Rush: Wednesday June 22, 2011 Gibson Amphitheater, Hollywood, CA
My gastroenterologist thinks I should have a colonoscopy next week, but it’s concert season and Rush is in town, so I have to prioritize and spend my tax-return wisely. Not that I’ve ever really had a desire to see Rush or anything, but their album Hemispheres has been the musical accompaniment to my summer-night’s dalliance with comic-book hero sketching. Yeah, I know, I only bought the record back in ’04 because my favorite drummer name-checked it in an interview as being, ahem, instrumental in the development of his playing but, as obligatory as the purchase was, my myriad attempts to measure up to it wouldn’t allow me to speak of it in less than reverential tones.
So what, if it took me six years to finally recognize it’s fantastical brilliance, Doc? By the way, did I tell you have a gentle touch and excellent bedside manner?
No, I can’t name most the tracks on Moving Pictures. Criminal indeed! My ignorance all this time has been a profound punishment in and of itself – all the more reason why I should witness the, what did you call them? “The Holy Triumvirate.” Yeah, so I only got through one and half of Neil Peart’s travelogues, but regardless of whether or not I have a fleeting interest in his totality as an artist, I do own all his books (dude’s got some peppy prose!) and that long ass instructional video where he breaks out the dance shoes. I get it; I’m a fucking fraud. But, come on man! Hasn’t my asshole – formerly known as “The Rapture” – suffered already for such an oversight on my part? By the way, thanks for bringing remedial relief to that “war-zone.” My eternal thanks!
Nah, I haven’t air-drummed to YYZ.
All right, enough! Listen motherfucker, I didn’t want to pull this card, but I was listening to Mahavishnu Orchestra and obsessing over Billy Cobham-excess the last ten years. Oh, no problem; I’ll totally make you a copy of their lost Trident sessions!
Waiting in line at the Gibson Amphitheater amongst the “Mormons” of rock-band fan-ships (Forgive me, but Rush fans are some of the nicest folks I’ve met at a rock show and that’s as far as I’d extend the analogy), I’m quickly impressed by their dorked-out love for the band. It’s a largely homogenous crowd of non-athletic, AV-clubber aging-males (most of whom could probably play perfect, nuanced renditions of Rush songs on guitar or drums) proudly wearing a diversity of vintage tour Tees and engaging in giddy, esoteric conversations about all things Rush. The lively, good-natured kinship issued a welcoming embrace to this outsider; I actually thought to myself, despite my George Carlin crankiness, “Hey, I wouldn’t mind being a part of this group.”
Being there as a male lacking a lady-companion does not induce the kind of self-awareness you’d feel if you were, say, at an 8 o’ clock showing at the cineplex. I was informed that this demographic reality is an accepted hilarity within the community. Not possessing, however, some sort of Rush merchandising accessory might be revealing of your neophyte status, but I don’t think any of these fans were mean-spirited enough to play the condescension bit – maybe they save that for the anonymity of the internet? There was, however, a foursome of entertainment industry metrosexuals carrying on in mocking fashion about “single balding dudes that still live with their parents that just need to get their 15th Rush tote-bag.” They were loud enough that one could assume they wanted it demonstratively known that they were not part of this scene. I guess acting like elitist d-bags is less of an embarrassment than being a fellow traveler at a Rush show. A faux-Brian Glazer, standing next to the merchandise stand, went as far as yelling out “Hey, ladies, get your Rush bras!” An unsuspecting female (there were a few) fell for the ruse, gullibly scanning the table before light-heartedly smiling at the perpetrator and saying, “Darn, I might’ve totally bought one.” Faux-Brian Glazer feigned a laugh with her and then shared a full on guffaw with his kewl entourage. I hadn’t self-identified as a Rush fan just yet (hey, foreshadowing?!), but I was offended on behalf of the enthusiasts and shot him an amused look. Shortly thereafter, a stagehand bearing a walkie-talkie waved them backstage while everyone else looked on in envy.
Once in my seat, I found myself behind three awesomely anachronistic burnouts. Their fearless leader, a blend of Mr. Potato-head, Gandalf and the biker-version of Tommy Chong, who reeked of lard and tobacco, struggled mightily with his cane whenever he had to rise and make way for people trying to get to their seats. After he waffled back into his seat, I watched what was probably a cockroach crawl up the silhouetted stripper’s pole on his “I support single mothers” t-shirt and then rise over his oaken shoulder like the great Fitzcarraldo. I fought the impulse to flick it off for fear of the undoubted awkwardness that would follow. But, in one fell swoop his Leprechaun-like buddy seized upon on it with homing precision and disposed of it over the mezzanine, then squealed in a drunken Elmer Fudd patois, “Holy shit man! You had a creepy critter on ya!” The roach host responded by vacantly staring off into the middle distance.
Seated next to me was an affable pair of friends who, tipped off, I suppose, by my uninitiated demeanor, gave me a quick overview of what the band has been up to recently and how significant this “Time Machine” tour is: Rush will be playing their magnum opus, Moving Pictures, in its entirety! “And you’re so lucky to see them perform it for your first show!” I humbly replied that at worst, I was expecting a veritable history lesson but had this sneaking suspicion that I may have been missing out on something all these years…something staggering, I hoped.
Then, as if on cue the house darkens, cheers ascend in a heroes’ welcome (Frodo and Sam coming home?) and the waking HD screens that outfit the high-production stage emit the first installment of many comical film clips that go along with the “time machine” leitmotif. They featured guitarist Alex Lifeson in a fat-suit as an unscrupulous rock promoter, bassist Geddy Lee as a diner proprietor, Neil Peart as an unamused police officer, a young accordion band, some chimps and a horn-shell phonograph/wormhole portal. Not a single note had been played and I was already smiling from ear to ear. How adorable it is to see these quintegenerians not taking themselves so seriously? They’re the anti-rockstars I can relate to.
The set opened with Spirit of Radio, which slaps me silly with all its layered charms, while the air-instrumentalist crowd fed off its euphoric energy. The set then blossomed like the most purifying of revelations, enchanting me with a newfound sense of discovery as the band worked through the often circuitous compositional genius that is their storied body of work. The coalescing moment, which will henceforth be known as “When I fell in love with Rush,” came during the funked out instrumental powerhouse Leave That Thing Alone (whose title I didn’t know at the time) off their early nineties record Counterparts (yep, I’ve been doing my homework). Geddy Lee laid out slinky mid-register bass tones over “The Professor’s” refined hard-swung grid-beat, while Lifeson’s guitar ethereum gave the track its soul. At intervals within that song, there’s an offbeat, unified drum and bass 3-note accentuation that was so infectious I had to learn it the next day in the practice space, along with at least an album’s worth of other captivating drum parts I heard for the first time that night. A similar compulsion to go home and “woodshed” came during the stank-face riff-rocking “BU2B,” a b-side single released off of their almost completed new album Clockwork Angels, which, according to my row-mate, “promises to explore the harder aspects” of their music. Midway through the set closer, the Final Countdown – invoking Subdivisions, my gleeful stupor was interrupted when I received an errant tap on the head as an epileptic fan, overwhelmed by the aggressive light show, was carried out in full seizure. Then the band excused itself for an intermission, which was appreciated, as there have been times during momentous shows of the past where I would’ve liked to have hit pause, stepped outside of the moment and just reflected, briefly, on how awesome the experience was. The guy next to me excitedly asked how I liked the show thus far? I told him, half jokingly, “It beats a colonoscopy.”
After intermission, another film kit begins, which segues nicely into the part of the show I apparently came for: the performance of Rush’s defining album Moving Pictures. All those time-tested classics – Tom Sawyer, YYZ, Limelight, etc. – took on an unforeseen vibrancy for me. My body pretty much went astral during “YYZ”s time-defying, triumphant breakdown. When the tom blasts on Witch Hunt gave way to Geddy’s sustained howl over those Blade Runner like synth chord suspensions, I shook with fearless emotion, mouthing “No Fucking Way.” During The Camera Eye, the on-screen traffic visuals played hypnotic foil to the song’s bustling radiance but I never lost sight of all the precise instrumental interplay. And how is it that I never noticed the nod-factor of Vital Signs? And Neil Peart’s interloping reggae feel on that track? Ridiculous! The rest of the second set, ensuring that no stone be left unturned, was rounded out by Peart’s perfected rotating drumset solo and notably, tracks from Rush’s concept record 2112.
At encore, the band emerged to put on a rousing performance of their instrumental masterpiece, La Villa Strangiato, the one song in their catalogue I was most intimately acquainted with, from the aforementioned Hemispheres. When Lifeson flubbed one part of a repeating guitar line, the imperfection made him even more endearing. Working Man, the song that announced the band to the world back in ’74, started off in some reggae mutation before they pulled out all the stops and built that shit up into a free-world rock monolith; fitting end to the show as they came full circle on this 3 hour career retrospective. The epilogue consisted of an entertaining vignette titled Meanwhile…backstage, where Jason Segel and Paul Rudd, reviving their I Love You, Man characters, invade Rush’s dressing room much to the band’s playful chagrin.
Rush is the ultimate musician’s band, playing the type of songs that expand the compositional imagination. It’s rare that I’m so feverish with musical ideas after attending a rock show. Luckily, Rush is still new to me; I’ve still got so many records to dissect and enjoy in their rich, ever-evolving repertoire. Neil Peart’s drumming, in particular, finally resonated with me. All night, his playing accented rhythmic and melodic lines with so much inventive sophistication. This is the type of articulation and power on the drumset that I aspire to! The guy literally took me to school. Overall, I was amazed that a band could be so audaciously multi-faceted yet identifiably idiosyncratic at the same time; so ambitious in its complexity yet totally intelligible and most importantly, musical.
{Gabe Hernandez lives in the celebrity-refuge of Ojai, CA where he agonizes over his writing; he also has a dichotomist appreciation for misogynist rap and chick-flicks.}
Photo Courtesy John Hardin
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