I grew up in Canada - Hamilton, Ontario, the same town where Neil was born and just down the road from YYZ. I saw Rush for the first time in a high school gymnasium. Then I saw them at a town ice rink a year later. There were maybe 250 people there, maybe less. There was a noticeable progression in their live shows in that short time. After Moving Pictures, they exploded and it was nothing but arenas and stadiums after that.
I think the beauty of Rush for most young people was that when you first heard them, they felt like a band that you were relating to on a level that no one else could understand. You felt like you discovered them. At least, that’s how I felt.
I moved to the States permanently in 8th grade and promptly got in to a fight with a Detroit kid who insisted Ted Nugent was better than Rush. Rush won. I also made a lot of friends when I played the few Rush songs I knew on the guitar. We played the high school talent show a year or two later and did the intro to 2112 then Bastille Day and Working Man. According to the gym teacher, who also played guitar, we almost caused a riot. I later asked that same gym teacher if I could check out his guitar as it was sitting in his office. He said, “After i saw what you were doing to your guitar, there’s no way you’re touching mine!” Damn jazz guys.
I moved on musically and moved away from the area after high school. I lost track of Rush around Subdivisions era but was always happy to hear they were still going strong. I’ll occasionally grab an album off the shelf, tell my wife that she might want to go for a walk, and I’m immediately taken back to that high school gym, that ice arena and my youth. I still love cranking up a JC120 model and playing “Closer to the Heart” or riffing on the trippy phaser sound off “The Necromancer”. Of course, you can’t cover Rush in a band because no one can sing it.
I told someone recently that if Canada were my Hundred Acre Wood and I was Christopher Robin, Rush was my Winnie The Pooh. Neil’s lyrics and the music they performed got me through the trying times of adolescence, changing countries and the rest of the unsettled teen angst. I used to carry a Rush picture in my wallet. I saw that same image on the web today. They were young men, long hair, standing in front of the drum riser, Neil in the background. Alex with his white 335. Geddy with his Rickenbacher. It made an impact. I watched their Rock Hall induction with Jann Wenner and shed a tear or two.
This is really, really a sad day. Going for a ride... Exit the warrior. RIP. We have assumed control.