{"id":885752,"date":"2026-09-06T17:12:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T17:12:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/885752\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T17:12:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T17:12:16","slug":"watch-alex-lifeson-fire-his-rush-bandmates-mid-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/885752\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch Alex Lifeson ‘Fire’ His Rush Bandmates Mid-Show"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Rush<\/a> drummer Anika Nilles<\/a> has been grabbing headlines<\/a> for her light-hearted asides at the end of the band\u2019s concerts.<\/p>\n

But this time guitarist Alex Lifeson<\/a> was the star of the show in a clip from their performance in Montreal on Sept. 4.<\/p>\n

As the video below shows, he made the most of a pause in proceedings ahead of playing classic track \u201cLimelight,\u201d presumably while waiting for a technical detail to be addressed.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0Rush\u2019s First Reunion Tour Song Was a \u2018Spinal Tap\u2019 Moment<\/a><\/p>\n

After breifly telling the audience about his love for their city \u2013 and admitting it sounded like \u201cjust something you\u2019d say,\u201d he looked over to Geddy Lee<\/a> and said, \u201cI think I\u2019d like to\u2026 can I start the song now?\u201d<\/p>\n

Lee replies, \u201cYou\u2019re the boss!\u201d to which Lifeson pulls an expression of surprise. \u201cI\u2019m the boss? This is new!\u201d he says before warming to the theme.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m the boss! Ah, you\u2019re fired, everybody! I\u2019m just going to do a show by myself. I\u2019m going to make hundreds of dollars!<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to go to the middle of the stage and take a rock star pose and start this, because this is my band now.\u201d He appears to look directly into the camera with a smug expression as he daintily steps to the front to play the opening riff of \u201cLimelight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alex Lifeson Fires Rush<\/p>\n

The re-energized band seem more relaxed than ever despite having been on hiatus for 11 years following the late\u00a0Neil Peart<\/a>\u2019s retirement in 2015. But as Lee explained in a recent interview<\/a>, it\u2019s not the first time they came back from a break with a new sense of lightness.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we first started we always had a good sense of humor,\u201d he said, \u201cbut for some reason \u2013 I guess it was youth and just lack of confidence \u2013 we kept that humor to ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

How Rush Decided to Be Themselves<\/p>\n

He referred to Rush\u2019s hiatus of 1997 after Peart lost his daughter and wife in separate tragedies. \u201cAs time went on,\u201d Lee continued, \u201cand we went through many different phases, and some of these phases were not happy times, by 2002 we had decided that it was okay to be ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s how the band came to be seen in episodes of South Park, began filming their own comedy sketches to be played as part of their shows, and made a cameo appearance in 2009 movie I Love You Man.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore 2002 we said \u2018no\u2019 to anything that was outside our comfort zone,\u201d Lee remembered. \u201cAfter 2002 we just started saying \u2018yes\u2019 to things \u2013 and I Love You Man was exactly that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rush Albums Ranked<\/p>\n

We examine Rush’s 19 studio albums, from 1974’s muscular self-titled release to a series of remarkable late-career triumphs.<\/p>\n

Gallery Credit: Eduardo Rivadavia<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Rush drummer Anika Nilles has been grabbing headlines for her light-hearted asides at the end of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":885753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75,44],"class_list":["post-885752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/885752","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=885752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/885752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/885753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=885752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=885752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=885752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}