{"id":253512,"date":"2025-11-01T01:29:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-01T01:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/253512\/"},"modified":"2025-11-01T01:29:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-01T01:29:07","slug":"enter-stage-right-rushs-decision-to-unretire-and-tour-again-was-not-easy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/253512\/","title":{"rendered":"Enter stage right: Rush\u2019s decision to unretire and tour again was not easy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson, left, with vocalist\/bassist Geddy Lee during an event to promote Lee’s book My Effin’ Life in Toronto in 2023.Chris Young\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

On Aug. 1, 2015, at the Forum in Los Angeles, Rush performed the final show of its last tour, walking away as a video short called Exit Stage Left played on arena screens. Next year, on June 7, the band will kick off its just-announced North American Fifty Something Tour<\/a> at the same venue, picking up right where they left off, as if nothing had happened.<\/p>\n

A lot has happened. Rush surprised everybody, including people close to the band who spoke to The Globe and Mail, by resurrecting the group. Joining vocalist\/bassist Geddy Lee and guitarist Alex Lifeson will be German drummer Anika Nilles<\/a> and potentially a keyboardist. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision did not come easily, and it did not come quickly,\u201d Lee told The Globe. \u201cAlex and I had discussed it a couple of times over the last 10 years, but we never got very far because he would change his mind or something would occur.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rush\u2019s Geddy Lee loves the Blue Jays, but his grandson is closer to the heart<\/a><\/p>\n

In 2022, Lifeson and Lee performed three Rush songs with guest drummers including Dave Grohl at a tribute concert for the late Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins at London\u2019s Wembley Stadium. And while lifelong friends Lee and Lifeson have been jamming for \u201cquite a while\u201d at Lee\u2019s home studio in Toronto, there was no reunion in sight.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there was a moment when we played together so much that the question was just hanging in the air \u2013 should we take it further?\u201d he said. \u201cBut Alex was very vocal about not wanting to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pair, both 72, have kept themselves occupied. Lee published his memoir, My Effin\u2019 Life in 2023, followed this September by the baseball book 72 Stories. Lifeson has released two albums and an EP over the past four years with his band Envy of None.<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Lifeson and Lee perform during Rush’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Los Angeles in 2013.Reuters<\/p>\n

At the Gordon Lightfoot tribute concert<\/a> at Massey Hall in 2024, the two joined Blue Rodeo for a supergroup version of the late singer\u2019s The Way I Feel. The appearance was completely out of the blue. As was the recent reunion announcement.<\/p>\n

Lifeson contributed guitar to the forthcoming Rheostatics album The Great Lakes Suite. During the recording sessions, he gave no hint of reviving the dormant Rush. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was totally surprised,\u201d said Rheostatics singer\/guitarist Dave Bidini, who worked as a writer on the 2016 rock doc Time Stand Still, from Rush\u2019s 2015 tour. \u201cIf anyone has any deep, dark family secrets they never want revealed, I suggest they tell them to Geddy or Alex. Combined, they are a vault.\u201d<\/p>\n

The vault was opened earlier this month at an invite-only \u201cevening of conversation\u201d at Cleveland\u2019s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Donna Halper, a Boston-based media historian and professor who, as a Cleveland radio DJ in the 1970s, championed Rush when others did not, was asked to introduce Lifeson and Lee. <\/p>\n

She received no clues in advance.<\/p>\n

\u201cI received an e-mail asking me if I could be in Cleveland on Sunday night and could I keep a secret,\u201d Harper said. \u201cI replied, \u2018Yes\u2019 and \u2018Yes,\u2019 and they flew me to Cleveland. All I knew was that Alex and Geddy were going to be there and that it was hush-hush. Even when I arrived, I had no idea why I was there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before a tour could be considered, there were issues to clear up, including Lifeson\u2019s digestive problems, which required surgery in 2023. Concerned about the touring grind after so many years away, the pair went to a health clinic in Europe. Lifeson came back to Toronto \u201cfired up,\u201d according to Lee.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when we decided to take it to the next step.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the band and its infrastructure having been mothballed for a decade, the people they contacted to gauge the appetite for a reunion were \u201cvery bullish,\u201d Lee said. <\/p>\n

Cliff Burnstein and Peter Mensch of the U.S. management company Q Prime will run the tour. Live Nation is on board as the promoter. It was envisioned as a series of multinight residencies at arenas in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Toronto, Cleveland, Mexico City and Fort Worth, Tex. Due to robust ticket sales, however, dates were added to the residencies<\/a>, and more cities (including multiple nights in Montreal, Vancouver and Edmonton) were put on sale.<\/p>\n

Drum roll, please: Who is Anika Nilles, Rush\u2019s new tour drummer?<\/a><\/p>\n

If anyone wondered whether Rush could still sell out big rooms, the tour\u2019s promoter did not share in the concern. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no doubt on our part,\u201d said Riley O\u2019Connor, chairman of Live Nation Canada. \u201cNone whatsoever.\u201d <\/p>\n

One last problem: The band had no drummer. The virtuoso percussionist and band lyricist Neil Peart died of brain cancer in 2020<\/a>. Enter Nilles, a former member of the late Jeff Beck\u2019s touring band. This spring she secretly came to Toronto to play with Lifeson and Lee. She\u2019s been back more than once to work on a repertoire of 35 songs.<\/p>\n

The tour has yet to begin, but already there is no end in sight, with concerts in Europe, South America and Asia being considered.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re wrestling with extending the tour into 2027,\u201d Lee said. \u201cI really don\u2019t know. We\u2019ll see how that all shakes down.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson, left, with vocalist\/bassist Geddy Lee during an event to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253513,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,75,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-253512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-entertainment","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}