Dayton's Blog: A pimple on the ass of the Internet.

...and any other Rush fans on my f-list, MusicRadar.com recently posted an extract from the blog of drummer Neil Peart, discussing what's next for the band:

MusicRadar.com: Neil Peart says Rush are poised for "reinvention"

The complete blog entry, which makes for some damn fine reading on a Sunday morning, can be found here: NeilPeart.net: November 2009 - Autumn Serenade.

Whatever you guys decide, I'll be here.

EarFarm.com: 10 Rush Lyrics That Should Be Fortune Cookie Inserts

They left off one of my favorite lyrics from "Dreamline," though: "[Learning that] we're only immortal for a limited time."

Ah, well. Any other Rush fans out there with suggestions?

....terri_osborne and infinitydog, Rush is on The Colbert Report on Comedy Central tonight; their first American television appearance in more then 30 frikkin' years.

(Note to amysisson: I'm employing the "gay" pic for your benefit. ;D)

Rolling Stone magazine has two new features about Rush.

I love the topic of one article, where they refute the lingering notion that "Rolling Stone hates Rush" using snippets of reviews written 25+ years ago. Way to be current, yo!

Discounting the so-called "review" of Snakes & Arrows and looking instead to the apparent fact that it's the first Rush album RS has deigned to review since the other Bush was president, it's pretty easy (and amusing) to understand why fans wonder what's up.

With our good friends Gail and Gregg LaRock volunteering to watch the munchkins for a few hours on Saturday evening, Michi and I set out with Kevin to attend the Rush concert at the Starlight Theater here in KC. Happy Birthday to me!

The place was packed, and the weather was perfect for an outdoor performance. They took the stage at about 7:45 or so, and played until close to 9 before taking their "halftime intermission." Then they came back and played another 80 minutes or so, followed by a nice encore. The show kicked total ass. Though this is essentially a second leg of the same tour they did last year for their Snakes and Arrows CD, the set list was different than the show we saw last August. Still a lot of material from the new album, but plenty of oldies (pronounced "classics") to round out the evening. You can do that kind of thing when you've got 18 albums of material, I suppose.

Naturally, we eagerly await the next concert tour, whenever that might be.

Rush, of course, is in town to perform here in KC Saturday night (of course we're going; how do you even ask that?), but Geddy Lee apparently found time to do a few other things:

Rush vocalist makes donation to Negro Leagues Museum

From the article:

"Close to 200 baseballs, all autographed by former Negro Leagues baseball players or backers, have been donated to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum by a somewhat surprising fan...Rush singer/bassist Geddy Lee."

That's just pretty damned cool.

Well, that was a blast.

Our whirlwind trip to Vegas began at Zero Dark Thirty on Saturday morning. Addy was still sleeping and our good friend Gail LaRock, who along with her husband, Gregg, had volunteered to watch over Addy arrived and promptly crashed on the futon in my downstairs office until such time as my eldest daughter stirred. Michi and I then transported Erin to her designated babysitter for the day before heading out to meet Kevin at the airport for our flight. 

( Read the rest behind the cut! )

Getting ready to head out for the airport so we can make the jaunt to Vegas. Our signing at Star Trek: The Experience is scheduled for 2-4pm, after which we'll have a couple of hours to kill before....



Since I won't be carrying my laptop with me, I'll likely be sans 'net access for the rest of today and a good portion of tomorrow (unless they offer access for free in the hotel business center or something). Therefore, I'll post a complete after-action report tomorrow night.

Feel free to chat amongst yourselves until we get back.

So, the Mrs. tells me this past week that she wants to also attend the Rush concert which will be held here in June. This is in addition to the whirlwind tour of Vegas we'll pull in May, which will include the Rush concert at Mandalay Bay as well as a book signing at Star Trek: The Experience.

Once informed that baby-sitting duties would be addressed (we have no shortage of willing volunteers, as it happens), I sat down this morning and waited for 10am to roll around so that I could be "there" when tickets went on sale via online as well as walk-up venues around town.

Short version: Scored the tickets. The concert is Saturday, June 7th, so Happy Birthday to me!

So, the Mrs. comes to me yesterday with an idea.

She wants to celebrate her 40th birthday by going to see Rush at some other venue (outside KC). The two options that are most appealing to her are Red Rocks in Denver and Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.

I wondered about the most important logistical hurdle we faced: the munchkins. However, I was told in no uncertain terms that if she could make the babysitting magic happen, I would have to make the travel arrangements. Wow, that's a no-brainer. Deal!

After weighing the pros and cons such as travel, hotel, the need or not for rental car, and what else we might do within the compressed timeframe we'd be talking about, we opted for Vegas, where they'll be performing on Saturday, May 10th. It'd be a case of us flying out, doing the concert, and flying back the next day, with an overnight babysitter taking care of the chit'lins.

It'll be a whirlwind tour of Sin City, as we fly in Saturday late morning, hit the hotel, maybe lounge around the pool or play some cards while partaking of favored beverages, eat, hit the concert, enjoy some Vegas nightlife (with more of our favored beverages, etc.), crash, then head for the airport the next morning. To satisfy my inner geek, I'm even thinking of getting us a room at the Las Vegas Hilton, so that I'll be in proximity to Star Trek: The Experience and be able to give that one more roll. With the proper use of monorails and other inter-hotel trams, we can probably even get away without having to use a cab except to and from the airport.

The only other thing we'd have to do to make the trip complete is to renew our marriage vows in one of those cheesy "Chapel O' Love" places.

Well, that or get a lapdance at the Palomino Club.

I'm guessing she'd go with the first option, assuming she doesn't just divorce me beforehand.

I don't know how in the name of Hell I missed this bit of news from last month, but i just found out today that Rush is extending their Snakes & Arrows tour from last year well into 2008.

They'll be rehearsing a new set list and getting out on the road again starting in the spring, and one of their stops will be here in Kansas City on June 7th, which just happens to be my birthday.


Yes, of course we're going. What are you, new around here?

I don't post reviews with lengthy critical examinations. I know that puts me in the minority of people on the internet, but they'll just have to get along without me. I tend to base my reviews on whether I felt I was reasonably entertained for the money I spent.

The Rush concert? Kicked all kinds of ass.

I don't know if I enjoyed it quite as much as I did their previous visit to KC (for their 30th Anniversary -- or "R30" -- tour), but I've never been disappointed by these guys. The set list was heavy with songs from the new Snakes and Arrows album, which was fine by me as I think it's their strongest studio album out of the last three or four. Traditional favorites were plentiful, as well as a few cuts that hadn't had the dust kicked off of them in quite some time. One of the benefits of having 18 studio albums (19 if you count the Feedback collection of cover songs) is that there's no shortage of songs to draw from, and they always seem to find the right balance between older and newer material.

All in all? Money and time well spent. My Rush love continues unabated. Can't wait to see them the next time they come around, and Michi and I are also thinking of catching them at some other venue, such as Red Rocks in Denver, which I've heard is a phenomenal place to attend a concert.

On a related note, I recently got an e-Mail from a reader who's a fan of our Star Trek: S.C.E./Corps of Engineers work, who only just recently figured out that the titles of several of our CoE installments are taken from Rush song titles. For example:

Grand Designs
Where Time Stands Still - inspired by "Time Stand Still"
Distant Early Warning
Turn the Page (I know it's also the title of a Bog Seger song, and a popular one with small-club strippers. Work with me.)

In fact, Kevin and I have a few other CoE story ideas hidden in our files, all of which make use of Rush song titles:

Where's My Thing? - Fabian Stevens suffers blackouts and memory loss thanks to an enounter with a mysterious alien artifact, which compromises his ability to repair critical systems aboard the USS da Vinci before the ship comes under attack by Androssi forces. Even if he can remember where he misplaced a key component, is it the one that will save the ship, or destroy it?

Roll the Bones - While touring medical facilities on a newly-established Federation colony, Admiral Leonard McCoy is mugged by rogue factory workers who abruptly fall victim to a mysterious virus. Can Dr. Sarjenka discover the source of the ailment in time to save the muggers' lives and find out where they've put Admiral McCoy's wallet and hoverchair? 

I Think I'm Going Bald - a special CoE/Star Trek: The Next Generation crossover, featuring a story about a young David Gold and Jean-Luc Picard undertaking a special assignment while still cadets at Starfleet Academy.


Think any of these will fly?

They've taken care of everything, the words we'll read, the songs we'll sing, and the pictures that'll give pleasure to our eye.

We just have to show up and enjoy the show.

The Mrs. and I are off! Rush awaits, again!

So far it's been an uncharacteristic Sunday. I have nowhere to be, no pressing deadlines to meet, and the work I was supposed to be doing for the dayjob is at a point where it's out of my hands until other people respond to my various e-Mail and phone queries. Hey, if nobody wants to answer their phone, that's okay by me. It'll make for fun times tomorrow.

As for yesterday, it was a combination of juggling dayjob stuff (all of which dropped like a bomb on Friday, much to my irritation) and the plans I already had for the weekend. I'd already had to deal with it Friday evening...while at the same time entertaining the company we'd invited over for dinner. By Saturday I'd decided on a schedule that would address everything while at the same time allowing me to stick to my original plans for the day, which consisted mostly of meeting Kevin so we both could check out the Robert A. Heinlein Centennial celebration taking place in Kansas City this weekend.

It was a rather low-key affair, at least during the time we were there, but I did get to meet up with friends Selina Rosen and Lynn Stranahan from Yard Dog Press, who were manning a table in the dealer's room (I'm sorry...they call it a "marketplace" on this most holy of weekends). We also met editor Eric Reynolds from Hadley Rille Books, a local outfit located in Overland Park, Kansas. Among the cool stuff they were promoting was Golden Age SF, an anthology of new stories (along with a couple of reprints) celebrating the style and concepts of the stories that filled the pages of magazines like Amazing Stories and Galaxy in the 1940s and 1950s. This, naturally, pinged our sonar, as we're both fans of that stuff, and Kevin bought a copy of the antho. I'm looking forward to checking it out. After that, it was lunch at one of my favorite restaurants in KC, "A Streetcar Named Desire," and the best frikkin' BLT mortal man has ever known.

As for today, the big item on the schedule seems to be introducing Addy to Rush via the handful of concert DVDs on my shelf. She's already endured Exit Stage Left and Grace Under Pressure, and now she's bouncing along to the tunes from A Show of Hands. May have to go with Rush in Rio and R30 before the day's out. In the meantime, I continue to peck at this short story that's been in my head the last few days. I should finish it tonight, and then it's on to the next project in the hopper, another article for Star Trek Magazine.

 Snurched from psiphiorg  

Pick a band and answer all the following questions with the titles of their songs.

Chosen band: Rush (yeah, like that wasn't predictable)

( Questions and answers behind the cut. )

....but I only care about that portion which resides in Bonner Springs, Kansas on August 23rd at 8pm.

Why? Because I've got our tickets for the Rush concert, part of the new Snakes & Arrows tour. After much back-n-forth with the online reservation system holding the special sale at the band's website, I've managed to secure seats that put us much closer to the stage than we've ever been for past Rush shows. We might even be able to catch some of the stuff they throw from the stage this time around.

Sweet.

The tour dates for Rush's forthcoming Snakes & Arrows tour have been announced. Among the dates and cities listed:

Kansas City - August 23rd.

If you need me for anything that evening, you'll know where I'll be.

That said, I'm also eyeing the dates in Las Vegas and Denver. After all, I've always wanted to see a concert at Red Rocks....

Rush.

Their new single, "Far Cry" from the upcoming album Snakes & Arrows, was released on the 12th. I heard it for the first time on the radio during the drive to work this morning, and you can hear it by following the link above to the band's official site. The CD's due in stores on May 1st, with a concert tour still to be announced for later this year. Looks like Addy's first concert will be a Rush show, after all.

(Of course, this also means that Kevin and I have a whole new batch of song titles as potential titles for future Corps of Engineers tales. Hehehehehehe....)

All is right with the world on this day.