Rush News

Pop Culture References Update - May 2014

It's time for the latest roundup of Rush References in Pop Culture.  This is long overdue, and thanks to everyone who has contributed! For this update, I have NOT included other recent references previously mentioned as an individual News item. If you have a reference in mind and believe I have missed it, please let me know!

  • First and most recently, just over a week ago on the American television series Supernatural, there has been yet another Rush sighting (this is the 5th time Rush has been referenced on the show); during the episode "Bloodlines" (season 9 episode 20, aired April 29, 2014), Sam and Dean identify themselves as FBI agents “Bonham and Peart”.
  • On Cartoon Network's Regular Show, during the episode "Video 101" ((season 5, episode 25, aired May 5, 2014),  Eileen adds up the time it will take to shot a music video and the total is shown on a calculator as 2112.
  • Swedish hardcore group Grace Will Fall released their latest album No Rush on April 1st; tied into the album title, the album cover is a tribute to Rush's 1974 debut.
  • In the video game South Park: The Stick of Truth released March 4th, after unlocking access to the "O Canada" level, a Rush poster can be seen on the wall of one of the houses.
  • On Cartoon Network's Adventure Time, during the episode "Bad Timing" (season 5 episode 49, aired March 3, 2014), Princess Bubblegum unveils her new time machine, and explains how it is controlled by a pair of special gloves. The gloves display the time and it reads 21:12.
  • In Marvel Comics' Deadpool issue #22, published January 9, 2014, Agent Gorman is on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier trying to guess the password for the person who has posters for Spider-Man and RUSH on his wall. He succeeds after guessing "SPIDEYLOVER2112".
  • Author Joe Schreiber states in the acknowledgements to his Star Wars novel Maul: Lockdown published January 28, 2014: "Vigilant readers will also find the influence of Geddy Lee, Neil Peart and Alex Lifeson among these pages, three gentlemen whose music animates much of the action as I initially conceived it in my mind."
  • On the Finish television series, Mun Ainoot 30 Minsaa (My Only 30 Minutes), during the episode "Korjaus" (episode 12, aired December 19, 2013), two characters wear 2112 t-shirts.
  • On the American reality television show Flipping Vegas, the main character Scott Yancey has worn a Fly By Night tshirt on more than one episode, including "Frat House" (season 3 episode 2 aired November 9, 2013) and "Hoarder House" (season 3 episode 4 aired November 23, 2013).
  • In the Vodafone Netherlands "workout" television commercial from September 2013, one of the framed photographs on the wall is of Rush taken at the Ahoy in Rotterdam in 1981.
  • On the American realty television show Pawn Stars, during the episode "Colt To The Touch" (Season 7, Episode 15, aired August 1, 2013), a customer brings a collection of "Chu-bops" (small bubble gum record albums which came in miniature replica album covers circa 1980 [yours truly has both Permanent Waves and an unopened/sealed Moving Pictures]), and one of the albums was Permanent Waves; Rick asks Corey "do you know any songs by Rush? Tom Sawyer?" and Corey replies "that's funny, I almost said 'Huckleberry Finn'." Check out a video clip here.
  • The plot of the horror-comedy film Knights of Badassdom which premiered at the ICon Festival on September 24, 2013, is about live action roll players whose final goal is to reach the Temple of Syrinx.
  • Wayne Coyne, frontman for The Flaming Lips, released a comic book in July of last year titled The Sun is Sick which is complete with a fake ad page in the front mimicing real comic books. Nested into one of the ads to purchase the LP "Beetles at Shea" is the text "Rush rules!".
  • Gods Of Night, Book 1 of the Star Trek: Destiny trilogy by David Mack was published September 30th, 2008, and is full of Rush references including: the conn officer of the Starship Enterprise is Lieutenant Gary Weinrib, an alien is named Lerxst, and when the Captain of the starship Columbia (possible "Countdown" reference) is speaking with members of an alien race, one of them states "while changes are never permanent, change is". Note, David Mack has included Rush references in previous works as well, including Wolverine: Road Of Bones published October 31, 2006, which includes a character named Alex Zivojinovich and a cab driver named Gary Lee. There likely are Rush references in more of his novels which we have yet encountered. Check out his homepage.
  • In his new book I Wear The Black Hat: Grappling with Villains (Real and Imagined), Chuck Klosterman quotes from "Limelight" and "Tom Sawyer". He writes about Laker great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: "Kareem (being Kareem) loves jazz music - but even if he loved rock, he'd never relate to Pearl Jam (except for maybe 'Corduroy'). He would prefer mid-period Rush: 'I can't pretend a stranger is a long awaited friend.'" Additionally there's a chapter titled "What Do You Say About His Company Is What Do You Say About Society".  Chuck Klosterman is another author who has refered to Rush frequently in past books: The Visible Man - the main character spies on a closet Rush fan as he air guitars passionately to 2112; in Chuck Klosterman IV: A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas, he says critics accurately described Triumph to Rush, only not as cool; and in Fargo Rock City he discusses interpretation in lyrics, and how one might mistake Rush for a Christian rock band.
- Thanks to Vesa Saarenpää, Paul Knox-Roberts, Alex van Loon, Jeff Lucas, Joe Pesch, Doug Hendrex, Mark Stench, Chris Rambo, Chad Kilhefner, David Wholihan, Bryan Benner, Jamie Nakai, Steven J Hall, David Kessler, Greg Nosek, Rand Stringer, RushIsABand.com, Cygnus-X1.net, Richard Leonard and anyone else I forgot to include!

3 comments:

  1. On the May 5th episode of cartoon networks Regular Show, 2112 is shown on a calculator as Eileen adds up the time it will take to shot a music video.

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  2. the latest old spice commercial in America the one where the mom is being dragged all over the very first scene all the wall hangings are RUSH pictures. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEbpbNTkIdk this is a link to the commercial. Loving all the rush references on TV and in movies.

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  3. Jeff someone else said those were Rush pictures, but I don't think they are Rush pictures. You're talking the trio frame on the far right of the wall in the first 1/2 second?

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