At their core, Rush were always about glorious musical excess, routinely cramming more riffs and time signatures into single songs than some bands managed on entire albums. And as much as the band absorbed the lessons of punk and New Wave by the late Seventies, they were always about conspicuous effort, too – hard-won chops, literary lyrics, inhuman onstage precision.
So maybe it shouldn’t be surprising that night two at Los Angeles’ Kia Forum of Rush’s first tour since 2015 went so incredibly hard, somehow surpassing the already spectacular tour debut. As the first show without late drummer/lyricist Neil Peart since 1974, the kick-off was suffused with nearly overwhelming emotion, both onstage and off. Lee audibly choked up during songs, and fans openly wept during the Peart tributes. Night two was just as much of a Peart tribute, but it was also a chance to fully unleash the firepower of the revamped Rush, with the additions of astonishing touring drummer Anika Nilles and the band’s first-ever outside keyboardist, touring member Loren Gold.
After years where it seemed like they’d never play again, Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson seem determined to make the most of a second chance, delivering more than fans dared dream. In a first in the band’s touring history, night two’s setlist was wildly different from night one, with 10 tour-debut songs, plus all of “2112” instead of a mere chunk, for the first time since 1997. They altered the order of songs, too, jumping into a walloping “The Spirit of the Radio” as song two instead of at the end of the first set.
(One of the tour debuts, “The Trees,” happens to be the favorite Rush song of a fellow artist who was in attendance at the Forum Tuesday night: Sabrina Carpenter revealed her Rush fandom — inspired by her dad — and her love for that particular song to Rolling Stone’s Angie Martoccio in a cover story last year.)
Lee, who relieved fans by hitting his old high notes on night one, sounded even stronger on night two, gleefully tearing into the most challenging corners of their catalog. Buoyed by recent vocal coaching, he even dug into the stratospheric “Anthem,” from 1975’s Caress of Steel, though he joked afterwards that it pushed him into a “Mickey Mouse” range.
After passing the trial-by-inferno of her first night, Nilles — who arguably has the hardest job in all of live music right now — seemed more relaxed in the second show, settling even deeper into a groove with Lee’s ever-extraordinary bass, and throwing in some of her own flourishes on top of her interpretations of Peart’s parts. In the instrumental section of “Limelight,” which essentially features simultaneous drum and bass solos under Lifeson’s always-galactic guitar excursions, Nilles felt fully onboard, somehow keeping up with her tourmates’ five-decade mind-meld. She nailed “Tom Sawyer,” with its over-the-top intricacies and legendary fills, for the second night in the row, visibly exhaling in relief at its conclusion.
When Rush kicked into the tour debut of “The Analog Kid,” from 1982’s “Signals,” it was at the song’s precise original breakneck tempo — with a 43-year-old drummer, the band’s 70-something co-founders are resisting the typical aging band’s resistance to slow down, even by a single BPM. But it was another fast song, 2012’s “Headlong Flight,” that fully demonstrated the new line-up’s capabilities, with Nilles seeming to particularly embrace the swelling brutality of Peart’s drum compositions, and Lee’s restored range especially evident. Lifeson responded with an unhinged wah-laden solo that was a reminder of how strongly he influenced Metallica’s Kirk Hammett. “I wish I could live it all again,” Lee sang, even as his band was somehow pulling off that very feat.
By the time the band kicked off their second set with all of “2112,” an entire album side, fans were running out of superlatives. Then they nearly topped it with a stellar version of a track from side two of the 2112 album, “A Passage to Bangkok,” the band’s ode to the pursuit of the world’s most potent weed.
Midway through the second set, after bringing Aimee Mann onstage — for the second show in a row — to sing backup on “Time Stand Still,” Lee posed a question to the crowd: “Should we keep going?” He didn’t need to wait for an answer.
Set List:
Set 1:
“Xanadu”
“The Spirit of Radio”
“The Analog Kid”
“Freewill”
“Subdivisions”
“Bravado”
“Leave That Thing Alone”
“The Trees”
“Headlong Flight”
“Limelight”
Set 2:
“2112 Part I: Overture”
“2112 Part II: The Temples of Syrinx”
“2112 Part III: Discovery”
“2112 Part IV: Presentation”
“2112 Part V: Oracle: The Dream”
“2112 Part VI: Soliloquy”
“2112 Part VII: Grand Finale”
“Animate”
“Closer to the Heart”
“A Passage to Bangkok”
“Time Stand Still (with Aimee Mann)”
“YYZ”
“Anthem”
“Red Barchetta”
“Witch Hunt”
“Tom Sawyer”
Encore:
Finding My Way
Working Man