Rush News from Power Windows

Caress Of Steel, A Record To Die For

In the February issue of Stereophile, writer Brian Damkroge includes Caress Of Steel in his "Records To Die For" feature. - Thanks to RushIsABand for the headsup!

"Caress of Steel, Rush's third album narrowly edges out their fourth, 2112, as my R2D4. The sparse arrangements showcase their playing; in particular, Alex Lifeson's chord-based guitar style is shown off far better here than on their later, more complex albums. With Caress and 2112, Rush exploited the album format with longer, more developed operettas than were possible with their later focus on radio-friendly singles. Yes, 'I think Im going bald' is woefully out of place, the lyrics a little pretentious, and Geddy Lee's vocals are an acquired taste, but the music and sound are incredible. Rush at their very best."

Neil Peart "Soulscape" Print

International artist Tom Noll paints various musicians and is now featuring his Neil Peart "Soulscape" as a giclee art print from the original oil painting. The print has an image area of 27" x 18" (68.6 cm x 45.7 cm), is printed on 100 lb cover stock using fade resistant UV inks and sells for $350 plus shipping. For more information visit creativeboneartworks.com; click here for a closeup of the painting. - Thanks to Frank Ray for the headsup!

RushPetition.com Is Back For 2010 Tour

RushPetition.com is back for a fourth consecutive tour to take your votes on the top five songs you would like the band to bring back from "the vault". This go round, however, they are only offering up songs that have not been played in the last 20 years (songs not heard since the Presto tour). Surprisingly, there are 85 songs to choose from! - Thanks to Skip Daly for the headsup!

30th Anniversary Of Permanent Waves On "In The Studio"

The 30th anniversary of Permanent Waves was the subject of "In The Studio - The Stories Behind History's Greatest Rock Bands" which aired the week of January 11th. The show was a compilation of past interviews, and can now be heard at inthestudio.net.

"Crafting A Neil Peart Prototype"

"Do artists really influence the designs of the cymbals that bear their names? And, if they do, by what process does a drummer design a cymbal? We sat down recently with Sabian's west coast artist relations director Chris Stankee to discuss the design of a new Chinese cymbal with Neil Peart. You'll see how over the course of two years Neil and Chris worked together, They would receive new prototypes, test the, take them on the road, and then ask the factory for changes. With each generation of the design, this cymbal got closer and closer to what Neil heard in his head. You can see the whole story of Paragon cymbals on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/sabianparagonlounge."- DRUM!.com, January 10, 2010 - Thanks to Frank Ray for the headsup!

Sonic Reality Releases "Neil Peart Drums Vol. 1: The Kit"

Announced at this week's NAMM show: "Neil Peart Drums Vol. 1: The Kit. This sample library for BFD2 and Infinite Player, and powered by Kontakt, is part of Sonic Reality's Drum Masters series. Neil Peart, drummer of the band Rush, collaborated with Sonic Reality and producer/engineer Nick Raskulinecz to digitize the sound of Snakes and Arrows’ Custom DW Drum Kit. It features deep level dynamics, humanized random alternating hits, discrete multiple mic mixing, and more. It gives e-drummers, keyboardists, and composers the ability to play rock drum samples with the distinctive Neil Peart sound, and have a drum kit suitable for many styles of music from Progressive Rock to Heavy Metal. It comes mapped in GM, iMap, V-Drum and a Custom Map mode to be controlled by any electronic drum kit. It also includes discrete mic mixing and album-quality presets. It ships in the first quarter, but the price has not been announced." - Macworld.com, January 15, 2010 - Thanks to Rushisaband.com for the headsup!

Neil Peart On Paragon Brilliant "More Than A Shine - It's A Matter Of Sound"

In a new article at Sabian.com, Neil Peart discusses Paragon Brilliant cymbals. - Thanks to Frank Ray for the headsup!

"The evolution of Paragon Brilliant is about more than spit and polish. It began with the pursuit of the openness and responsiveness of an older cymbal, right 'out of the bag.' I have always found that brand-new cymbals have a certain 'tightness,' both in their physical response and in their sound, and it takes a few shows to play them in. Then they loosen up and start to 'dance' on the stand, and the swell of sound from attack to decay would become smooth and open..."- Neil Peart, Sabian.com, December 22, 2009

Alex Lifeson Makes "VH1's 100 Most Shocking Music Moments"

Alex Lifeson makes list of VH1's 100 Most Shocking Music Moments. Moment number 62, titled "When a Rush Comes to Shove", discusses Alex's New Year's Eve at the Ritz in 2003 (click here for a complete history of the event). Several musicians, including Scott Ian from Anthrax, comment on how Rush is a "geeky prog rock band" and "who would've thought they'd actually be on the list", while a comedian states "maybe Rush is using the prog rock geekiness as a front. Maybe they all could kick your ass." The segment includes Alex saying, "Gives a whole new meaning to spending the night at the Ritz."

"Trailer Park Boys 2: Countdown To Liquor Day" Now On DVD

Trailer Park Boys 2: Countdown To Liquor Day, the second Canadian comedy film featuring the bad boys from the trailer park, is now available on DVD. The film includes yet another cameo by Alex Lifeson, this time in the role of a cross-dressing undercover policeman:

"Of course, there's the de rigueur appearance by Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson, here playing a drunken, undercover cop posing as a transvestite in a gay-prostitute alley (centered around a Chip Wagon that serves alcohol -- man, Halifax is one weird town). The character may indeed be the same cop Lifeson played in the previous Trailer Park Boys movie, showing his true colours." - Edmonton Sun, September 25, 2009 - Thanks to RushIsABand.com

"R30" Complete Edition BluRay

The R30 Complete Edition Blu-Ray is released today, including Rush's complete concert from Frankfurt, Germany, on September 24, 2004. Unlike the DVD release which omitted Bravado, YYZ, The Trees, One Little Victory, Secret Touch, Red Sector A, La Villa Strangiato and By-Tor and the Snow Dog, those tracks have been restored to their original running order for this high definition release:

"Some of the songs were dropped from R30 due to technical reasons but also we didn't want to have too many similarities with Rush In Rio. Why not? Well, I think now that it was a dumb decision of ours. In fact I regret not having put the whole show on those disks. But I promise you, all those songs that were cut will eventually see the light of day, in some shape or form." - Geddy Lee, Aardschok Magazine, March 2006

Unfortunately, unlike the DVD release which includes a bonus disk containing over 1:30 minutes of interviews and bonus features, the Blu-Ray version contains the concert feature only. Click here for more information.

Neil Peart & John Good discuss The Finer Points Of DW's Shell Technology - Video Online

Early last month, the latest issue of Drum Workshop's "The Edge" magazine was published including a new article titled "Neil Peart & John Good discuss The Finer Points Of DW's Shell Technology" (see pages 14&15 here). Now, two 10 minute videos of their conversation are available on Drum Workshop's Youtube Channel. Check them out here and here. - Thanks to Mark Rosenthal for the headsup!

Permanent Waves Album Cover Details Explained

One intriguing aspect of Rush's albums is their album covers, and one of the most intriguing album covers to me has always been Permanent Waves. Let's face it, the scene showing a gorgeous smiling woman standing in the midst of all that destruction has always been a visual feast for the eyes.

"Permanent Waves is the result of a conversation which I had with Neil out at his home in the country. We spoke all evening about Rush growing up, and how we were going to do these EKG readings of each member as they were recording. We were going to tape their temples and chests and have real heartbeats of them while they were playing. So Permanent Waves was going to be a technical statement, and we were going to treat that with red and gold foil, and do a nice study in design- as opposed to a photographic thing. I walked out and, in the doorway, said 'Wait! Let's try something with Donna Reed, with her permanent Toni hairdo, and have her walking out of a tidal wave situation.' Neil gave me this blank look and said, 'Get out of here.' The following day, he asked me to consider doing just that because he'd discussed it with the band, and they'd all thought it was more likely for a cover than the serious approach." - Hugh Syme, Creem, 1983

By now we all know the story behind the "Dewey Defeats Truman" newspaper headline, but what about the rest of the cover?

Click here for more »

Rush Wins SOCAN's "International Achievement Award"

"Veteran rockers Rush took the international achievement award...as the music industry organization SOCAN handed out its awards Monday night. The Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada, the copyright collective for musical works, gives annual awards for Canada's top acts and recognizes songs and artists who get the most airplay. Rush is coming off a year of successful international touring and the release of its album Snakes & Arrows Live. The band, which first toured in 1974, is also wooing a new generation by releasing its classic songs for download on the game Rock Band." - CBCnews.com, November 23, 2009

"Working Men" Now Available

The new live Rush compilation, Working Men, is now available on DVD and CD. This release brings together the "best of" live tracks culled from Rush In Rio, R30and Snakes & Arrows Live. Click here for the North American and UK press releases.

Tracklist: Limelight³, The Spirit Of Radio², 2112¹, Freewill³, Dreamline², Far Cry³, Subdivisions², One Little Victory (previously, unreleased performance)², Closer To The Heart¹, Tom Sawyer (w/South Park Intro)³, Working Man², YYZ¹ [Source: ¹Rush In Rio, ²R30 and ³Snakes & Arrows Live]

Working Men downloads have been added to the Desktop Wallpaper, PSP Wallpaper, and Winamp Skins sections of this website. At the same time, I've revamped the entire Winamp Skins collection, updating the skins to include some new Winamp features.

Alex Lifeson's Painting Sells for $2,125 to Benefit Kidney Foundation

Alex Lifeson's painting, which he donated to the Kidney Foundation Of Canada, sold today for $2,125 through eBay.ca.

"Alex Lifeson (RUSH), Red Green (Steve Smith), Jessica Holmes, Rita MacNeil and Stompin’ Tom Connors are just a few of the celebrities who have taken up brushes and paints to create small masterpieces to help the nearly 2 million Canadians who either have kidney disease or are at risk." - www.kidney.ca

"It is through the support by all of us that the Kidney Foundation of Canada can continue to provide hope for those who are not so fortunate and must live with this debilitating condition. I urge you to take the time to help in any way you can, whether by donation or some other method to realize the dream of a cure. Even a little goes a long way..." - Alex Lifeson

New Rush Book: "Rush, Rock Music, and the Middle Class: Dreaming in Middletown"

Rush, Rock Music, and the Middle Class: Dreaming in Middletown by Chris McDonald, is now available. A professor at Cape Breton University, McDonald is an ethnomusicologist who specializes in popular music studies.

Synopsis: "Canadian progressive rock band Rush was the voice of the suburban middle class. In this book, Chris McDonald assesses the band's impact on popular music and its legacy for legions of fans. McDonald explores the ways in which Rush's critique of suburban life -- and its strategies for escape -- reflected middle-class aspirations and anxieties, while its performances manifested the dialectic in prog rock between discipline and austerity, and the desire for spectacle and excess. The band's reception reflected the internal struggles of the middle class over cultural status. Critics cavalierly dismissed, or apologetically praised, Rush's music for its middlebrow leanings. McDonald's wide-ranging musical and cultural analysis sheds light on one of the most successful and enduring rock bands of the 1970s and 1980s."

Canadian Release of Sacrifice's Latest To Include "Anthem"

"Canadian thrash metal legends SACRIFICE will release their first new album in more than fifteen years in November on Sonic Unyon in Canada. Entitled The Ones I Condemn, the album was recorded at Toronto's Rouge Valley Studios last winter by the band and Darius Szczepaniak...Released by the Brazilian-based Marquee Records this summer, Sonic Unyon will release a domestic Canadian version of the album, ensuring that it will be available in retails stores nationwide in their home country...After reuniting for a sold out performance at Toronto's Opera House in 2007, the band decided to reconvene and record a new studio album. Containing ten new original songs, the Canadian version of the album will also contain an exclusive bonus track of the band's cover of the Rush classic 'Anthem.'" - Thanks to Sean at SonicUnyon.com.

"Prog" Rush Feature Transcript Now Online

The August 2009 issue of "Classic Rock Presents…Prog" included a special feature on RUSH. The article has been transcribed by John at Cygnus-X1.net and is now available online here. You can also purchase a copy of the magazine at www.myfavouritemagazines.co.uk.

"Issue 3 of …Prog looks at the world of prog metal, featuring such genre stars as Dream Theater, Queensryche, Opeth, Porcupine Tree, Voivod and Finnish siren Tarja, and an intriguing interview with the man who launched the legendary Vertigo label. There are also brand new interviews with ex-Genesis guitarists Steve Hackett and Anthony Phillips, Marillion, The Gathering, War Of The World’s maestro Jeff Wayne, It Bites and even Captain Sensible. Plus there’s the usual round-up on the latest prog news and an even bigger reviews section than ever before. All this plus a free CD featuring an hour’s worth of the finest new progressive music being made today." - ClassicRockMagazine.com

New GarageBand Lessons Include Rush

"Today’s Tom Sawyer, he gets high on you, and the space he invades is your personal computer. Well, if you’re using GarageBand ’09, anyway. The GarageBand Lesson Store has added three new lessons to its arsenal, including the classic tune by the Canadian progressive rock band. Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson contributes two lessons to the new assortment, 'Tom Sawyer' and 'Limelight'...Each lesson costs $5 and consists of a video of the artist walking you through the piece, in some cases with both simplified and more complicated versions of the song." - MacWorld.com, September 22, 2009 - Thanks to Devon Cox for the headsup!

Neil Peart on Vertical Horizon's "Burning The Days"

Burning The Days, the long awaited album by Vertical Horizon, is finally available. Neil plays drums on three tracks, "Welcome To The Bottom", "Save Me From Myself", and "Even Now" (in fact, these tracks were recorded before Rush recorded Snakes & Arrows). In addition, Neil contributed lyrics to "Even Now", which you can view here.

The April 2007 issue of Drumhead Magazine included an interview with Vertical Horizon frontman, Matt Scannell, where he discussed his friendship and collaboration with Neil, and also discussed how Vertical Horizon was influenced by Rush. Neil first wrote about this collaboration over three years ago in his "News Weather & Sports" report:

"Late in 2005, Matt and I started working on a song together, with lyrics I wrote especially for Matt’s voice — literal and metaphorical. Matt suggested I might like to play drums on that song, and when I agreed to that, he started sending me demos of other songs he thought I might like to play on. (Trickster!). So while I was in Toronto working on Rush songs, I was also 'moonlighting' on three of Matt’s songs, playing to his demos and working out drum parts for them...Through the miracle of modern technology, I was able to e-mail those recorded sketches to Matt, and collect his comments as I went along. Thus it came to pass...on June 14, 2006, at Capitol Records Studio B in Hollywood (Hollywood and Vine, in fact), I recorded three songs for Matt’s upcoming Vertical Horizon album...The following day I told Matt that session had been one of the greatest challenges, experiences, and — now — rewards of my life. That’s the way I have always felt about making Rush albums, and I have every faith the same will be true when Alex, Geddy, and I reconvene in September." - Neil Peart, NeilPeart.net, June 17, 2006

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