Revelations from Rush at Red Rocks

Slightly blurry photo of Rush at Red Rocks, taken from my nondescript LG flip phone.

My wife and I went to see Rush last night at Red Rocks Amphitheater outside Denver. The show was incredible, the venue was outstanding, and the traffic was minimal, at least until we got to Red Rocks (that's a big deal in the Denver metro area). The show was split into two parts with a short intermission - in the words of Geddy Lee himself, the band members are "aging rapidly" and "need to take a break." Geddy's self-deprecating humor was refreshing in an age of ego-centric celebrity.

At the beginning of both sets, the band showed short films where actors took the roles of the band members (basically just pretending to play their instruments) while the band members themselves took on other roles. Neil Peart, not surprisingly, was the most awkward and nervous of the three, owing to his introverted nature, and his scenes were short with almost no dialog. Geddy and Alex Lifeson, on the other hand, had major roles with plenty of lines. It's hard to tell who played it up the best - Geddy as the eccentric British film director or Alex as the fat, bumbling band manager (complete with over-the-top fat suit). The fact that these guys can still laugh at themselves after all these years has to be the main reason why they're not only still together as a group but also are good friends. And I gotta give props to their acting chops. Someone who didn't know Rush would have no idea they were band members and not actors.

The show was a good one, but as Neil put it in his book Roadshow, it's hard for them not to put on a good show after all these years. The only mistake I noticed was in "The Camera Eye." The transition into the second verse was blown by someone, although it was hard to tell whether it was Alex or Neil. Alex also broke a string on his PRS on the second song (which one I can't remember) and had it swapped out for his Telecaster, which was clearly not the right guitar for the song as it took a few moments of footswitch fiddling to get it to sound right. But, being true professionals, neither gaffe shook the band's focus and they just kept on going without a hiccup. Rush always give the crowd their money's worth.

They're also breaking from tradition and playing new songs on this tour. They played two, "I Was Led to Believe" and "Caravan," the latter being the better of the two.

Now back to the topic of this post. I had a few revelations at the show last night. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. At 50-plus years old, these guys can still rock. On any given night they could give any band a run for their money. Rush are still the best live band around.

2. Geddy's voice still sounds pretty good after all these years. My wife noticed that it's not what it used to be, which is true, but when he wants to he can still hit the high notes. I noticed that he saves them for a few key songs and skips them on others. This time, he saved it for the high bits in "Free Will," which he sang like a 25-year-old, and kept them out of "Marathon."

3. Red Rocks is an incredible place. Geddy called it "the most beautiful venue in North America." But for all its beauty, it is apparent that it was designed as a state park first and a concert venue second. The narrow two-lane road up to the amphitheater was a slow congested nightmare, not helped at all by people who insisted on parking their cars along the sides. And then there's the hike up way too many stairs to get to the seating area. I thought I was going to have a heart attack. My breath was shallow and my heart was pounding. No wonder they have signs along the way telling you to "check your heart rate."

4. I think I'm allergic to pot smoke. Maybe I'm out of touch, but I've never experienced that much pot smoke at a concert before, and I've seen Pink Floyd. I think pot is just so much more ingrained and accepted in our society now, even more than it was 20 years ago. Unfortunately, that meant I was inundated with smoke, even in the open air. After a while, it made me cough terribly. And not the normal I-don't-smoke-so-it-makes-me-cough kind of cough, but the allergies-gone-haywire kind of cough that I used to get in the fall in Pennsylvania when the tree pollen was high. At least I know I can never be a pothead.

5. I'm getting old. If the trek up the staircase of doom didn't prove it, the fact that I could barely stay awake on the ride home surely did. And it was only midnight! I used to stay up until 1:30, 2:00 a.m. regularly and then get up the next morning for class. Getting old sucks.

6. Ear plugs are divine. I don't know how I ever enjoyed a concert without them. I think they actually improved the sound of the band by eliminating the clipping and letting the nuances through. Plus my ears don't hurt and I can hear today.

7. Drunk, seat-hopping assholes should be shot on site. A few of these choice individuals decided to fill in an empty area next to my wife and pretty much ruined the second half of the show for us. They were loud, obnoxious, rude (they stole our seats when we went to the restroom) and they kept bumping into my wife the whole time. Between that and the pot smoke, we got fed up and left early. I missed Neil's solo! I was so pissed. Hopefully they'll make a DVD of this tour and I'll get to see what I missed.

That's it for now. Despite number seven, my wife and I had a great time and I loved seeing my favorite band again. Every time they come through the area I want to see them, because you never know which tour will be their last.