Apple's annual Worldwide Developers Conference is taking place this week, and Apple Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, Craig Federighi, gave his keynote address to kick things off on Monday. Federighi is a huge Rush fan and snuck in a couple of Rush references into the address, as he's done in years past. At around the 16:30 mark of the keynote, while demonstrating some new features from Apple's latest offering, Rush's Headlong Flight is shown on the music widget on his phone's control center screen as seen here. Then later on at around the 54:20 mark, Federighi's tote bag is shown and it has a Rush button on it as seen here. You can watch the entire keynote address online at this location.
Despite Geddy Lee's My Effin' Life: In Conversation spoken word tour ending this past December, Ged announced back in April that he'd be doing a special one-off show at the Grand Théâtre de Québec as part of the Quebec City Summer Festival on July 13th at 1PM. Due to the first show selling so well, he decided to add a second show taking place shortly after the first at 4PM. The shows will take place in the 500-seat Salle Octave-Crémazie room, and some VIP tickets that include an autographed copy of his memoir have been made available (although there aren't many left). Tickets are $57 CAD ($140 VIP) and are on sale at this location while they last. The first show is nearly sold out, but the second still has plenty of great seats available.
The 37th Annual TD Toronto Jazz Fest runs for 10 days later this month from June 21-30, and for the first time ever they are also hosting an online auction as part of the festivities, with all proceeds going towards supporting local and Canadian artists. Rush's Alex Lifeson has donated a signed guitar to the auction, as described in this Toronto Sun article:
Alex Lifeson ... is auctioning off a signed crimson red Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster guitar as part of the TD Toronto Jazz Fest's first ever online auction. The instrument is also an Artist Proof Prototype which means it was built by Fender in 2021 specifically for Lifeson to try out that was based on a Stratocaster he used "back in the day." Bids for the guitar, and other items, are being accepted between June 1-30, with the festival's inaugural gala being held on June 20 at the Windsor Arms Hotel with a roaring '20s theme before celebrating Cuban jazz and salsa. ...
For all the details visit torontojazz.com, and you can place your bid on the Alex Lifeson guitar here.
The Peart Family Foundation is running their Cancer Relief Charity Auction all this week and through the weekend. To check out all the amazing items available, and to place a bid, visit this location.
The Professor of Rock YouTube channel ran an episode this past week on novelty songs, one of which was Bob & Doug McKenzie's 1981 hit Take Off, featuring Rush's Geddy Lee on vocals. They give a brief history of the McKenzie Brothers characters, how the song came about, and how Geddy became involved. You can watch it on YouTube at this location around the 6:30 mark (thanks RushFanForever).
On the latest episode of Rush Roundtable (#231) on the Rushfans YouTube channel, the panel continues their Vapor Trails album discussion with the track Peaceable Kingdom:
That's all for this week. Have a great weekend!
