Rush Nostalgia
Just for the scrapbook record… a little memory skipping down the lane post. Perhaps my kids will read this some day and understand a bit more about my Rush Story.
I grew up loving country music because my mom did. I still love Johnny Cash. Then in my rebellious teens I turned to The Clash — perfect for rebellion, yes? But in 10th grade I was walking down the sophomore hall at school and I heard a song coming from the auditorium. I recognized it on some level — maybe it had been on the radio. A few days later I heard it in Pizza Hut. Finally, at an assembly, a band played it live. I mentioned it to my friend Parker and he said, “Oh — that’s Rush. You just heard Tom Sawyer.” He lent me the cassette and told me song 1 was Tom Sawyer and the 4th was Limelight, give that a listen to as well.
I bought the record. One of my first vinyl purchases. I liked it. Then one night I flipped the record over and listened to side two as I drifted off. I did a strange thing: I tuned into the bass. I’d never really separated bass from drums from guitar before — they were just songs. The song that hit me was Camera Eye. I was BLOWN away.
Every night after that I’d listen to Moving Pictures all the way through, isolating the bass, then the drums, then the whole thing again. I was consumed — in a good way.
I went back to the record store in Provo and looked for more. I picked up Caress of Steel (not the obvious follow-up to Moving Pictures), and eventually learned to love it. Then Permanent Waves, Fly by Night, Hemispheres, A Farewell to Kings. Then I found 2112 and fell into another black hole of obsession equal to the one Moving Pictures had made in me.
A friend moved into town, Danny Klone, and he had albums I hadn’t heard. Signals hit me later in its own season, and then Grace Under Pressure. I got them all. I was hooked.
Then they came to town on the Power Windows tour — 1986. I remember the set list like it burned into me: The Spirit of Radio; Limelight; The Big Money; New World Man; Subdivisions; Manhattan Project; Middletown Dreams; Witch Hunt; Red Sector A; Closer to the Heart; Marathon; The Trees; Mystic Rhythms; Distant Early Warning; Territories; YYZ (with drum solo); Red Lenses; Tom Sawyer. Then the encore: 2112 Overture/The Temples of Syrinx; Grand Designs; In the Mood.
I remember falling out of my seat when 2112 started — I bounced up and down so hard I momentarily lost consciousness and tumbled down the steps. For years I called that my first religious experience. Mystical union. God-consciousness. It changed my life. I may have taken it too far for a while, but who cares — it was beautiful to love something that much. I had a tribe who loved them with me, and others who hated how obnoxious I was about it. Over time, most of those people grew to like them too.
After Power Windows came Hold Your Fire, then Presto, Roll the Bones — life moved: school finished, I opened a business, I got married, had kids. Counterparts came out when my wife was pregnant with our first son. Then Test For Echo (still my least favorite), a long hiatus after Neil’s family tragedy, Vapor Trails, Feedback, Snakes and Arrows, Clockwork Angels. They toured a lot, and those years at Usana are some of my favorite memories.
I’ll leave you with two epic stories… stories that I’ve told and retold many times, and are definitely worth hearing again:
T-SHIRT #1
At a Vapor Trails show, my son Asher called during the concert saying he was sad he wasn’t there. I promised him I’d bring him next time. The next tour I met a guy selling front-row tickets and bought them. Asher stood on the rail giving Geddy thumbs up the whole show. Geddy first, and then Alex second, came over and gave Asher the thumbs up. At the end Geddy opened one of the dryers they had on stage and tossed shirts into the crowd. A very drunk man pushed Asher aside and grabbed the shirt. Guards hauled the man out, but the shirt was gone and Asher was crushed. I sat down in daze while the show finished, my heart hurting for my boy. Then Geddy ran back onstage, pointed to Asher and said: “Wait. Stay.” He got him a shirt. I cried telling this again.
In the midst of all that had happened, Geddy doing the show… he NOTICED that the drunk had stolen the kids shirt, ran back out, and got him a T-Shirt.
If you thought I loved that man before… well… now he was a deity. (Actually, he’s just a really decent human being with a wide awareness. Pretty cool.)
T-SHIRT #2
So… a number of years later, I’m at Usana again, but this time with my son Riley. I had an intuition we were getting a shirt, and some idiot would try to take it from him. I psyched myself up for violence to protect my child. We waited, waited, and then the encore began with no shirt got thrown our way. Crestfallen, I turned to tell Riley I’d been wrong. He looked up and said, “What are you talking about? I got the shirt!” He’d wrestled a grown man on the cement to get it, and I missed the whole heroic scene because I’d been blinded by the idea of protecting him. Maybe God protected me from doing jail time. Or maybe He just made the story better. Either way — Riley fought like a champ and kept the shirt.
That’s my t-shirt mythology. That’s my Rush story. I love Rush.
— Jason
#Rush #Scrapbook #MovingPictures #Fatherhood #MusicThatMadeMe #Nostalgia #SacredRebel