[Interview: Alex Lifeson (Rush)]

Greg Prato of UGO.com's music blog recently conducted an interview with Alex Lifeson which was posted online this past Thursday. Alex mostly talks about the recently released Snakes & Arrows DVD but also had this to say regarding choosing more obscure songs for future setlists:

... I’m always toying with that idea - of really doing a tour, or a set, of more obscure stuff. Kind of stay away from “Tom Sawyer” and “The Spirit of Radio,” and explore some more obscure songs. I think the thing with us is, it’s “An Evening With,” and these are Rush fans that are there to see us play, and I think we can play just about anything we’ve written, and it would be accepted and there would be great interested in it. It would be really great to play those songs - for us to go on tour and play material that we haven’t played in 20 or 30 years...or ever. It would be a different tour, and something I hope we’ll consider seriously. It would be really interesting for us, I think. ...

Alex has been touching on this theme of a B-sides Rush tour in recent interviews such as his interviews with the Toledo Blade and Modern Guitars. Hopefully he really means it and can convince his bandmates to go along with it. Alex also reminisces about touring with Kiss in the early days, TV shows he's been watching lately and had this to say about the band's future plans:

We finished the tour in July, and we were exhausted. We had been working hard for the last seven or eight years - I think we’d done four tours, four albums, and a bunch of DVD’s. Constantly working. And we all just need to get away from it. So our plan for the next year is to not even think about the band. And then jump into it fresh. I mean, there’s a bunch of stuff that we have coming out - the DVD, and we were part of a film called ‘I Love You, Man,’ that is coming out in the new year. A couple of other film things. There’s lots to keep us “plugged in” for the next little while, but we just want to clear our minds of the whole business for a little bit, and jump into it with a renewed energy. Maybe not this late next year, but sometime in the fall of next year, I think we’ll get together. Having said that, Ged and I have this habit of getting together sooner than later, and casually starting to do some work. So if we get bored in the new year, we might advance that schedule a little bit. But right now, we’re thinking about next fall.

This echoes what both Alex and Geddy have been saying in recent interviews; that the band will be taking a break for most of the next year and possibly begin writing again in the fall. Many thanks to BW&BK for the heads up. Interviewer Greg Prato is a huge Rush fan who also recently issued books about Shannon Hoon/Blind Melon and guitarist Tommy Bolin - both are available for purchase at this link.

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