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

Fri, Dec 3, 2010@12:19PM | comments removed/disabled

The first round of ticket pre-sales for the North American leg of Rush's 2011 Time Machine Tour kicked off earlier this week. Music Today fan pre-sales for the dates in Hershey, Detroit and Baltimore began at 10AM Wednesday and ended a short time ago while Rush VIP pre-sales and CITI Cardmember pre-sales began at 10AM Wednesday and will end later this afternoon at 5PM. Pre-sales for the date in Rotterdam also ran last week and general on-sales began earlier today. There are also various venue-sponsored, Live Nation and radio pre-sales going on today as well. If anyone has password info for these, let us know. It looks like the password MOVING works for the Detroit show (thanks craigl), there's a venue pre-sale for the Hershey date using a password of HERSHEY (thanks Professordrums) and the Live Nation pre-sale password for all 3 dates is TRIBUTE (thanks lilvictory). I'll keep updating the tour page as I get more information.

Although they haven't been officially announced yet, Music Today pre-sales for the remaining 10 dates should run next week starting on either Monday or Tuesday. Ticketmaster has Rush VIP and CITI Cardmember pre-sales already scheduled to commence Tuesday of next week (Monday for MSG) for several of the dates, and should have them all listed in the next few days. To say that the pre-sale process can be a bit confusing is a vast understatement. Therefore I've put together a ticket sales and pre-sales guide which attempts to explain the differences between the various pre-sales, how they all work and what you need to know to participate. You can check it out at this link. And remember to stay tuned to the tour page for up-to-the-minute information on all of the various pre-sales.

Although we now know the dates/cities where Rush will be playing in North America before heading on to Europe in May, many questions remain regarding the post-European, June portion of the 2011 tour. From the Rush.com newsletter that went out late Sunday night:

... The tour also returns to North America in June with performances in select markets that will include cities such as New Orleans, Austin, Vancouver and a very special return play in Los Angeles - more information on these dates and more soon! ...

From what I've been hearing, this run of June dates will begin in New Orleans, move west to Texas and California and then up north to end up in Vancouver. It doesn't look like there will be any further Eastern US dates although it's possible that another show in the Midwest or Southeast would be added before the New Orleans show. I'm also hearing that the specific cities/dates will not be announced until after the New Year. What Rush means by that special return play in Los Angeles line is anybody's guess. There's a lot of speculation that this could mean they'll be recording a show, but I honestly don't have any concrete information at this point. It also looks as though Atlantic Canada, France, Spain, Australia, etc. will once again be left out of Rush's tour plans this go-around. This hasn't dissuaded Atlantic Canadian reader rushrulz from trying though; he has a petition to try and get Rush to play in Atlantic Canada which you can check out and sign at this link.

Wednesday night we learned that the Rush documentary Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage has been nominated for a Grammy Award in the Best Long Form Music Video category. The 53rd annual Grammy Awards ceremony will take place on February 13th at 8PM and air on CBS.

Official Rush photographer and pyrotechnical wizard John Arrowsmith wanted me to let everyone know that he's uploaded a new batch of black and white photos from the Time Machine Tour to the Rush.com Multimedia: Rush on the Road section.

The long-awaited Rush and Philosophy book from Open Court Publishing's popular Culture and Philosophy book series will be released this coming May and is now available for pre-order at this link. Longtime Rush and philosophy author Durrell Bowman along with Jim Berti are the co-editors of the 288-page anthology which is is divided into 4 sections containing 16 essays with a complete title of Rush and Philosophy: Always Hopeful, Yet Discontent.

Reader andy1027 let me know that Alex Lifeson is featured in the January, 2011 issue of Guitar Player magazine for a feature titled 10 Things you Gotta Do To Play Like Alex Lifeson.

Reader Jaybird is very psyched that Rush will be coming to Greensboro for the first time in 25 years, and wrote this little article about it on his blog.

Neil Peart's original Slingerland drum kit (which he used from Fly By Night through 2112) was put up for auction on eBay back in 2009 and ended up being sold for over $25,000 to Rush super fan Dean Bobisud. With the help of Michael Lowe of NeilPeartDrumsticks.com, Bobisud restored the kit to playable condition and since then has been touring it around the country to share it with fans and raise money for charity. Dean and the kit are the subject of a recent Triblocal article which you can check out at this link.

Nearly 2 years ago Canadian folk singer/songwriter Jacob Moon posted a video of himself performing a one-man, acoustic version of Rush's Subdivisions to YouTube which caused quite a buzz in the Rush fan community. Rush themselves were also impressed and asked Jacob to perform the song when they were inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame earlier this year. Filmmaker Ron Kebic put together a short documentary on the recording of the song titled Behind the Subdivisions which was screened at the 2010 Hamilton Film Festival last month. Kebic sits down with Moon to discuss the inspiration for the video and the technical challenges involved in putting it together. You can watch the video at this link. Thanks to RushFanForever for the heads up. Speaking of RushFanForever, Jacob Moon put on a show in Abbotsford, BC last Friday and RushFanForver was there pimping the website as seen in this photo. Jacob forgot to bring his hand held tape recorder which he uses to say Subdivisions in the chorus of the song, so he employed the services of RushFanForever to do the honors.

In the latest installment of his music discovery podcast and blog Bands Like Rush, Ben Sommer talks to Robert Pashman of New Jersey based prog rock band 3rdegree. 3rdegree's music is an interesting blend of jazz-pop, hard rock and prog. The podcast includes 2 tracks from the band and you can listen to it or read a transcription at this link. To find out more about 3rdegree check out their website here.

RushFanForever let me know that MusicRadar.com posted a feature to their website last week titled Live rigs of the rich and famous where they feature photos and videos of famous guitarists' stage setups, including Rush's own Alex Lifeson. They have a video from back on the 2007 leg of the Snakes & Arrows tour where Alex walks through his setup. You can check out the video below or at this link.

That's it for this week. Stay tuned to the site for pre-sale information and have a great weekend!

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