for various other bands, including Rocket Science. Lee's first solo effort, My Favourite Headache, was released in 2000. Along with his Rush band mates, guitarist Alex Lifeson and drummer Neil Peart, Lee was made an Officer of the Order of Canada on 9 May 1996. The trio was the first rock band to be honoured so as a group. Lee is ranked thirteenth by Hit Parade magazine on their list of The 100 Greatest Heavy Metal Vocalists of All Time.
Geddy Lee is arguably best known for his use of gadgetry and equipment and has become synonymous with weird and wonderful musical instruments. He has pioneered new keyboards and bass guitars, and inspired some of the finest musicians of modern times. He is renowned for constantly touring with a different bass guitar as this article from the bands official website explains:
'For his first local gigs in the early 1970s and Rush's debut album, Lee used a Fender Precision Bass. From Fly by Night onward, Lee favoured Rickenbacker basses, particularly the 4001 model, and a Fender Jazz Bass which is heard on Permanent Waves, Moving Pictures, Signals and the supporting tours. In 1981, Lee began using the compact, headless Steinberger bass, which he occasionally used on the supporting tour for Signals and for several tracks on Grace Under Pressure. From 1985 to 1992, Lee used British Wal basses. He switched back to Fender Jazz Basses for the recording of Counterparts in 1993, and has been using them virtually exclusively since, heard on albums Test for Echo, Vapor Trails, Feedback and Snakes & Arrows. However, he used a Fender Jaco Pastorius Tribute fretless replica bass for the song Malignant Narcissism on Snakes & Arrows, and a Fender Custom Shop Jazz with an Alder Body and a Flamed Maple top in transparent red for songs in an alternate tuning during the last several tours. In 1998, Fender released the Geddy Lee Jazz Bass, available in black and three-colour sunburst. This signature model is a recreation of Lee's favourite bass, a 1972 Fender Jazz that he bought in a pawn shop in Kalamazoo, Michigan. On all of his basses, Lee uses Rotosound Swing Bass 66 Stainless Steel round-wound strings (RS66LA). Lee once again used his Rickenbacker 4001 for the performance of A Passage to Bangkok on the 2007 and 2008 Snakes & Arrows Tour. For the 2010 Time Machine Tour, Lee added the alchemical symbol for amalgamation to the body of his Fender Jazz Bass guitar.'
However since 1996, as well as varying his bass guitars regularly he has also begun to shun traditional amplifiers and keyboards preferring instead to use a venue's own sound system and plug his guitar into the microphone system. This has led to him having a huge space on his side of the stage where amplifiers and equipment would traditionally be positioned. Lee has filled this gap with a wide range of items from a full size commercial fridge freezer to coin operated tumble dryers.
Geddy Lee is also a huge advocate of charity work and a fan of baseball. In June 2008, he donated a collection of 200 rare signed baseballs that he had cherished since his childhood to a museum in Kansas City. They were from the Negro Leagues, which were set up in the 1930s and bore a huge significance to the Negro Leagues Museum that had been recently set up to commemorate racial separation in the United States.
Lee's high-register vocal style has always been a signature of the band, and was sometimes a focal point for criticism, especially during the early years of Rush's career when Lee's vocals were high-pitched, with a strong likeness to other singers like Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin. Although his voice has softened over the years, it is often described as a 'wail'. Lee's instrumental abilities, on the other hand, are rarely criticised. An award-winning musician, Lee's style, technique and ability on the bass guitar have proven influential in the rock and heavy metal genres, inspiring such players as Steve Harris of Iron Maiden and Cliff Burton of Metallica, among others.
The bulk of Lee's work in music has been with Rush. However, Lee has also contributed to a body of work outside of his involvement with the band through guest appearances and album production. In 1981, Lee was the featured guest for the hit song Take Off and its included comedic commentary. This starred Bob and Doug McKenzie, played by Rick Moranis, who Lee actually went to school with, and Dave Thomas, for the McKenzie Brothers' comedy album Great White North. The following year, Lee produced the debut album from Toronto New wave band Boys Brigade. On the 1985 album We Are the World, by humanitarian consortium USA for Africa, Lee recorded guest vocals for the song Tears Are Not Enough.
Apart from band contributions, Lee sang the Canadian National Anthem in front of a full crowd at Camden Yards for the 1993 All-Star Game. Another version of 0 Canada in rock format was recorded by Lee and Lifeson on the accompanying soundtrack CD for the Trey Parker and Matt Stone film South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut released in 1999.
My Favourite Headache, Lee's first solo album, was released in November 2000 while Rush was on a hiatus due to tragedies in drummer Neil Peart's life. Lee appeared in Broken Social Scene's music video for their 2006 single Fire Eye' d Boy, judging the band while they perform various musical tasks. In 2006, Lee joined Lifeson's super group the Big Dirty Band, to provide songs accompanying Trailer Park Boys: The Movie.
Lee's life has seen him win a number of famous awards including Best Rock Guitarist and Best Bass Guitarist from Guitar Player magazine. He was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1994 and is still seen as an ambassador for Canadian music worldwide.
ALEX LIFESON
Alex Lifeson is best known as the groups' guitarist and one of their founder members. In the summer of 1968, Lifeson founded the band that became Rush with friend and original drummer John Rutsey. He has been an integral member of the three-piece band ever since. Lifeson was born Aleksandar Zivojinovich in Fernie, British Columbia to Serbian immigrants, Nenad and Milka. He was raised in Toronto, Ontario where he met his fellow band members at secondary school. His assumed stage name of Lifeson is a semi-literal translation of the name Zivojinovich, which means 'son of life' in Serbian.
Lifeson's first girlfriend, Charlene, gave birth to their eldest son, Justin, in October 1970, and they married in 1975. Their second son, Adrian, who is also involved in music, performed on two tracks from Lifeson's 1996 solo project, Victor.
Lifeson's first exposure to formal music training came in the form of the viola, which he renounced for the guitar at the age of twelve. His first guitar was a Christmas gift from his father, a six-string Kent classical acoustic which was later upgraded to an electric Japanese model. During his adolescent years, Lifeson was influenced primarily by Jimi Hendrix, Pete Townshend, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page. In 1963 Lifeson met the future Rush drummer John Rutsey in school. Both were interested in music and decided to form a band. Lifeson was primarily a self-taught guitarist with his only formal instruction coming from a high school friend in 1971 who taught classical guitar lessons. This training lasted for roughly a year and a half.
Instrumentally, Lifeson is regarded as a guitarist whose strengths and notability rely primarily on signature riffing, electronic effects and processing, unorthodox chord structures, and a copious arsenal of equipment used over the years. Despite his esteem, however, Lifeson is often regarded as being overshadowed by his band mates due to their on stage eccentricity, in comparison to his calmer and more composed style.
Unlike many of the other members of Rush, past and present, Lifeson has also developed a fairly active media career and is well respected as a solo artist, television presenter and actor. This began in 1972 when he appeared in a Canadian documentary film called Come on Children. He then left acting to focus on his music career before returning to the craft during a Rush hiatus in the late 1990s. Lifeson's next foray into television came in 2003, when he starred in an episode of the Canadian mockumentary Trailer Park Boys, titled Closer to the Heart, in which Lifeson plays a partly-fictional version of himself. In the story, he is kidnapped by the show's protagonist Ricky and held as punishment for his inability to provide the main characters with free tickets to a Rush concert. In the end of the episode, Alex reconciles with the characters, and performs a duet of Closer to the Heart with the character Bubbles at the trailer park.
Lifeson later went on to be instrumental in the Rush's 2008 appearance on hit Television comedy show The Colbert Report, which provides a satirical take on week's news. The band played the full version of Tom Sawyer, which according to the host was the first time the entire band had appeared on television in thirty-three years. Lifeson also appeared in Trailer Park Boys: The Movie, as a traffic cop in the opening scene and then again in Trailer Park Boys: Countdown to Liquor Day, but this time featured in drag as an undercover vice cop. In 2009, Lifeson and his fellow Rush members appeared as themselves in the hit comedy I Love You, Man. In 2010, Lifeson once again appeared in a Trailer Park Boys project, The Drunk and On Drugs Happy Fun Time Hour.
However, much like the life of most rock musicians, Alex Lifeson's career and musical life hasn't been without controversy. In what fans and critics alike refer to as the Naples Incident, Alex managed to get himself arrested at the Ritz Hotel in Naples, Florida. He was in the hotel on New Year's Eve with his son and daughter-in-law and was accused of assaulting a sheriff who was trying to break up a fight between his son and another youth. On 21 April 2005, Lifeson and his son agreed to a plea deal with the local prosecutor for the State's Attorney office to avoid jail-time by pleading no contest to a first-degree misdemeanour charge of 'resisting arrest without violence'. This is the most series of the misdemeanour charges in the US, and as part of the plea agreement Lifeson and his son were each sentenced to twelve months of probation.
Lifeson is known for his wide range of guitars and other musical instruments that he constantly varies, much like Lee. For most of Rush's early career and throughout the seventies, Lifeson took an understated approach and stuck to a Gibson ES-535. However during the eighties and nineties Lifeson began to become more experimental with his instruments. By 1982 Lifeson's primary guitar was a modified Fender Stratocaster with a Bill Lawrence high-output L-500 in the bridge position and a Floyd Rose vibrato bridge. Lifeson increasingly relied on a selection of four identically modified Stratocasters from 1980-1986, all of them equipped with the Floyd Rose bridge.
Lifeson is also regularly involved in charity and has launched his own range of guitars in association with the music company Hughes and Kettner with the proceeds from sales going to the children's charity UNICEF. He has also been named the Best Rock Guitarist by Guitar Player magazine on 4 occasions in addition to receiving the Order of Canada in 1996.
NEIL PEART
Neil Peart was born in September 1952 in Port Dalhousie in Ontario, Canada. He had a passion for music from a young age, getting into trouble at school and at home for his constant drumming on tables and desks. From the age of thirteen he participated in various regional bands, but decided his future lay in England and moved there at the age of eighteen. Unfortunately, he found little success in London, where he ended up selling jewelry, and returned to Canada after eighteen months.
Peart was disillusioned by his lack of progress in the music business on his return to Canada, but never gave up. He supported himself working for his father selling tractor parts whilst he pursued a career in a local band called Hush. They toured the Southern Ontario bar circuit and small local venues. In 1974, the turning point in Peart's career came when he was asked to audition for the Toronto band Rush as a replacement for their then-drummer, John Rutsey. Peart made quite an impression on his fellow bandmates, making a haphazard entrance, fresh from his father's farm. As Geddy Lee told The Guardian in 2018, 'He was very tall, lanky. And he had short hair. All of us had major hair... he had just moved back home and given up his dream of playing in a rock band... He drove up in this little sports car, drums were hanging out from every corner. He comes in, this big goofy guy with a small drum kit with eighteen-inch bass drums. Alex [Lifeson] and I were chuckling — we thought he was a hick from the country. And then he sat down behind this kit and pummeled the drums, and us. I'd never heard a drummer like that, someone with that power and dexterity. As far as I was concerned, he was hired from the minute he started playing.'
The mirth of his future bandmates was not lost on Peart, who said in a later interview with Rolling Stone that, 'I felt that my entire audition was a complete disaster, I was shocked when they chose me.
It is certainly not shocking to anyone who has since heard Peart's astonishing technical brilliance, but Rush got even more than they bargained for when Peart came onboard. He was also a stunning lyricist, although he had not developed the skill much up to this point. The lack of an interest in writing within the band forced his hand, and soon he was the band's primary lyricist. Frontman Geddy Lee never actually wrote a lyric during Peart's time with the band. Of this Lee has reflected, 'It has felt odd at times. It has felt very comfortable at times, at times very uncomfortable. Being an interpreter for Neil has been a singular pleasure of mine and a really difficult job at the same time, because I'm not always on the same page as him. As we grew as a band, I became trusted by him to be his sounding board and his editor, and if I couldn't get into a thing, he would leave it alone. That's the beauty of a relationship that lasts.'
Peart enjoyed huge cult success with Rush throughout the late seventies and early eighties. The band reached the peak of their popularity with the 1981 release of Moving Pictures. Following this, the band started to wind down for a time and Peart began exploring new directions musically. During this time Peart looked into new ways to expand his drumming skills. This is incredible considering he was thought of as one of the greatest drummers in the industry, but Peart took up lessons with the jazz player Freddie Gruber. In the 1990s Peart went on to create two albums celebrating Buddy Rich —a jazz icon and personal hero of his.
In 1997 tragedy struck for Peart when his then-only daughter Selena was killed in a car accident. Devastated by the news, Peart's first wife Jacqueline succumbed to cancer and died only ten months later. Emotionally destroyed, Peart found he was unable to return to music and Rush were put on hiatus.
As Geddy Lee described it, 'Neil was so powerfully running away from all that pain that it was understandable to me if he didn't want to return to the things that reminded him of the life that had been stolen from him. I didn't think he would return.'
But return he did, although it was four years before Peart felt ready to retake the stage. Peart's road to recovery began when he met his future wife, photographer Carrie Nuttall. They instantly connected and were married on 9 September 2000.
Peart's public return to the scene came in 2002 with the release of Rush's album Vapor Trails. This was followed by an accompanying tour, and Neil stayed involved in music full time until his 2015 retirement. He withdrew from Rush citing tendinitis and shoulder issues: 'It does not pain me to realise that, like all athletes, there comes a time to... take yourself out of the game. I would rather set it aside than face the predicament described in our song Losing It.'
Following his retirement, Rush searched for another drummer but eventually decided that a natural conclusion to the band's career had been reached. It is a testament to the high esteem that fellow drummers hold Peart in, that when Dave Grohl of Nirvana and Foo Fighters fame, was offered the position, he responded, 'I'm not physically or musically capable, but thanks for the offer. That's a whole other animal, another species of drummer.'
It is also notable that throughout his life Peart was also a prolific author, writing several non-fiction books centering around his travels on the road and experiences with grief and recovery. These have been widely acclaimed by critics, and Neil also collaborated on a number of fiction projects.
It seems that writing was always in his blood and rhythm in his soul. Although the circumstances surrounding his death are tragic, they may yet serve to highlight a devastating disease, and it is his musical legacy that Neil Peart will be remembered for — and for that we all thank him.
The devastating news of Peart's passing was summed up by the surviving members of Rush who issued the following statement:
'It is with broken hearts and the deepest sadness that we must share the terrible news that on Tuesday our friend, soul brother and band mate of over forty-five years, Neil, has lost his incredible brave three-and-a-half year battle with brain cancer... Rest in peace brother.'
OTHER NOTABLE BAND MEMBERS
JOHN RUTSEY was one of the founders of Rush and was a member from August 1968 to the summer of 1974. During that time Rutsey was the bands drummer and percussionist, and also sang backing vocals on a number of early hits. It was during this time that he played on the single Not Fade Away / You Can't Fight It and on the band's eponymous debut LP. According to the Rush biography Contents Under Pressure: 30 Years of Rush at Home & Away by Martin Popoff, Lee and Lifeson both acknowledged that during the writing and recording sessions for the band's debut album Rutsey was given the role of chief lyricist. Unfortunately when the time came to record these songs Rutsey did not deliver any lyrics. In interviews, Lee and Lifeson have both said that Rutsey was dissatisfied with what he had written and tore up the lyric sheets. Rutsey was said to have left the band following a diagnosis with diabetes, which would have posed potential problems with extended tours. His final performance with the group was on 25 July 1974 at Centennial Hall in London, Ontario. He was eventually replaced in the band by Neil Peart. Rutsey died in May 2008, following complications with his heart relating to his diabetes. His former band mates Lee and Lifeson released a statement praising Rutsey's role in the band saying, 'Those years spent in our teens dreaming of one day doing what we continue to do decades later are special. Although our paths diverged many years ago, we smile today, thinking back on those exciting times and remembering John's wonderful sense of humour and impeccable timing.'
JEFF JONES was the original bass guitarist in Rush, but he only lasted for a short period in 1968. He went on to become a member of the band Ocean. During his time with Rush he served as the primary bassist and lead singer before he was replaced by Geddy Lee just a few months after the band formed. In Ocean, Jones was hugely successful and their million-selling 1971 single Put Your Hand in the Hand was awarded a received a gold disc by the Recording Industry Association of America on 3 May 1971. Ocean disbanded in 1975.
LINDY YOUNG was a short-term session and recording artist. Young played keyboards, rhythm guitar and sang backing vocals between December 1968 and July 1969.
MITCH BOSSI was a short-term album and tour artist that played rhythm guitar and sang backing vocals between February 1971 and May 1971.
JOE PERNA was a short-term bass guitar player, who also sang some lead vocals. Perna was only with the band for a couple of months during the summer of 1969.
RUSH AND THE PROG ROCK GENRE 1975-1981
Rush's musical style has changed substantially over the years. Their debut album was strongly influenced by British blues rock: an amalgam of sounds and styles from such rock bands as Cream, Led Zeppelin, and Deep Purple. Over the first few albums their style remained essentially hard rock, with heavy influences from The Who and Led Zeppelin but by a process of musical osmosis Rush also became increasingly influenced by bands of the British progressive rock movement.
In the tradition of progressive rock, Rush created extended compositions that strived to push the boundaries of melody and form. Varied time signatures combined with fantasy and science fiction-inspired lyrics were the hallmark of Rush during their progressive phase. However, the trio offered no compromises and did not soften their sound. This fusion of hard and progressive rock continued until the end of the 1970s. Progressive rock's popularity peaked in the mid-1970s, when British prog artists such as Pink Floyd, Yes, Genesis and ELP regularly topped reader polls in popular music magazines in both Britain and America. By this time, several North American progressive rock bands had been formed. However, there were only a few similarly British-influenced acts in North America, chief among them was, of course, Kansas. Kansas existed in one form or another from 1971, and they became one of the most commercially successful of all the progressive rock bands.
Beyond the addition of new instruments, Rush kept in stride with the progressive rock movement by continuing to compose long, conceptual songs with science fiction and fantasy overtones. However, as the new decade approached, Rush gradually began to dispose of their older styles of music in favour of shorter, and sometimes simpler, arrangements. To this point the lyrics, most of them written by Peart, were heavily influenced by classical poetry, fantasy literature and science fiction. These influences are exhibited most prominently on Rush's 1975 release Anthem from Fly by Night and on a specifically acknowledged derivation in 1976's 2112.
The advent of punk rock and disco music in the late 1970s helped shift critical opinion and popular support in the UK and the US towards a simpler and more aggressive style of rock. This lead to progressive bands being increasingly dismissed as pretentious and overblown, ending progressive rock's reign as a leading style in rock. However, established progressive bands still had a strong fan base. Rush, Genesis, ELP, Yes, Queen and Pink Floyd all regularly scored Top 10 albums with massive accompanying tours. Fortunately staunch support meant that many of these acts, Rush in particular, actually became more popular as time went by. Overall, however, prog rock was losing its relevance, becoming largely associated with, in the words of Dr. Feelgood's Wilko Johnson 'men in dresses singing about Mars, science fiction, love and fantasy'.
Rush began to realise that in order to maintain their fan base they would have to adapt their style to incorporate the New wave sound of disco, pop music and synthesisers. This resulted in the band's move from the progressive rock style to a fusion of pop, rock and electro-synthesiser in the early eighties. Rush successfully merged their sound with the trends of this period, experimenting with New wave and pop rock. This period included the band's most extensive use of synthesisers, sequencers and electronic percussion. Although a hard progressive rock style was still evident, more and more synthesisers were introduced throughout the 1980s.
Another change was that, in an effort to increase the limited airplay Rush's previous extended-length songs received, their new album Permanent Waves included shorter, more radio-friendly songs. The Spirit of Radio and Freewill were two such tracks that helped Permanent Waves achieve huge success in the US and abroad.
With the dawn of the early nineties and Rush's character sound still intact, the band transformed their style once again to harmonise with the alternative rock movement. Rush started to return to their roots of music with the inclusion of blues rock and some progressive rock beats and rhythms on their new albums before their hiatus in 1997. The 1993 album Counterparts began to see the return of guitars over synthesisers. This theme continued onto the 1996 album Test for Echo and both albums have been called 'Rush's most guitar-led albums of their forty year career in music'.
The new millennium has saw Rush return to a more rock and roll roots sound, albeit with modern production. The band started to incorporate more electronics and better amplification in their music. But the lyrics and style returned to the early stages blues rock, as well as some progressive rock mixed with heavy metal. It seemed the band had gone full circle and tried to appeal to their original fan base. Perhaps this was a commercial decision, maybe it was simply for style and ease of creativity, but it definitely proved popular with the fans.
I suppose it is difficult to attach a single generic musical style to Rush. How can a group that has exhibited so many different styles and type of songs be referred to as just prog rock, heavy metal, blues rock or synthesised pop. It's difficult to assess where Rush made their greatest contribution and impact, however the majority of critics view them as one of the most influential progressive rock bands of all time, hence they are commonly associated with this genre. Some critics argue that Rush are progressive rock in one sense, but that they have some much more than this dimension. As the online critic known as Prog Rock is My Life' put it: 'First off they are progressive rock in the sense that they have the necessary albums to merit their inclusion (Caress of Steel through to Moving Pictures),I am more concerned about the later years (Signals to Vapor Trails). It has been said that these albums are not progressive albums but have progressive songs, but I disagree. The 1980's Rush output is just as prog rock as the seventies output.
For example, these albums may not have long songs with extended pieces in them but they do have a theme about them. It is not a concept album, but rather an album that has one singular theme in all the songs. Grace Under Pressure is as the album title suggests is about despair and troubled times. Signals is about signals sent out in society, and the views of what is popular and makes you "cool". Chemistry is about the signals sent in the body, and Power Windows is about how power can be, and is, corrupted.
'At this point in time Rush decided to move on and progress away from the synthesiser period. Most people consider the synthesiser period as a pop side of Rush, but pop means what was popular at that time and does not have connotations that it is not progressive rock music; it is just progressive rock that happens to be popular much like Pink Floyd. If Rush were concerned about popularity they would have done what the public wanted from them at that time, more synthesiser music. But, being a progressive rock band, they decided to once again go in a different direction. It marks another section of Rush. The music changed but the theme based albums did not. Roll the Bones is about chances and Counterparts is about, well, counterparts to life. Rush may have returned to their roots, but this is not regressing. They decided to make music that was more guitar oriented that included mainstream style (a bit) yet his was not mostly mainstream style. They took what was popular at that time and made it their own. They even strayed away a bit with the instrumental tracks on Roll the Bones and Counterparts.
'Clearly Rush were a progressive rock band by the way they changed musical style and by their album content. If they stayed in the same style this would not be progressive rock since they would not be moving their music in different directions. The fact that they have made many albums with theme based lyrics suggests that this is the work of a progressive rock band.'
AWARDS AND RECOGNITION
Rush have been widely recognised as one of the most successful bands of all time winning countless awards ranging from Grammys to Stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In this section we explore the nominations and triumphs that have littered Rush's illustrious career.
JUNO AWARDS
In 1975, the band won their first ever award at the Juno Music Awards. The Juno Awards are presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music. New members of the Canadian Music Hall of Fame are also inducted as part of the awards ceremony. They won the Most Promising Group of the Year Award in 1975. This was followed by their first major title when they won Group of the Year in 1978. Rush then became one of the first groups ever to win Group of the Year twice in a row when they won in 1979. They were given a special award in 1990 in recognition of their achievements throughout the 1980s. Rush were also given the title of Canadian Artist of the 1980s, a huge accolade for the band.
Following the eighties, Rush continued to win Juno Awards for their more modern stylings. In 1991 they won the Best Rock or Metal Album for Presto, and again in 1992 for the album Roll the Bones. Rush have picked up another five Juno awards since then. In 1994 they won the Hall of Fame award, then picked up a further two wins for Music DVD of the Year, with Rush in Rio and Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage, in 2004 and 2011 respectively. A victory in the Best Rock Album category came in 2013 for Clockwork Angels, and Rush's incredible winning streak came to a close in 2015 when they picked up the coveted Humanitarian Award. For Rush to still be picking up awards forty years after their first win really shows the great respect that the people of Canada and the entire music industry holds for Rush.
GRAMMY AWARDS
Despite being nominated for Grammy Awards on seven separate occasions since 1981, Rush have never won a Grammy. Some of the band's fans have called this a disgrace and feel that Rush should be recognised for their contribution to the history of American Music, blaming the judges for their poor decision making.
In 1981 the band received the first nomination for Best Rock Instrumental Performance for the song YYZ, however this was beaten by The Police with Behind My Camel. In 1991 they were again nominated for Best Rock Instrumental Performance for Where's My Thing?, which sadly lost to Eric Johnson's with Cliffs over Dover, anyone remember that?
Rush received further nominations for Best Rock Instrumental Performance in 1995 for Leave That Thing Alone which lost to Pink Floyd's Marooned. The next defeat came in 2004, when O Baterista was nominated following a Rush hiatus, and ended up losing to Brian Wilson's song Mrs O Leary's Cow — another memorable classic!
In 2007 the band were nominated for the track Malignant Narcissism, and were widely tipped to win after being overlooked so many times before. In fact some bookmakers made them such overwhelming favourites that they stopped taking bets. Unfortunately the award that year went to Bruce Springsteen's Once Upon a time in the West.
The next for Rush in Best Rock Instrumental Performance came in 2008, when their contribution to a charity album called Songs for Tibet was nominated. Hope (Live for the Art of Peace) was beaten to the award by Frank Zappa's Peaches En Regalia.
Rush looked like they might finally take home a coveted Grammy award in 2010 when Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage was nominated for Best Long Form Music Video, however they were cruelly snubbed once more when the prize went to the Doors for the When You're Strange documentary.
OTHER AWARDS
Despite the numerous disappointments at the Grammy Awards, Rush have been wildly successful in receiving accolades from outside the music industry. This is evidenced in this list of miscellaneous awards taken from the official Rush website.
DECEMBER 1990 Rush win the Mayor's Award at the Toronto Music Awards. OCTOBER 1992 Rush receive the Harold Moon Award by the Society of Composers, Authors, and Music Publishers of Canada. MAY 1993 Rush are inducted into the Harvard Lampoon and named Musicians of the Millennium. OCTOBER 1993 Rush receive the Toronto Arts Award. MARCH 1994 Rush are inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. MAY 1996 Lee, Lifeson and Peart are made Officers of the Order of Canada, the first rock musicians so honoured. DECEMBER 1996 Performance magazine, a publication for the touring industry, nominate Rush as Rock Act of the Year for their 1996 Performance Readers Poll Awards. MAY 1997 The Foundation Forum and F Musicfest announce Rush as the recipient of the Concrete/Foundations Outstanding Contribution to Music Award. MAY 1999 Rush are inducted into Canada's Walk Of Fame in Toronto. JANUARY 2000 Rush top JAM! Music's online poll, awarding them the title of Best Canadian Musicians of All Time. 2003 Rush are inducted into the CMW Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame. 2009 The song Tom Sawyer is ranked No. 19 on VH1's 100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs. MARCH 2010 Rush are inducted into the Canadian Songwriter's Hall of Fame. JUNE 2010 Rush receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, located at 6752 Hollywood Boulevard.
INDIVIDUAL TITLES FROM MAGAZINES
Rush have always been popular with music magazine writers and editors and often feature in polls for the greatest guitarist of the year or even of all time. Geddy Lee has been named Best Bass Player by Guitar Player magazine no less than six times. In addition he has also won the Best Rock Bass Player of the Decade for the 1990s from Bass Player magazine, and is in Guitar Player magazine's Bass Hall of Fame. Alex Lifeson is a two-time winner of Best Rock Guitarist from Guitar Player magazine, winning in both 1984 and 2008. He holds the record for the widest gap between victories showing the success of the band in modern times. He has also been named runner up in the competition on no less than four occasions in 1982, 1983, 1985 and 1986. Neil Peart was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1983, and is also a nine-time winner of Modern Drummer magazine's Drummer of the Year award. Peart won the award an incredible seven years in a row from 1980-1986, then again in 2006 and 2008. He has also been named as the Best Drummer of the 1980s by the same magazine.
chapter one
Rush was formed in 1968 in Toronto, Canada. The original line-up consisted of Alex Lifeson (guitar), John Rutsey (drums) and Jeff Jones (bassist and vocals), although Jones quickly left the band and was replaced by Geddy Lee. Over the next three years Rush underwent several line-up changes whilst performing small gigs in the local area. The band also appointed their first manager in 1971, who also happened to be a regular attendee. Ray Daniels became the band's first manager on the back of making himself known to the band at early shows. He represented the band for a long period of time and became friends with the group's members.
Lee has recalled, 'We were playing a lot of high schools. You'd pull up in Magnetawan, Ontario, set up your gear and start playing and the crowd would be looking at you to say, "What is this? I can't dance to this!" So we started by being unpopular on the high school circuit. And then, when we turned eighteen, we became unpopular on the bar circuit because we were too loud.'
After gaining stability in the line-up and honing their live skills Rush came to release their first single Not Fade Away, a cover of the Buddy Holly song, in 1973. Side B contained an original composition, You Can't Fight It, credited to Lee and Rutsey. Unfortunately the single made very little impact commercially. Rush placed the blame for this on their record company, Mercury Records and decided to form their own label, which they named Moon Records. With the aid of Ray Daniels and the newly enlisted engineer Terry Brown, the band released their self-titled debut album in 1974, but critics were less than thrilled, considering the release to be highly derivative of Led Zeppelin.
Rush peaked at No. 105 in the American Billboard 200 charts. The album sold over half a million records in America alone, and was the only album to feature Rutsey before he left the band for health reasons. Rutsey wrote some lyrics for the debut, but never submitted them to the band and new lyrics had to be thrown together at the last minute.
It was not until Rush gained some airplay for their second single Working Man from WMMS Radio in Ohio that the band were able to generate some interest from the industry. The single was released on their Moon Records label, but seeing that people were starting to take notice, Mercury Records also decided to re-release the single. Until this point their own label Moon Records had only sold 3,500 copies of the Rush album but once listeners of the Donna Halper show heard the music, the station was inundated with phone calls asking how to purchase Rush. In response to the demand the band also agreed a deal with Mercury Records in the US to re-release the album.
Immediately after the release of the debut album in 1974, Rutsey resigned due to health difficulties stemming from diabetes and a general distaste for touring. His last performance with the band was on 25 July 1974 at Centennial Hall in London, Ontario. Rush held auditions and eventually selected Neil Peart as Rutsey's replacement. Peart officially joined the band on 29 July 1974, two weeks before the group's first US tour. They performed their first concert together, opening for Uriah Heep and Manfred Mann with an attendance of over 11,000 people at the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In addition to becoming the band's drummer, Peart assumed the role of principal lyricist from Lee, who had very little interest in writing, despite penning the lyrics of the band's first album. Instead, Lee, along with Lifeson, focused primarily on the musical aspects of Rush.
The arrival of Peart brought an influx of new ideas and creativity, and the music became more progressive with influences taken from fantasy literature and right-wing ideology — in particular the writing of Ayn Rand.
Fly by Night saw the inclusion of the band's first epic mini-tale By-Tor and the Snow Dog. However, despite these many differences some of the music and songs still closely mirrored the blues style found on Rush's debut. The album Fly by the Night was undoubtedly the most successful album the band had released so far and started to become recognised on a wider scale. Unfortunately the album still only peaked at No. 113 in the American Billboard 200 charts and was actually less popular than its predecessor with local radio playlists. Critics rated the album an average of three-and-a-half out of five stars. All Music reviewer Greg Prato said, 'the album may not be one of Rush's finest albums, but it is one of their most important — it showed that the young band was leaving their Zep-isms behind in favour of a more challenging and original direction'.
Following on from the limited success of Fly by Night, Rush released Caress of Steel in 1975. Caress of Steel is a five-track hard rock album featuring two extended multi-chapter songs, The Necromancer and The Fountain of Lamneth. Some critics described Caress of Steel as, 'unfocused and an audacious move for the band because of the placement of two back-to-back protracted songs, as well as a heavier reliance on atmospherics and story-telling, a large deviation from Fly by Night'. Intended to be the band's first break-through album, Caress of Steel sold below expectations and the promotional tour consisted of small venues which led to the moniker the 'Down the Tubes Tour'. The album actually only reached No. 148 in the Billboard Charts. However it did eventually achieve gold certification and sold in excess of 500,000 copies in the US alone.
The album performed disappointingly commercially and Rush were put under pressure from their record label to produce a more mainstream release. However, Rush refused to bow to these demands and created the excellent 2112, which featured a twenty-minute title track divided into seven sections.
Alex Lifeson remembers making the decision to stick to Rush's own creative style, and has since stated, 'I remember clearly saying, "OK, screw it. We're may go down in flames, but at least we know that we've done it our way." There's no way we're gonna remake the first record just because that's what the record company wants and they're worried about sales. So we dove into 2 112 and there's a little more angst in that record than with Caress of Steel's The Fountain of Lamneth, which was structurally the same sort of thing.'
2112 provided Rush's first taste of commercial success and their first platinum album in Canada. The release was supported by a hugely successful tour, which featured sell-out dates across Canada. 2112 sold well in excess of three million copies worldwide and peaked at No. 61 in the US charts.
In spite of its commercial success the album was not without its controversies. The ideas of right-wing darling Ayn Rand, a writer and philosopher who captured the attention of many during the Cold War era, heavily inspired the work. Rush credited 'her genius' in the liner notes, and were very vocal about their respect for her ideology. As Geddy Lee enthused, 'I think she's brought forth a lot of concepts and philosophies that have confirmed for us a lot of different things. I've just found it very positive. I've found it very positive. I've found a lot of truth in what she writes.'
This later resulted in a particularly scathing piece by Miles of NME, which was published in 1978, and centered on the band's political beliefs. This was somewhat of a hatchet job, and the band's fixation on the writings of Ayn Rand seriously damaged their reputation in the UK.
'All the classic hallmarks of the right-wing are there: the pseudo-religious language, which extends right down to calling the touring crew — road masters instead of road managers. The use of a quasi-mystical symbol — the naked man confronting the red star of socialism (at least I suppose that's what it's supposed to be). It's all there... They are actually very nice guys. They don't sit there in jackboots pulling the wings off flies. They are polite, charming even, naïve — roaming the concert circuits preaching what to me seems like proto-fascism like a leper without a bell... Make sure that next time you see them, you see them with your eyes open, and know what you see. I, for one, don't like it.'
Rush have always denied that despite finding inspiration in the work of Ayn Rand, they do not hold any right-wing political views, and Alex Lifeson has since described feeling very depressed by the backlash over her inclusion on the liner notes. In 2016 he described his reaction to the controversy in Rolling Stone magazine:
'I'm a very liberal guy. I always have been. I remember during our second tour of England, we did an interview with a journalist, who was very hard-left socialist, for New Musical Express. Ayn Rand wasn't quite as contentious as she is today. But he set forth his point of view, and then Neil took the opposing view, as more of an exercise than anything. And they ran it as this big expose. It said that we were Nazis and we would leave our grandmothers starving in the street because we were so selfish and uncaring.
Ged's a child of a Holocaust survivor. It was just such a stupid, stupid thing. That's the way the press works sometimes. We got over it but they dogged us for the longest time. And we were perceived as some sort of ultra-right-wing rock band, when to be honest, I had no political interests at all at that time. I think that was true of really all of us.'
chapter two
Despite the brewing controversy in the UK, Rush retreated to Rockfield Studios in Wales to record 1977's A Farewell to Kings and 1978's Hemispheres. These albums saw the band members expanding their use of progressive elements in their music. As Geddy Lee described it:
'As our tastes got more obscure we discovered more progressive rock-based bands like Yes, Van der Graaf Generator and King Crimson, and we were very inspired by those bands. They made us want to make our music more interesting and more complex and we tried to blend that with our own personalities to see what we could come up with that was indisputably us.'
Trademarks such as increased synthesiser usage, extended-length concept songs, and highly dynamic playing featuring complex time signature changes became a staple of Rush's compositions. To achieve a broader, more progressive palette of sound, Alex Lifeson began to experiment with classical and twelve-string guitars, and Geddy Lee added bass-pedal synthesisers. Likewise, Peart's percussion became diversified in the form of triangles, glockenspiel, wood blocks, cowbells, timpani, gong and chimes. Beyond instrumental additions, the band kept in stride with the progressive rock movement by continuing to compose long, conceptual songs with science fiction and fantasy overtones. However, as the new decade approached, Rush gradually began to dispose of their older styles of music in favour of shorter, and sometimes softer, arrangements.
Permanent Waves was released in 1980, and represented the first dramatic shift in Rush's style of music via the introduction of reggae and New wave elements. Although a hard rock style was still evident, more and more synthesisers were introduced. Moreover, because of the limited airplay Rush's previous extended-length songs received, Permanent Waves included shorter, more radio-friendly songs such as The Spirit of Radio and Freewill, two tracks that helped Permanent Waves become Rush's first US Top 5 album; both songs continue to make appearances on classic rock radio stations in Canada and the United States to this day.
The album was recorded at Le Studio, Morin Heights, Quebec, and was mixed at Trident Studios in London, UK. Permanent Waves hit No. 4 in the Billboard Charts and was the band's fifth gold and eventually platinum selling album.
Whilst Rush's musical style and composition had shifted to a more radio friendly reggae style, Peart's lyrics had moved toward an expository tone with subject matters that dwelt less on fantastical or allegorical story-telling and more heavily on topics that explored humanistic, social and emotional elements. He had shifted away from his background with the usual science fiction and fantasy overtones being replaced by an almost philosophical tone.
Rush's popularity reached its pinnacle with the release of Moving Pictures in 1981, a near-flawless album that was developed yet not rambling. Peart recalled the period of musical transition in interview with Rolling Stone magazine:
'When punk and new wave came, we were young enough to gently incorporate it into our music, rather than getting reactionary about it — like other musicians who I heard saying, "What are we supposed to do now, forget how to play?" We were fans enough to go, "Oh, we want that too." And by Moving Pictures, we nailed it, learning how to be seamlessly complex and to compact a large arrangement into a concise statement.'
The album Moving Pictures essentially continued where Permanent Waves left off, extending the trend of highly accessible and commercially friendly pop-progressive rock that helped thrust them into the spotlight. It also featured a blend of the new age reggae and synthesised music mixed with their traditional blues rock. Commercially the album was Rush's biggest success yet, reaching No. 3 and going quadruple platinum in the US. This was buoyed by the single Tom Sawyer, Rush's most recognisable hit.
Tom Sawyer relies heavily on Geddy Lee's synthesiser playing and the drumming techniques of Neil Peart. Geddy Lee has referred to the track as the Rush's 'defining piece of music and a great example of music from the early-eighties'. It is a staple of classic rock radio and reached No. 25 in the UK singles chart in October 1981.The track also peaked at No. 44 on the Billboard Hot 100 and at No. 8 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. Tom Sawyer was one of five Rush songs inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame on 28 March 2010.
In the December 1985 Rush newsletter, drummer and lyricist Neil Peart stated:
'Tom Sawyer was a collaboration between myself and Pye Dubois, an excellent lyricist who wrote the lyrics for Max Webster. His original lyrics were kind of a portrait of a modern day rebel, a free-spirited individualist striding through the world wide-eyed and purposeful. I added the themes of reconciling the boy and man in myself, and the difference between what people are and what others perceive them to be — namely me I guess.'
Moving Pictures was Rush's last album to feature an extended song, the eleven-minute The Camera Eye. The song also contained the band's heaviest usage of synthesisers up to that point, hinting that Rush's music was shifting direction once more.
chapter three
Following the release of a live album Exit... Stage Left, Rush began recording their new album Signals at Le Studio, Quebec in April 1982. The band was now hugely famous after commercial success of Moving Pictures helped to make the band to a global phenomenon, and they were now well known worldwide. However, the members themselves had become disillusioned with their traditional style of music, and decided to branch out into a more electronic and radio friendly sound. The band signaled their latest style change and new mentality with the creation of their new album Signals.
The recording of Signals proved Rush's most difficult project thus far, as they struggled to refine the new sound that they were looking for. As Peart told Rolling Stone:
'A lot of the early fantasy stuff was just for fun. Because I didn't believe yet that I could put something real into a song. Subdivisions happened to be an anthem for a lot of people who grew up under those circumstances, and from then on, I realised what I most wanted to put in a song was human experience.'
Released in 1982, Signals represented a drastic stylistic transformation. The aforementioned Subdivisions was one of three singles that were released from the album, the others being Countdown and New World Man. New World Man proved to be Rush's biggest hit to date; it went to No. 1 in Canada and was their highest charting single ever in the United States. Other more experimental album tracks such as Digital Man, The Weapon and Chemistry expanded the band's use of ska, reggae and funk. Although the band members consciously decided to move in this overall direction, they felt dissatisfied with long-time producer Terry Brown's studio treatment of Signals and parted ways with him in 1983. Brown had been with the band since 1974, but did not support the new direction the music was taking, being more comfortable with heavy guitars than synthesisers.
Signals was fairly well-received and it reached No. 10 in the American Albums chart, as this is usually centered around traditional pop bands, the placing is a notable achievement for the band. Signals also was certified platinum in the US after selling in excess of one million copies.
The style and production of Signals was augmented and taken to new heights on Rush's next album, 1984's Grace Under Pressure. It was Peart who named the release, borrowing the words of Ernest Hemingway to describe what the band had to go through after making the decision to leave Terry Brown.
Musically, Lee's use of sequencers and synthesisers remained the band's cornerstone, but this time his focus on new technology was complemented by Peart's adaptation of Simmons electronic drums and percussion. Peart had started to experiment with a wider variety of synthesised instruments and was so taken with this new sound that on some tracks the electronic drums replaced his traditional instrument completely.
Lifeson's contributions on the album were decidedly enhanced to act as an overreaction to the minimalistic role he played on Signals. Still, many of his trademark guitar textures remained intact in the form of open reggae chords, as well as funk and New wave rhythms. The combination of a new direction for all members of Rush meant that the Grace Under Pressure album was arguably Rush most artistic, and is stylistically different from anything else they released.
Grace Under Pressure reached No. 10 on the Billboard 200 and went platinum in the US on its release in 1984.
Producer Steve Lillywhite, who gleaned fame with successful productions for Simple Minds and U2, was enlisted by Rush to produce Grace Under Pressure. However, after receiving another offer he backed out at the last moment, much to the ire of Lee, Lifeson and Peart. Lee was so irked that he went on record to say, 'Steve Lillywhite is really not a man of his word... after agreeing to do our record, he got an offer from Simple Minds, changed his mind, blew us off, so it put us in a horrible position.'
Rush eventually hired Peter Henderson to co-produce and engineer the album instead.
In 1985 Rush released the album Power Windows and in 1987 they followed this up with the similarly styled Hold Your Fire. The music on these two albums gives far more emphasis and prominence to Lee's multi-layered synthesiser work. However the album marked a far less important role for Alex Lifeson who had begun to experiment with short bursts of sound and punchy, echoing guitar riffs. Hold Your Fire only went gold in November 1987, although it managed to peak at No. 13 on the Billboard 200. Power Windows was more or less a disaster commercially and critics stated, 'It has shown that Rush have taken their experiments with style too far and no longer care about their commerciality and radio airplay'.
Rolling Stone magazine's music critic Michael Azerrad dismissed the albums as 'musical muscle with little point, I give it 1.5 stars, and an insult to Rush fans who had viewed their favourite power trio as the holy trinity but now see them as something of a sell-out.'
Nevertheless, their 1989 album A Show of Hands managed to surpass the gold album mark, reaching No. 21 on the Billboard 200. At this point, the group decided to change record labels from Mercury, who had worked with them since 1975 to Atlantic Records. After Rush's departure in 1989, Mercury released a two-volume compilation of their Rush catalogue but it proved largely unpopular as most of the fans had moved on.
chapter four
During the late eighties and early nineties Rush began to enter another transitional period in their musical style and taste. Up to this point the changes had been well received by critics and fans alike. However when on the 1989 album Presto, the band began to experiment with their style yet again, some fans thought that had taken the experimented too much and should return to their roots. The band eventually started to notice the fans response and to some extent their nineties albums reverted back to the blues rock and prog rock that had made them successful. They started to deviate from their eighties synthesiser style with the albums Presto and Roll the Bones.
Produced by record engineer and musician Rupert Hine, these two albums saw Rush shedding much of their keyboard-saturated sound. Beginning with 1989's Presto, the band opted for arrangements that were notably more guitar-centric than the previous two studio albums. Although synthesisers were still used in many songs, the instrument was no longer featured as the centrepiece of Rush's compositions.
Continuing this trend, 1991's Roll the Bones extended the use of the standard three-instrument approach with even less focus on synthesisers than its predecessor. While musically these albums do not deviate significantly from a general pop-rock sound, Rush incorporated traces of other musical styles. Roll the Bones, for instance, exhibits funk and hip hop elements, and the instrumental track Where's My Thing? features several jazz components.
Roll the Bones became Rush's first US Top 5 album since 1981's Moving Pictures peaking at No. 3 on the Billboard 200. The album went platinum selling well in excess of one million copies. Roll the Bones marks further transition from the band's 1980s style to their sound in the 1990s. The roles of the instruments have generally been reversed; guitar is beginning to creep to the front of the song arrangements, while bursts of keyboard and organ are played in the background. Dreamline and Roll the Bones were popular radio staples of the early nineties, with the former reaching No. 1 on the Album Rock Tracks Chart, while Where's My Thing? became the band's third instrumental and was their second song to be nominated for a Grammy.
This trend to move away from the synthesisers was even more noticeable in both the 1993 album Counterparts and the 1996 album Test for Echo. Critics have described these as 'two of Rush's most guitar driven albums allowing Lifeson to truly showcase his talent which had been hidden through the late eighties.' Counterparts became Rush's highest ever charting album in America where it reached No. 2 on the Billboard 200 chart. The album went platinum and sold over half a million copies in the USA and almost 150 thousand in Canada. The lyrics of Counterparts continue the trends of Roll the Bones with dark and emotional themes being the primary focus. Throughout the album, there is a distinct alternative rock influence, showcased through heavy-sounding tracks like Animate and Stick it Out. The song topped the Mainstream Rock Tracks for four weeks in late 1993, becoming the band's fifth single to do so.
As for Test for Echo, this marked a further return to the bands more traditional rock roots. The band also chose to promote this album with a highly successful world tour. The album marks the final Rush work prior to the events in Neil Peart's life that put the band on hiatus for several years. Peart recorded a majority of his drum tracks for the album using traditional grip, after receiving drum lessons from jazz instructor Freddie Gruber.
The cover denotes the Inukshuk which is a stone figure in the shape of a human used to mark a food cache or hunting ground. The word is taken from Inuk meaning human and Shuk meaning substitute. The album reached No. 5 in the Billboard 200 charts and sold over half a million copies.
Rush's Test for Echo Tour was in support of the band's studio album Test for Echo. It was the band's first tour without an opening act, and was billed as An Evening With Rush'. The tour kicked off 19 October 1996 at the Knickerbocker Arena in Albany, New York and culminated on 4 July 4 1997 at the Corel Centre in Ottawa, Ontario. This was the only concert tour in which Rush played the epic song 2112 in its entirety.
After finishing the Test for Echo Tour in 1997, Neil Peart received some terrible news that changed the next five years for the band. His eldest daughter Selena had been killed in a car crash in California at the age of just nineteen. Only a few months later his long-term partner Jacqueline died of cancer; Peart always maintained it was because of the grief of losing their daughter and that his wife had simply given up the fight. Rush were forced into taking a five year hiatus during which time Peart decided to return to travelling and writing.
On 10 November 1998 a triple CD live album entitled Different Stages was released, dedicated to the memory of Selena and Jacqueline. Mixed by producer Paul Northfield and engineered by Terry Brown, it contained three discs packed with recorded performances from the band's Counterparts, Test for Echo, and A Farewell to Kings tours, marking the fourth officially released live album by the band.
In early 2001 Peart announced to his band mates that he was ready to once again enter the studio and get back into the business of making music. With the help of producer Paul Northfield Rush returned in May 2002 with Vapor Trails, written and recorded in Toronto. To herald the band's comeback, the single and lead track from the album, One Little Victory was released to grab the attention of listeners with its rapid guitar and drum tempos.
Vapor Trails marked the first studio recording not to include a single synthesiser, organ or keyboard part since the early 1970s. While the album is almost completely guitar-driven, it is mostly devoid of any conventional sounding guitar solos, a conscious decision made by Lifeson during the writing process. The album was also the first non-compilation album to be released by the group in six years. Amazingly it was a huge success and reached No. 6 on the Billboard 200 as well as No. 3 in Canada. According to the band, the entire developmental process for Vapor Trails was extremely taxing and took approximately fourteen months to finish, by far the longest the band had ever spent writing and recording a studio album. The album was supported by an enormous tour, that included Rush's first-ever concerts in Mexico City and Brazil, where they played to some of the largest crowds of their career. The last night of this tour at the Maracand Stadium in Rio was recorded and released as the three-disc live album and DVD Rush in Rio in 2003. The album proved an enormous success; it was nominated for a Grammy Award and has been certified seven-times platinum in the US.
To celebrate their thirtieth anniversary, June 2004 saw the release of Feedback, a studio EP recorded in suburban Toronto featuring eight covers of such artists as Cream, The Who and The Yardbirds, bands that the members of Rush cite as inspirations at the time of the band's formation. The album was a commercial success and was praised by Rhapsody magazine who called it one of their ten favourite albums of all time. The album also charted well, reaching No. 19 in the Billboard 200. In the summer of 2004 Rush hit the road again for their 30th Anniversary Tour, playing dates in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Sweden, the Czech Republic and the Netherlands. The tour was a huge success with demand for tickets leading to most venues selling out within hours.
chapter five
After their 30th Anniversary Tour and the release of the covers album, the band revealed their intention to begin writing new material in early 2006. Lifeson and Lee began to write some songs from their studio in Toronto whilst Peart, who was settling into his newly married life, simultaneously assumed his role of lyric writing while residing in California.
The following September, Rush chose to hire American producer Nick Raskulinecz to co-produce the album. The band officially entered Allaire Studios, in Shokan, New York in November 2006 in order to record the bulk of the material. Taking the band five weeks, the sessions ended in December. On 14 February 2007, an announcement was made on the official Rush website that the title of the new album would be Snakes & Arrows. The first single, entitled Far Cry, was released to North American radio stations on 12 March 2007 and reached No. 2 on the Media Base Mainstream and Radio and Records Charts.
Snakes & Arrows was released 1 May 2007 in North America, where it debuted at No. 3 in the Billboard 200 with approximately 93,000 units sold in its first week. It would go on to sell an estimated 611,000 copies worldwide, making it the latest in a series of Rush albums to go platinum. The most popular track Malignant Narcissism was nominated for a Grammy Award under the category Best Rock Instrumental Performance. The album was named as one of Classic Rock magazine's 'Ten Essential Progressive Rock Albums of the Decade'.
The Rush website, which was relaunched in March of 2007 in order support the new album, also announced that the band would embark on a tour to begin in the summer.
Rush began the Snakes & Arrows Tour in Atlanta, Georgia. The 2007 tour came to a close on October at Hartwall Arena in Helsinki, Finland. The 2008 portion of the tour started on April in San Juan, Puerto Rico at Jose Miguel Agrelot Coliseum and ended during July in Noblesville, Indiana at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre. The tour was Rush's most successful to date, grossing nearly $65 million. Comprising 113 shows, it became the second longest tour Rush had ever done. It was the band's first successful world tour when it took in countries including Scotland, England, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Norway, Sweden and Finland.
As the band neared the conclusion of their Snakes & Arrows Tour, they announced their first appearance on American television in over thirty years. Rush was interviewed by Stephen Colbert and they performed Tom Sawyer on The Colbert Report on July 16, 2008. Continuing to ride what one movie reviewer has called a 'pop culture wave', they also appeared at a live show in April 2009 for the comedy film I Love You, Man.
It wasn't until February 2009, that Rush next considered a new album. Despite their raised media profile and the success of Snakes & Arrows the band seemed to be more inclined to rest after their previous tour. However during a magazine interview in February 2009 Alex Lifeson remarked that the band had plans to begin working on a new album towards the end of the year with Nick Raskulinecz, the producer of Snakes & Arrows. The next news of the album came during their induction into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. Lee and Lifeson touched on future material during the interview, and Lee was quoted as saying, lust about a month and a half ago we had no songs. And now we've been writing and now we've got about six songs that we just love.'
Shortly after this interview Lifeson reconfirmed on the bands official website that they had already written a half-dozen songs and that there was the potential for two supporting tours, one planned for summer 2010 and a more extensive tour planned for summer 2011.
On 8 April 2010, both the official Rush website and PR Newswire announced that the band would embark on the Time Machine Tour. The first leg of the tour began on 29 June in Albuquerque, New Mexico and finished 17 October in Santiago, Chile at the National stadium. The set-list featured the album Moving Pictures played in its entirety, as well as the single Caravan and its B-side BU2B. Songs that featured on the band's next studio album, Clockwork Angels, which followed in 2012.
Clockwork Angels was sadly Rush's last studio album, as following the supporting tour Lifeson stated the band were taking some time off:
'We've committed to taking about a year off We all agreed when we finished this tour we were going to take this time off and we weren't going to talk about band stuff or make any plans. We committed to a year, so that's going to take us through to the end of next summer, for sure. That's the minimum.'
Rush embarked on the R40 Tour celebrating Neil Peart's fortieth anniversary with the band in summer 2015. Sadly following the end of the tour Peart was forced to retire from Rush citing arthritis and tendinitis. The announcement was made in December 2015, and despite Lifeson suggesting the band may continue, Rush was no more.
This brought to a close an incredible career spanning forty years. It had been a formative and emotional journey for both Rush and their fans. Rush's continued popularity today, shows the dedication of both a new generation and diehard fans. They have long been North American heroes and their impact on the many bands that followed them, ensures that Rush will not be forgotten any time soon.
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