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Rush’s Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson had announced something special for this year’s Juno Awards – and they delivered: The band opened the show with a live performance that featured their new drummer Anika Nilles for the first time. The choice fell on “Finding My Way”, the opener of their very first album, “Rush” from 1974, on which John Rutsey was still sitting on drums in the studio – among othersnd not the late Neil Peart, who only joined the band afterwards.
Nilles, who was previously known as Jeff Beck’s drummer, mastered what was probably the most powerful moment of her career brilliantly: on the powerful kit with the Rush logo on the bass drum, she played her way through the song with virtuoso fills. Lee and Lifeson appeared visibly electrified after their long break – Lee hitting notes from the upper register of his prime. Keyboardist Loren Gold, who will also accompany the band on the upcoming tour, completed the expanded line-up. In the background, video footage of Peart flickered across the screen, a reminder that the evening was as much homage as comeback.
The performance at the TD Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario marked the first time that Lee and Lifeson appeared on stage as Rush since the conclusion of the R40 tour on August 1, 2015 at the Forum in Los Angeles. In the more than ten years since then, the two have only performed together sporadically – but always under their own names, not as a band, for example at tribute concerts for the late Gordon Lightfoot and Taylor Hawkins from the Foo Fighters.
Lee and Lifeson on song choice
“You really can’t ask us what song to play,” Lee told reporters afterward. “If we have to choose a single song, it’s almost impossible. We have so many. So we just asked management and they said: first song, first album.”
“Plus,” Lifeson added, “it’s the only song we can play.”
The performance served as a preview of the Fifty Something Tour, which begins June 7 at the Forum in Los Angeles – the same place where Rush played their last concert with Peart in 2015. What was initially announced as a manageable 12-date tour has now grown to 58 shows across the U.S., Canada and Mexico, including four nights at Toronto’s Scotiabank Arena in August. Each concert is planned as a two-part evening, drawing from a rotating repertoire of around 35 songs.
