“Twice a night we’ll pick a song to play for him”: Geddy Lee reveals how Rush will pay tribute to Neil Peart on reunion tour
Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson have announced plans to honour their late Rush bandmate Neil Peart every night on their upcoming Fifty Something world tour.
Celebrating 50-something years of Rush music, the upcoming reunion tour will see Lee and Lifeson joined by drummer Anika Nilles, who will play in place of Neil Peart, who was the band’s drummer from 1974 until their hiatus in 2015. He sadly passed away in 2020 from glioblastoma, a form of brain cancer.
In a new interview with National Today, bassist Geddy Lee and guitarist Alex Lifeson say the nightly tribute to Peart will consist of “certain songs” performed alongside a visual accompaniment.
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“We’ve been talking about certain songs that we feel really, really give us the vision of Neil,” Lee says. “Twice a night we will pick a song to play sort of for him and we’ll present a visual tribute behind us, to Neil, whether it be to his lyrics or just to his playing or whatever.”
“It’s a celebration of who he was as a person and a drummer, not so sad anymore,” Lifeson adds.
Elsewhere in the interview, the pair reflect on the decision to perform as Rush or to call the tour something else entirely. “[At] one point we were coming up with all these ways of not calling it Rush,” says Lee. “And then it seemed ridiculous because when you’re learning 40 Rush songs, what the hell are you supposed to call this thing you’re doing? Yeah, let’s say we’ll go out, we’ll play 40 Rush songs, we’ll call it Iron Butterfly.”
Indeed, Lee made a similar comment in a recent interview, saying: “What the fuck should we call it, Iron Maiden?” adding that the pair “twisted themselves into a pretzel” trying to land on a name that wasn’t Rush.
Lee and Lifeson will perform alongside drummer Anika Nilles on the upcoming tour. Nilles performed with them at this year’s Juno Awards ceremony. On filling Peart’s shoes in a longer-term setting, Nilles recently told Classic Rock:
“His playing was very energetic, and I really like that. That’s something I feel very comfortable with. I also love playing in a very energetic way. That’s the first thing that comes to mind, and something I really appreciate about his playing.”
Rush’s Fifty Something Tour will begin in Los Angeles on June 7. The group will perform in North America, South America, the UK, and Europe, finishing the tour on April 10, 2027, in Helsinki.
Head to Rush.com for full dates and ticket information.
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Source: www.guitar-bass.net
