Rush Live - NEC 12th Oct 2007

The first time that I saw the legendary Rush was in 1983 at Wembley Arena, London. This was my first ever concert and it will remain with me for all my days as a truly seminal moment, well evening. The fourth time that I saw Rush was last week at the NEC in Birmingham UK and nothing has changed much – I even went with the same two friends from 1983.

However, the band are obviously older and their audience was noticeably balder. Their back-catalogue is even bigger than Alex Lifeson. But in 1983, their then back-catalogue was exemplary and a 3 hour show of no fillers ensued. At the NEC, there were too many songs from their latest album ‘Snakes and Arrows’, which I have given plenty of time to and I do concede that this is the tour name. But Rush fans, however loyal, would rather hear such missing wonders as Xanadu, Red Barchetta, The Trees, Bastille Day or Animate, than some blatantly inferior new material – this is a fact. It’s not that I am in anyway implying that seasoned bands shouldn’t perform or promote new material, it’s just that the new material needs to be on a par with or ideally superior to their highly respected older stuff. Of course, very few veteran acts continue to write decent music, which is the main problem. That said, the younger but still veteran Megadeth’s latest album, has as many moments of brilliance on it, as their ‘classics’ did nearly 20 years ago. I think that Genesis (with Gabriel and Hackett) could still pull off a masterpiece, but that is as hypothetical as it is improbable.

All that aside, I love Rush, hate to disrespect them and there was still two thirds of the show to enjoy without complaint - even if the PA was a bit smoggy and the lighting was desperately uninspired for large sections of the show. When you are prog legends, you really should start the show with purple, yellow and claret lighting, piercing lazers and some ‘elevated from the norm’ music – a bit like ‘YYZ’ achieved way later in the show. Instead, they opened with the jolly ‘Limelight’, but with a flat, house lighting effect that was just a bit disappointing – you don’t want to see their shoes and shirt patterns first off – you want Valhalla. (God I’m being picky today).

There were pockets of magic and obvious highlights such as Peart’s drum solo (how often can you say that about a drum solo) and the epic ‘Mission’, where Lifeson’s annoyingly effect-laden guitar sounds actually complement the song. They also worked wonders in the most sonically and impressive song of the evening – ‘Between The Wheels’ from ‘Grace Under Pressure’, the Rush album that had ‘most likely to date’ written all over it. This song also proves how effective keyboards can be in Rock music when used as a weapon of power and intent. It reminded me of Depeche Mode at the same venue a year before (I can hear the gasps…).

As mentioned, YYZ was sublime but the crowd lacked the passion shown on the R30 DVD – Brummies verses Brazilians, hmmm...

‘The Spirit Of Radio’ was also an obvious crowd pleaser, even if Alex’s opening riff was inaudible (presumably trying to give it a facelift in some way). I wish that Rock Divas would stand in say Block 16 Row Z when doing the sound check and hear how the left-side PA unit doesn’t quite translate the intricate sounds that said Diva hears through his stage monitors. When will they learn that the guys on the sound-desk are nearly always collectively deaf. I believe that Fred Durst sound checks from all parts of any given venue and I have never witnessed a more sonically excellent live band than Limp Bizkit (Yet more gasps…)

However, the real highlight of the evening was when a man behind us said in the interval, “Urr, excuse me but can you stop moving about and talking to each other, as I can’t see properly…” Communication and enjoyment denied!!

Fortunately for this train spotter, he wasn’t at the R30 gig in Brazil’s Maracana, but somehow I think that we would have preferred it.