On March 21, UMe/Mercury and Anthem Records label groups celebrate the half-century milestone marker for Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame icons with RUSH 50, a wide-ranging 50-track super deluxe anthology that encompasses the entirety of the band’s long and storied career for the first time across all the band’s label groups, bookended with the first ever reissue of their debut 1973 single and a live recording of the last song they ever performed together as a band at their final concert in 2015 at The Forum in Los Angeles. RUSH 50 will be available to fans in five distinct configurations, including the (1) Super Deluxe Edition, (2) Rush Store Exclusive Super Deluxe Edition, (3) 7-LP Deluxe Edition, (4) 4-CD Deluxe Edition, and (5) Digital Edition. They can all be pre-ordered and pre-saved HERE.
In July 1974, bassist/keyboardist/vocalist Geddy Lee, guitarist/vocalist Alex Lifeson, and the late, great drummer/lyricist Neil Peart came together to solidify Rush’s lineup that brought the world at large many multiple decades’ worth of masterful progressive-rock-leaning musicianship and scores of rock radio masterpieces, iconic lyrics and storytelling. RUSH 50 serves as a complete career-spanning Rush anthology on seven LPs and four CDs, featuring 50 tracks in total — seven of them previously unreleased — alongside numerous choice selections from every studio album, live release, and deluxe reissue the band has officially released over the years. Amongst the Holy Grail unreleased tracks are the first-ever official CD and LP reissue of Rush’s very first single on Moon Records from 1973, “Not Fade Away” and “You Can’t Fight It,” a pair of early gems that Rush fans have been clamoring to be released officially for decades – newly remastered from the original analog tapes. Other studio rarities found on RUSH 50 include Vault Editions of 1974’s “Working Man” and 1978’s “The Trees,” both of which showcase alternate guitar solos by Alex Lifeson, with the former track only having been available as a digital single while the latter cut has never been officially released beyond its appearance on instrument-based video games.
Additionally, five unreleased live songs have been culled from some of Rush’s most legendary performances. Four of them — including two non-album cuts, “Bad Boy” and “Garden Road” — originate from a pair of the band’s earliest live shows at (1) Laura Secord Secondary School in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, on May 15, 1974, and (2) the Agora Ballroom in Cleveland, Ohio, on August 26, 1974. The two live tracks from the Ontario show include original drummer John Rutsey (“Need Some Love” and “Before and After”), while the other two from the Cleveland gig feature Neil Peart behind the kit (“Bad Boy” and “Garden Road”). Rush visited New York’s iconic Electric Lady Studios in December of 1974 with their unreleased performance of “Anthem” being presented here. The RUSH 50 collection’s last unreleased live offering comes from Rush’s final career performance with Peart that took place at The Forum in Los Angeles, California, on August 1, 2015 — a masterful, nuanced medley construction of “What You’re Doing / Working Man / Garden Road” newly mixed from the multi-tracks by longtime Rush producer & engineer Terry Brown.
Besides these long-sought-after rarities, RUSH 50 embodies the full arc of Rush’s growth and ultimate prowess in the studio setting, as evidenced by the restless nomadic manifesto of “Fly by Night,” the vulnerability linchpin “Closer to the Heart” and the crackling energy of the airwaves in “The Spirit of Radio” and “Tom Sawyer.” The collection continues to showcase at least one studio track from all 20 official studios albums while also spotlighting officially released live recordings such as “YYZ,” “La Villa Strangiato” and two Neil Peart masterpiece drum solos.