Rush is a Band

A blog devoted to RUSH:
Neil Peart, Geddy Lee & Alex Lifeson

Thu, Mar 28, 2024

Early Rush festival shows around the Michigan area

Fri, Feb 3, 2006@3:55PM | comments removed/disabled

[Michigan Area Rock Festivals: 1967-1972]

Some random Rush fan emailed Eric at Power Windows this info. According to this site which has a record of rock festivals in the Michigan area from 1967-1972, Rush played the following 3 festivals:

* August 3, 1969 Sportsmans's Park. Mt. Clemens, Michigan ("Mt. Clemens Pop Festival")

* August 26, 1969 State Park Roll-Air-Rink. Saginaw, Michigan ("Second Annual Saginaw Pop Festival")

* September 14, 1969 Toledo Raceway Park. Toledo, Ohio ("Toledo Pop Festival")

They played with some cool bands including MC5, Alice Cooper, The Stooges and The Amboy Dukes (Ted Nugent's first band). Cool. I was just an embryo at that time.

Update - 2/4@8:45AM: Wow. These posters started a long discussion at Counterparts about whether the Rush referred to was the Rush. Most biographical accounts of Rush say that the band was defunct during this period and could not have possibly played these festivals. Member Peter Griffin dug up this information:

Here's an interesting lead... I found a site with MC5 concert posters,
and they have a page for the third festival in Toledo (they probably
have the others, just haven't looked yet). At the bottom of the page
for the Toledo poster is reads: Not the same Rush from Canada that
would gain fame in the 70s

http://makemyday.free.fr/69/mc5_posters_1969_17.htm

I'm sure this would hold true for the other posters. Although this
means it's not "our" Rush, it's interesting to know that they weren't
the first Rush to have some success.

Interesting to say the least. I wonder what this other Rush was like and who was in it.

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