There's not too much to report in Rush news this week other than the fact that Alex Lifeson will be appearing on an upcoming episode of the Rick Mercer Report. According to this Niagara Falls Review article Alex and Rick Mercer were spotted Wednesday filming a segment for an upcoming episode at Niagara Freefall Indoor Skydiving. There's no word yet on when the episode will air. Both Geddy Lee and Neil Peart have also appeared on the Rick Mercer Report. Neil did a segment back in 2006 where he gave Rick some drum lessons. You can watch the video here. And Geddy appeared on the program back in January of 2004 for his now famous Tobogganing Safety tips video which you can watch here.

Rush's upcoming Working Men compilation will release this coming November 17th and is now available for pre-order on both CD and DVD. The R30 Blu-ray full concert re-release - which was originally slated to release on November 17th - has been delayed until December 8th according to Amazon.com. Amazon's entry for the R30 re-release on standard DVD has also disappeared (it actually replaced the Blu-ray entry and the old Blu-ray entry is gone) and I've just confirmed with Anthem that it will only be available on Blu-ray. Looks like we'll all have to finally break down and buy a blu-ray player.

Earlier this week we learned that Stephen Clare and Trevor Adams of Halifax Magazine are conducting an internet poll of writers, readers and literary luminaries to determine the top 100 Atlantic Canadian books ever written. They then plan on publishing the results in an upcoming book titled Spindrift: The 100 Greatest Atlantic Canadian Books Ever Written. They are also running a contest to guess what the top 5 books will be. According to QuillandQuire.com one of the writers polled was Neil Peart. You can check out Neil's top ten list in this post.

Speaking of Neil Peart, the film Adventures of Power - which features many a Rush reference along with an appearance from Neil himself - made its theatrical debut last weekend in New York City. This weekend it will make its West Coast debut at the Laemmle's Sunset 5 in Los Angeles. The film's charity release parties in New York and Los Angeles have been a big success and they'll be launching an online auction later today which will include signed instruments from Neil Peart, Metallica, Judas Priest and many others. The film received an enthusiastic drums up from the Los Angeles Times. Last weekend we were treated to a great air drum-off video of Power versus Neil Peart which was recorded at the Drum Channel studios a few weeks ago. If you haven't seen it yet, you can check it out here. For a complete list of theaters and show times for the movie, check out the official site at this link.

The Rush Backstage Club is running a new contest where you could win a signed 24" X 36" Test For Echo poster. The contest ends on October 28th and you can sign up to enter at this link.

Classic Rock magazine recently ran an article written by guitarist Mick Box (Uriah Heep) and Mick spoke about being interviewed for the upcoming Rush Documentary:

I was recently interviewed about the Canadian band Rush for the film Rush: The Documentary. The reason I was asked was quite simply, Rush supported Uriah Heep coast to coast throughout the USA, when we were huge over there, and this eventually broke them. It was an on-camera chat about my memories of Rush touring with us. The very first concert Rush played with Neil Peart as their drummer, in 1974, was supporting Heep. Of course they went on to great things and I really enjoy listening to them, and for a three piece they are incredibly powerful.

You can read the entire interview at this link. Thanks to meuste for the heads up. While on the subject of the Rush documentary, I've been hearing some tasty rumors regarding some vintage (pre-Neil, pre-1974) videos that have been dug up for use in the film. Remember my April Fool's joke from earlier this year? Well, it seems that the joke may have been on me. :)

Little Kids Rock is a nonprofit organization that provides free instruments and lessons to children in under-served public schools. They are conducting an online charity auction that will run through October 21st and several well-known musicians including Neil Peart have donated items for the auction. Neil's contribution is a pair of signed Pro-Mark drumsticks. You can check out all the items and place your bid at this link. The online portion of the auction will end at 10PM on October 21st and bidding will then continue via silent auction format at the organization's Right to Rock Celebration in New York on October 22nd. Neil has participated in past auctions for the charity. Thanks to Genaro G for the heads up.

Last October a team of St. Catherine, Ontario artists unveiled a project where they had created a series of double-sided banners featuring famous St. Cathariners and hung them up at various locations downtown. One of these banners is our favorite St. Catheriner, Neil Peart. You can check out a picture of Neil's banner, which is hanging outside police headquarters, at this link. Reader july141789 recently noticed that the St. Catharines Downtown website now has a page up describing all the banners. Here's what they say about Neil Peart:

World famous musician, Neil Peart is best known as the drummer and lyricist for the rock band Rush. Born in Hamilton, Ontario, his father became parts manager for Dalziel Equipment, a farm machinery supplier, and in 1956 the family moved to Port Dalhousie (now part of St. Catharines). From a young age he showed an interest in music, he started playing piano and soon set his sights on drumming. Peart worked the occasional odd job. However, his true ambition was to become a professional musician. During adolescence, he floated from regional band to regional band and dropped out of high school to pursue a career as a full-time drummer. After a discouraging stint in England, Peart returned home, where he joined local Toronto band Rush in the summer of 1974. The band has gone on to win countless awards for their recordings and Peart has become one the most respected rock drummers of all time. Peart is known for his astounding musical performances and for his technical proficiency and stamina.

You can read their complete bio of Neil Peart at this link.

Last month the CBC ran a couple of documentaries exploring the Canadian music scene in the '70s and '80s titled This Beat Goes On and Rise Up. Reader RushFanForever recently located an older article that I'd missed before which features a 15-minute promo video for This Beat Goes On including interview segments from Geddy Lee talking about the band Rough Trade, and a later feature discussing Rush and Closer to the Heart.

Reader dan let me know that Eric Singer and Paul Stanley of KISS - who was recently nominated for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame - were recently interviewed for Q104.3. When asked about bands that they think should be inducted into the Rock Hall that haven't been, Singer immediately mentioned Rush. You can listen to the interview at this link; Rush is mentioned at around the 1:10 mark.

According to Nicola B at the National Midday Sun messageboard, a contestant on the British TV Show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? last week announced that he wanted to win the money so he could take himself and his kids to Canada to see Rush next time they played. :)

There was yet another Rush reference from commentator Andy Levy on the Fox News Channel show Red Eye last Wednesday, October 7. This time Levy ended his opening remarks with a passage from Rush's Distant Early Warning.

Reader Zitro let me know that Rush was featured at Once Upon a Win this past Wednesday.

Reader GedHed was looking through Steven Wilson's complete discography and noticed the following entry:

Vapour Trail Lullaby
October 2006
Published: via MySpace.com
Players: Steven Wilson
Track: Vapour Trail Lullaby (6:24)

Note by SW: I found this on a CDR of demos from around 2000, and it's an early version of the song that was later recorded for the first Blackfield album with a much more stripped down piano and string quartet arrangement. Here I was obviously going for something a bit more epic (the full version lasts about 16 minutes, but this is the first 6). After Rush called their album "Vapour Trails" I changed the title of the Blackfield version to just Lullaby.

The new Vertical Horizon album Burning The Days, which features Neil Peart on 3 songs, released last month. Neil plays drums on the tracks Save Me From Myself, Even Now (which he also wrote the lyrics for) and Welcome to the Bottom. Vertical Horizon frontman and founder Matt Scannell is a good friend of Neil's and recently spoke about Neil's involvement with the album for an interview with ABC News Radio (thanks sbabsovitch). You can watch the video of the interview here:

That's all for this week. Have a great weekend!

NOTE: Posts over 10 years old are partially archived. All comments, images and other embedded media have been removed.