The Most Emotional Reunion of the Summer
It has an unbearably poignant hook. Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson are back on the road as Rush this summer, their first tour in eleven years and, after 52 years as a band, their first ever without Neil Peart, who died in 2020. German drummer Anika Nilles sits in his seat, with the blessing of Peart's family, and the Fifty Something tour is as much a memorial as a comeback. If you have only ever half-heard Tom Sawyer at a stoplight, this is the moment to actually get it.
The trouble with getting into Rush is that the fans send newcomers to the wrong place. They point you at the 20-minute side-long epics first, and half of you never come back. Ignore them. There is a clean path in, and it does not start where the die-hards insist.
Do not overthink it. Put on Moving Pictures tonight, all of it, in order. If the drums on YYZ make you sit up, you understand what the Fifty Something tour is really mourning, and celebrating.
