For decades, Rush was one of the hardest working bands in the business. Their early years were a near constant cycle of recording albums, then touring, then recording, then touring, then recording. Unbelievably, the group had only one lineup change in 1974 (Neil Peart replacing the band’s original drummer, John Rutsey), and the rest is history.
Fortunately for the hardcore Rush fans out there, the band was keeping track of all of these gigs in tremendous detail. That detail is beautifully captured, along with some great historical photography, along with newspaper and magazine clippings of show advertisements from years gone by. The book is entitled Rush Wandering the Face of the Earth, the Official Touring History 1968 - 2015, which is well worth the investment for any fan or for anyone interested in really digging into the work necessary to build a very deep and committed fanbase over a long period of time. This band did the hard way - years on the road, thousands of gigs, hundreds of thousands of miles, and a lot of hard work, which really is the main takeaway.
I was fortunate enough to see the band fourteen times in the second half of their career, starting with the 1986 Power Windows Tour at the Spectrum in Philadelphia. To be precise, the show was April 14, 1986 along with a sellout crowd (now that I can look it up!).
Only 14 years old at the time, it was an eye opening experience for this aspiring drummer that I can still remember vividly. I had seen a few concerts prior to that, but nothing close to the perfection that Rush was capable of producing in their prime. This was back in the pre-social media days, so you rarely had an opportunity to actually see your musical heroes unless they were on broadcast television. With no television appearances, the concert was the only opportunity. It was a revelation to actually see those three guys in the pictures on the album liner notes recreating the songs you had memorized in your room with the headphones on.
Fortunately, now that I own a copy of this weighty tome (seriously, this thing is as heavy as a manhole cover), I can look back at not only that concert but the other concerts I saw live, and the ones I wish I could have seen that were maybe a bit before my time.
What are the lessons to be drawn from this book, you ask? The overarching theme of this book is pretty simple. There is no substitute for hard, focused and sustained effort towards your goal. This is easy to say, but difficult to do. Most importantly, this lesson applies across all industries. It is true for musicians and artists, and also for entrepreneurs and small business owners no matter what the business is.
While many people can understand that concept, very few are capable of putting it into action. This is what separates people who achieve their goals from the people that do not. There were times when Rush was playing 23 performances over a 24 day span. There were times when the band played over 200 concerts in a single year. That kind of dedication to their craft is what built the band’s audience. This is a huge lesson for the younger players out there.
Highly recommended.
