In the documentary “Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage,” Gene Simmons tells a story about Kiss and Rush on tour in the early ’70s. While Kiss indulged every rock-star whim, Rush took a different approach.
“Every night after the show, girls would line up,” says Simmons. “None of the Rush guys ever [hooked up]. I never understood it. I said, ‘They’re not gay. Farm animals? No, that’s not it. What the f – – k did you do back at your hotel?’”
As we see in the film, out now on DVD, the Rush guys — bassist Geddy Lee, guitarist Alex Lifeson and drummer Neil Pert, who play Jones Beach on Saturday — spent their time watching TV, reading books and generally being huge dorks.
Not surprisingly, their fan base over the years has been almost completely male.
“I often talk to women who say that a Rush show is the only concert they’ve ever gone to where they didn’t have to line up at the washroom,” says Scot McFadyen, who co-directed the film. “The men’s line is around the block.”
OK, so the guys who wrote anthems such as “Tom Sawyer,” “Spirit of the Radio” and “Limelight” are nerds. But at least they’re likable nerds. Lifeson and Lee became lifelong best friends in junior high school, bonding “more over our goofiness than over music,” Lee says.
Some critics have derided Rush as humorless, but they were wrong. Lee once sang “Take Off (to the Great White North)” for SCTV’s Canadian hosers Bob and Doug McKenzie, and has played arenas flanked by a wall of never-explained rotisserie chicken ovens. In an age when quirkiness is celebrated, the film’s exposure of the band’s funny side has broadened its appeal — as in actual broads.
“Since the documentary, a lot more women have come to their shows,” says McFadyen. “People who might not have liked Rush came out [of the film] feeling that they liked them as individuals, and that gave them appreciation for the music.”