Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson confirms no more band tours
Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson confirms no more band tours
Given that Rush drummer Neil Peart had “unofficially” announced a few months back that he was retiring, it comes as no surprise that Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson has recently advised that there will be no more tours from the iconic Canadian band.
In an interview with RollingStone on March 8, 2016, Lifeson stated:
“We had such a great time on the tour. And it was really nice to go through all the material in reverse chronology, and I think our fans really enjoyed it. I think that no matter how long it would have been, it would have been too short. Neil was prepared to commit to 30 dates and he told us that right from the very beginning. He didn’t even want to do the tour, to be honest with you. It’s been increasingly difficult for him, but he committed to the tour and we got through it. As far as he was concerned, that was the end of touring.
“His shoulders were hurting, his arms were hurting, his elbows, his feet, everything. He didn’t want to play anything less than 100 percent. He was finding it increasingly difficult to hit that mark on this last tour. So, all those things combined, I get it. I’m disappointed and I think Geddy [Lee] is very disappointed and we’d love to continue this tour a little bit longer, but we’re off now.”
Lifeson left the door open for Rush to come back at some point with the legendary drummer in the future. The RollingStone interview indicates:
“You never know. Maybe next fall or something like that, we’ll plan something. We took a year off before the last tour and we didn’t discuss anything about the band or work, and everybody had a great time, and we came back from that. We’re getting older and it’s getting tougher, but I don’t know. We’ll see.”
Finally, Lifeson was reportedly sarcastic in his interview with RollingStone when asked whether he and Lee would tour together without Peart when he stated, “Well, we have been saying that every 40 years, we fire our drummer and get a new one.”
The entire interview can be read at RollingStone.
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