Rush is a Band

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

Fri, Mar 29, 2024

Updates and other random Rush stuff

Mon, Jun 11, 2007@12:19PM | comments removed/disabled

It's the veritable calm before the storm in Rushland today; just 2 more days until the Rush Snakes & Arrows tour kicks off in Atlanta. We have some idea of what the setlist might contain (SPOILER alert) due to some fans spying in on Rush's rehearsals, but you never know what surprises the 3 travelers of Willow Dale might have in store for us; it's gonna be a fun week. I thought I'd take care of a few random updates in the interim.

First off, Neil Peart sent out a mySpace bulletin a few days ago that has sparked a lot of discussion on the various Rush boards. Here's the bulletin:

Jun 8, 2007 3:13 AM
Subject This is a must see!
Body: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9219647520615705963

I love it!

~SPQR~

Hmmmpfff.... Such a thankless job...

See you all on Tour!

Praetorian!

If you go and watch the video, you will be shocked and amazed... it's rather amusing. There are some really crazy people out there.

There's a new contest up at the Rush Backstage Club. The winner of the autographed Snakes & Arrows tourbook from the last contest was Dan Curia from North Carolina. This new contest is also for an autographed tourbook. Here are the new contest details from the site:

The winner of this contest will receive an autographed and personalized Snakes & Arrows tourbook. The book will be signed by Geddy, Alex, and Neil. The book has just been completed, and will be signed and delivered to the winner during the first two weeks of the upcoming world tour. This contest closes on June 15, 2007. Good Luck!

Thanks to rosmakloma for the tip.

Reader Bravest Face has a radio show on HAY-98 (many of you are already very familiar with it) and this coming Friday, June 15th at 9PM he will be playing all Rush with no commercials. His original plan was to play the setlist from opening night and then take requests for the remainder of
however long he's on. However, since many people do not want to know the setlist he's considering doing something else. So basically he asked me to put it to an informal vote. So if you think he should play the selist or not play it, let us know in the comments or contact him directly via his personal contact form.

A couple of weeks ago I let you know that the Digital Rush Experience recently launched a Logo Store at Cafe Press with proceeds from the store going to the Epilepsy Foundation. Jim (aka crazyrunner) at DRE wanted me to give you the following update.

In our first week of sales DRE Logo gear, we've already raised over $100 (over $200 after matching funds) for the Epilepsy Foundation. We've had sales all over the world including US, Canada, UK, Germany and Brazil. Our best sellers so far have been the Mens White Value Tee which is just $11.99 and the Womens White Tank Top for just $14.99 (images attached). Most orders are printed and shipped out next business day. Shipping is only a flat $5 for up to 5 items. Plus, if you use the coupon code MOTIONFENCES at checkout, you can save $5 on a $50 order (code good until July 13th). [he also later sent me the code SRV155C which gives you $5 off $35].

With the tour immenent, Ticketmaster continues to release tickets and offer several various deals for tickets at different venues. Reader qzmhfl just let me know that for the June 25th show in Pittsburgh at the Post-Gazette Pavillion (which I'll be attending) they are offering a special 4-pack; 4 pavillion tickets for $25 each. There are also several contests for free tickets going on sponsored by various radio stations across the country. Reader Bill A let me know that 96 Rock is having a "Best Drummer" contest where the winner gets front-row seats and backstage passes to the Raleigh, NC show. Details at this link.

I ran across this site on the Rush Tour Forum and thought it was really cool. The site is home to the Rush Fan Film Project. Here is the idea:

I always thought it would be cool to follow Rush for an entire tour, filming as I went and assembling a documentary just for and about Rush fans from around the world. What they do before a show, how far they've traveled, who they go with etc. However, this would be very expensive and time consuming and not a realistic goal for me at this stage of my life.

I have been thinking about it more as a new tour approaches and I came up with an idea.

"What if I could get people going to the shows to film themselves doing their own Rush concert rituals?"

I've been thinking about a way to do this and I'm fully confident that this could work and work well. I know not everyone is a Video Professional, but I can make up for a lot of that with technology and by giving a few simple instructions and requests of what I need from everyone that will make this thing flow and have a feel of continuity. I can also shoot and post some examples of the type of stuff I'll need.
I look forward to working with all of you!

-Ray

This truly is a great idea. If you have a minute check out the site and help out if you can.

Here is probably the best Snakes & Arrows review I've seen yet. It comes from the Ulster Herald:

Consisting of 13 songs and just over an hour long, the new Rush album is amazing. I can be that blatant as it offers some of the most amazingly addictive verses, riffs, twists and themes.

Opener Far Cry demonstrates the Rush of old and oozes of the masterful musicianship that makes them such an influence to so many bands today. Geddy Lee's vocals are instantly soothing with their narrative and honest offerings and the hard rock guitars are enough to put any modern day prog rock band to shame.

Every song tells a story to get lost in and throws you in the ideals of a past era such as Amour & Sword, which offers a trip into King Arthur's realm. Tracks like Faithless, Workin' Them Angels and We Hold On have an enticing groove that over powers any of the reformed bands from the same period but the difference is Rush never lost it. 10/10

Agreed.

Bob Lefsetz is a music business insider and runs the LefsetzLetter Blog. He recently had a post where he analyzed several of the Billboard top 100 albums and had this to say about Snakes & Arrows:

61. Rush "Snakes & Arrows"

Sales this week: 9,619
Cume: 159,770

Either their fans have the loudest voices of all, or there aren't that many of them, or BOTH!

Rush has got a rabid fan base. They rave about the band constantly. But this is a piss poor number. Suddenly, it appears Rush is an oldies act, and fans only want the classics. Then again, should the band be scared on the road?

Whatever. Thanks to Tristar for the tip.

There was a recent Rush mention in a strange place: Family Circle Magazine. Reader pblaster let me know that in the July 2007 issue in the My Family Life section a celebrity is profiled each month. The magazine starts a sentence and the star finishes it. This month, the celebrity was Michael Chiklis from The Shield. When presented with the question My iPod is loaded with... he answers I have three of them, with 10,000 songs total – there's everything from Rush for working out to jazz and classical. Nice.

Toronto-based record store Sam the Record Man is set to close its doors. The store is a Toronto icon and was featured in the video for Subdivisions. Thanks to Jim M for the heads up.

The UK Air Guitar National Championships were recently held and a BBC news broadcast on the event contained a Rush reference. You can check out the news clip on the BBC website. One of the contestants is air-guitaring to Rush's Fly By Night. Thanks to Kagrenak for the tip.

And I'll close with this impressive fan-made music video for Sweet Miracle from Vapor Trails that Power Windows alerted me to. The star and creator of the video, Kimberly, based it on the scene described by Neil Peart on pages 338-339 of Ghost Rider. For details/background about the video visit Kimberly's MySpace page. It's very well-done; you can tell she put a lot of time and imagination into it.

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