Original subtitles

It is our pleasure today to be of service in the following languages,

French, Spanish, Portuguese.

I think the last thing I expected was to find fans at the airport.

It's not like we're Justin Timberlake or anything like that.

Listen, we're musicians. It's not really that noble a pursuit.

And if you can do something that touches someone like that, it's pretty mind

-boggling to me.

So I had actually arrived separately from the other guys coming in from

California and they were coming in from Toronto.

And thus I was able to avoid all the hoopla, which is fine for me.

And we came into it all kind of open -minded, expecting anything, not knowing

what might happen, technically what the circumstances of the concerts might be,

or even how big the audiences might be. But it was the last three shows of the

tour, and we had deliberately chosen to end on a kind of risky but exciting way.

At the time of finishing Vapor Trails, we were kind of debating whether or not

to tour, but decided, yeah, we'd do it one more time. And started, I guess,

about April of 2002, I started rehearsing my parts in a warehouse in

and then gradually the guys came together and we started simplifying the

and gearing it up again for the long haul.

And consequently though, we were so well prepared and the production around us

was so well rehearsed that even the first show went really well. And I

the three of us just exchanging a look on stage of the triumph of having

survived the last five years and everything that it took to bring us to

show.

I think you do get tired of playing certain songs over the course of a tour,

especially songs that you've played for decades.

But this tour, I never got tired of any songs that we played.

I didn't have a song that was on my B -list of songs

to play that night. I just seemed to get off on the whole thing every night. It

was immediately rewarding to see the audiences.

The whole issue of not taking it for granted, which I think you can easily do

something like this.

I just looked at it like this might be the last time I ever played these songs.

And it probably isn't, but I think you have to look at all of life like that.

To create a set list is one of the toughest things.

And what we do is we start with, well, what did we do last? What did we play?

What songs did we play? What songs didn't we play?

And then we put a wish list together of what songs would we like to pull back

out of the past that we haven't played in some time.

And we start emailing potential set lists to each other.

And that's how it starts.

And of course, you know, there's always pressure from fans.

Then Alex and I got together at my house, and we started listening through

all these records. Like, we kind of went through every record going back in

time. I mean, we hadn't done that, maybe ever.

And we sat in my kitchen, played everything back over my computer, and it

kind of fun. We were laughing a lot.

Some songs came back and went, wow, that really sounds good. And some songs came

back and was like, there's no way I can ever play that song again. I'm sorry. I

don't care how much the fans want it. I apologize, but there's no way I can play

it.

And so that's how it starts. And the first set list is about four and a half

hours long.

And then you just start playing it. And sometimes a song that you think will

never work, once you play it, you go, that sounds really good.

What was I thinking? We should definitely play this. And Neil had some

hesitation about certain old songs.

And then once we played them, there was so much spirit and we were smiling so

much that it was like, well, yeah, let's do it.

Oh!

Are you kidding?

We got into bed, and I'm, like, rubbing her. I'm going, I love you, Arlene. I

love you.

And she's like, shut up.

Shut up. I'm trying to sleep. Shut up.

My wife, Charlene, came out to a lot of gigs on this tour, more than

she ever has.

And we had a lot of fun together.

Now something's going.

Stone, I need makeup.

You need more than that, honey.

Even she's yelling at me.

She's hitting.

Ladies don't make with the hitting. Please, ladies.

I'm wandering around my room going, where am I?

I think I must be in... So my limit

is supposed to be 20 grams of carbohydrates a day. I hit about 1 ,200

night.

I woke up... I woke up and I'm like the fattest person I've ever met in my life.

I concur.

I got dressed and touched like, oh, you look like a magician. You spin around,

jumping around like a magician. So I'm still pretty agile for a big, bloated,

fat guy.

How come there's so many eggs?

I don't drink coffee.

Or smoke cigarettes. Or smoke cigarettes.

That's the truth. I quit smoking a year ago.

It's second -hand smoke that I'm worried about.

My second hand, it always has a cigarette in it.

How long are your interviews?

Weeks.

Like three hours?

No. We have a photo shoot for ten minutes.

It's like, you know, paparazzi!

And you go, you stand like this.

By Steven Seagal? Yeah.

I learned from Steven Seagal.

Got my hat on. I'm ready to go do the interview. You should.

All right, I will.

Shut up.

This is monotonous.

Such a play. This is going to be too good.

Welcome to Brazil.

We're going to be able to have a wonderful time here. We're really

So long, like, waiting for you to come down. Well, we were just upstairs. No,

no, waiting for you to come down to Brazil.

Yeah.

Hi,

guys. This is the Brazilian press.

No, no, you got one.

Use your pen. Use your pen.

Okay,

we have to go.

It took us so long to come here because we're

not very smart.

We didn't realize we had so many fans quite frankly.

Where is Neil?

Why isn't he here with you?

Before we started this tour, we had to discuss how we were going to handle

press.

And because of the events in Neil's life and what had gone on, we knew there was

going to be a lot of interest in what had happened and how he's doing.

Most of it, I believe, comes from a good place, but some of it is just pure

curiosity.

And so we talked about it.

So we talked about it, and we had to feel that he could handle it.

And, you know, it's very emotional to talk about that kind of thing.

And it's one thing to talk about that kind of thing with your friends. It's

another thing when you're being asked it over and over and over and over and

over again by people you don't know very well.

And we just believed it was best for him just to not be involved in press.

It was enough for him to come back to play on the record so well and to be a

contributing part of the band again and to even be willing to spend that much

time on the road.

So that's asking a lot of him from where he was.

We're going

to

make airplanes out of beef.

We flew in.

to Porto Alegre the day of the show. Originally we were supposed to come in

night before, and for some reason that wasn't working.

So we flew in, and then we realized halfway through we were in the middle of

tropical storm, and it was pouring rain, and the plane was being tossed around,

and people were very nervous.

Anyway,

we landed fine, and we walked out, and it was pouring like cats and dogs.

And then we thought, oh.

My God, I hope... These are outdoor shows.

Will the show go on? So we got to the venue, and of course, there were

Well, we don't have a monitor console.

The one that we're supposed to have didn't happen.

So best case scenario is that it's put the mix board, the mix

position, side stage, stage left, and Brad will have to mix from there and do

monitors from there.

The stage is completely wet. They're at a standstill right now. They can't do

anything.

Our nightmare started this morning when we came in with so much rain.

We've got basic heavy problems with monitor desks and such

being way too wet.

We've just now got it back. We're doing a line check, and by God, we're going to

have a show.

I can learn to coexist with anything but pain.

I can learn to compromise anything but my

insides. I can learn to get along with all the things I

can't explain.

Well, I think for...

Three tours now, we have this conversation, Alex and I. Wouldn't it be

do something acoustic?

And we talk about it, and somehow or another, we never get around to trying

But when Alex and I were sitting down and listening to all the material and

Resist came on, you know, I said to him, you know, I bet you that would sound

great with a slightly different arrangement, just guitar, because it's a

song anyway, really.

And he said, well, let's try it. And even when we got in rehearsals, we were

kind of delaying trying it, and then finally one day we just said, okay,

come in a half an hour late, we're going to try it. And we felt really odd about

it.

But we kept rehearsing it, and we just loved doing it.

Kenny and Alex had started talking about doing an acoustic version of Resist,

but they were still a bit dodgy about partly the stereotype of doing the

unplugged part of the set that we've always avoided doing the predictable

But I noticed that they had asked me to come in a bit later while they worked on

it, and then one day I remember Alex coming up, it's going to work, it's

to be so great. I was crying, I had tears in my eyes. And then from then on,

actually during the tour, you would often see him at the end of that number,

know, mock wiping away tears.

And they said at the time, you know, if you want to play something acoustic,

play some congas or something. I said, no, that's okay, because it came in the

set right after my solo.

So after that workout, I was quite happy just to sit down in the dark and let

them play for a little while by themselves.

There are songs that come to mean different things to us.

Emotionally, and for instance, I can never play the past without being moved

emotionally for what that song says, not only explicitly lyrically, but what it

conveys musically to me. It's one of our better crafted ones in terms of the

expression of emotion and the expression of restraint, and

there's a certain worldly compassion about that.

That sounds like...

For us over the years, it's always been kind of a sacred time of day. And even

if we were playing two nights in the same building, we'd do a sound check on

second day and at least run through things. It was a kind of a warm -up.

And a lot of times we'd be going into a jam session at the beginning that we

would record and save at the end in mind for good ideas and a lot of times get.

great song ideas from. Other times it can be an opportunity for Alex to do a

monologue that we'll be playing something and he'll step up to the vocal

in his inimitable style he'll deliver a little story about somebody on the crew

or some flight of insanity, you know, that only Lurk could do.

The nature of Rush has always been musicianship first.

Just him.

We always tried to be the best musicians we could and we tried to challenge each

other. And I don't think that's really changed.

I mean, a lot has changed.

Obviously, we've become much better songwriters and song arrangers and

producers, and all those things have taken a more and more important role

through the years.

So that shows your growth and your expanding, but at the core of it, we're

players, we love to play, and we love to play well.

I expect myself to play well, and I expect myself to play better.

and do something better than I did last time.

And that is a natural part of Rush. It's a natural thing that Alex, Neil, and I

share. We want to do things better. That's what drives us.

That's always what's driven us.

Today there was a big rainstorm.

And stuff got broken and wet.

And then our great, excellent, most excellent crew fixed everything,

the rain. They got to stop rain.

So those guys were the best.

Cut your hand.

It's a bit sluggish, but it's a lot better than it was, but it's definitely

healed yet.

Did you find out what was wrong?

Yeah, I have two stretched ligaments on either side of the finger's knuckle, and

they're way stretched and way falling, and they're making mobility.

They're taking the strength and mobility away from the finger, which is my main

problem.

noisy bastard.

I feel so happy for these fans. They waited so long.

I want to give them the best show we can do.

I just want to send them home happy after all this time.

I mean, look, they come out so early.

They wait three hours, and they're screaming already.

This perfect city has lost most of its magical South American ass.

That's Florianopolis. That's one that they told us.

Love you, too.

For me, I like to warm up for a half hour or so before the show.

I find even 10 minutes is beneficial to get the fingers moving.

I've had some problems with my hands with psoriasis, and they get a little

swollen, so I need to do that warm -up to clear it out a little bit.

And I think you just continue watching. Watching baseball, that loosens me up.

Baseball is good. It gets my hands ready, and it gets my mind right.

So that's my woman.

And then, of course, I have to put on my clothes, which is strenuous. Very

difficult. Changing my shoes. Well, yeah, changing my shoes is really

Neil warms up for about 20 minutes really, you know, a real serious. Yeah,

out. Does an all out, you know, 20 minute drum solo kind of thing.

Just to make sure that he's loose.

Oh, and soup.

We have soup every day.

Usually before sound check. Yeah, before sound check we have to come in and have

soup. And that is really important.

And we, you know, we talk, and sometimes we don't talk.

But we still have soup.

Yeah, we still have soup, and we have that.

Sometimes we could talk or not talk for hours.

Yeah. And sometimes we have soup after we have soup.

So we'll have two soups. Yeah.

Every day I have the soup. I don't think we could have got through that tour

without the soup.

Thinking about this foreign country I've never been to before, on the other side

of the world.

The fact that we have this opportunity to play for a lot of fans that we never

knew we had there.

The wrapping up of the tour.

The work that went into the album that preceded the tour.

Time off that we had for five years.

Both good and bad.

Where we were at on the previous tour.

Like all those things were going through my head.

The new stuff from Vapor Troll, I think, was really the most exciting stuff to

play, and it's always like that, you know, the newer material is always more

enjoyable to play.

Earthshine was a great song to play, nice and heavy.

You know, the old standards, like Tom Sawyer and Limelight, you know, they're

always a lot of fun.

By tour, we probably stopped playing around 78, I would guess.

77, 78, something like that. I wanted to play that for a long time.

You know, it was always a favorite. I think it's a really good representative

song of Rush in the early days.

So I was really pleased that we were, you know, resurrecting it for this tour.

The video stuff that was done for it, the animated battle between Vitor and

snow dogs, was quite humorous. You know, you could...

He's playing the song, and you can see people laughing in the audience.

And that's so great to see.

You wouldn't think that you'd want people laughing in your audience, but

definitely it's, you know, I want it to be fun going through the show.

Welcome.

Okay, thanks everybody.

See you later.

When the hoax of Russian Brazil came on to us,

the Brazilian fans fastly tried to gather

on the purpose of meeting them.

All music was perfect for the lyrics. It inspired me in so many ways

that I...

Oppression and such stuff.

Yes, yes.

It's everything.

The world is everything.

Which country are you going to?

Rio and Sao Paulo.

If I had my money, I would go to Porto Alegre too.

All my presents.

I'll tell you.

Jews must have a hell of a time with their hair in it.

Fine.

I'll get for Jewish hair.

I'll get the frizzies immediately.

How many fucking nails have I broken?

I don't think these shapes will be there.

Hardly much rain.

Well. I mean, it came, like, in buckets for about five, ten minutes. Oh, did it?

And it's been, like, misting, like, I don't think we've seen the last of it,

I do see blue sky there.

Better than it was earlier. Yeah, let's hope.

Definitely.

Hello, sir. How are you?

I'm fine.

Did you have a good day?

No, but I'm still fine.

No problem?

Plenty of problems.

Did the board crank up okay? Well, yeah, until we basically lost power.

So everything lost power?

No, just the audio. What we've got is we have bad cabling that they brought in.

We have bad insulation on the joint.

Rubbed together our fire extinguisher. Now we're waiting. I mean, we do

everything so that we're safe for tonight.

And then we're going to...

So what are we looking at? We're still wiring the stage.

Okay. You know, I mean, it's going to be a while. Okay, that's fine. I just want

to know. Where's your hat?

Where's your hat?

I should have a hat asking for money.

You look like you should be on the beach at Rio trying to make a few bucks.

Go on.

Throw this. poor beggar a few coins, would you?

He can't even afford full pants like everybody else.

Merce is my oldest and dearest friend.

He's the funniest man I've ever met in my life.

I don't expect I'll ever meet a funnier person than him, ever.

He's an incredibly emotional guy, so he can be rational one second, and the next

minute he can be completely irrational.

Very sharp in a very scientific way.

And as a player, he's not kind of a methodical player. He's a very

player.

He can write things without thinking about them.

That felt like I got a real taste for civilian culture. Right.

I really had a great day. It was nice to get out of the hotel. I was feeling so

claustrophobic.

Well, I'll tell you, like all of us,

a lovable mass of contradictions, as we all are, and we can all be goofy as can

be, and we can be serious and get down to it, and Geddy particularly, when he's

constructing arrangements or working on vocal parts, he enters that narrow zone

of concentration.

But at the same time, he's crazy for sports and baseball, but we share so

interests.

in art and literature and even bird watching the two of us can talk about

time to time. All of us have these broad ranging interests and facets to

personalities that in the case of the three of us at least just happen to mesh

so well that we entertain each other and we stimulate each other and more than

that the work actually gets done by the combination of methods that we all have.

I left a bag in the van.

Alfredo, I left a bag in the van that I came in. Is it still here?

It's my stage shoes for tonight.

Pete, did you get that black bag out of the van?

Black bag?

I left a black bag in the van.

Looking for the shoes is not really a documentary issue here.

Well, Neil is a very different guy. People build up this impression of him

he's this real serious, brainiac guy, and he freaks people out when they come

try to talk to him, but he's just a normal guy. He's just got a big brain,

he can be as goofy as anybody.

He's just a great guy to hang out with and a great guy to talk to about

anything.

And here we have my new team, the Porto Alegre team.

Of course, if I were to wear it, the San Paolo team fans would kill me.

So forget it.

Just forget it.

That's groovy, yeah?

What is that for? That's security.

Vigilancia. I'm tired.

Security guy gave it to me before we got in the car. That was really cool.

Nice man.

Thank you, man.

Okay, I have to go to the washroom now.

We don't need that part.

Well, the venues in Brazil are so huge, in São Paulo and Rio, they're just huge,

and they're historic, because that's where the great matches, you know, it's

about football there, soccer.

Being Canadians, you know, it's not that well -versed in there.

soccer history, and everyone's waiting for an opportunity to talk about soccer.

So to play those venues, in their mind, that's a great honor to play at the site

of the great soccer victories for the Brazilian team.

So that was kind of cool.

I suddenly realized how huge the stadium was.

It was just one section, because You took in the whole stadium. It didn't

that big, you know. It just seemed like a stadium.

But when you looked at a section, and it had, you know, like 600 seats in that

section,

and the seats were tiny, you realized how big this place was.

So it was great.

Normally before the show we do a short, what we call a meet and greet, which is

just, you know, you take ten minutes out and meet some hardcore fans that have

won contests, and it means a lot to them to spend a few minutes chatting with

them, so we try to do that on a nightly basis and spread some good karma around,

kind of.

And so we did the same thing in Brazil. We got to meet some of the fans.

I am fan since 1995.

And I can't explain what I'm feeling now because it's not only music.

They teach us so many lessons with their songs.

And there is another thing.

I'm a drummer and I'm a third fan.

We love them all and we'd like them to come back.

It's a great show in Brazil.

And they will come back and I will be here too.

I will be here again.

Russia is our best band in the world.

A lot of thanks because you came to Brazil.

It's a hope. It's a very, very... A long time we were expecting you here.

It's a great expectation for all these fans.

And I hope you have a great time here and come back a lot of times.

There's three guys that sound like 20 guys on stage.

They can do better than an orchestra.

They're really enjoying themselves, not looking like robots, you know, trying to

go to effects and stuff.

You really see they are really enjoying the music.

The band, it's my musical inspiration, and music in my life is very, very

important. It's my heart, my soul.

And these guys, they mean happiness for me, you know?

And the songs, they're wonderful.

And you guys are the best.

The best. Thank you. Thank you for changing my life so much.

We love Louis with all of our heart.

And the fans will enjoy the show forever.

It's great that at least they have a chance to come here. At least once, you

know. I don't know about the future, but at least they came here once, you know.

And people are so happy.

That power show was one of the most dramatic shows in our entire career

For one thing, by far the largest audience we've ever played to anywhere.

And I think in my memory, the only time we've actually played in pouring rain,

not only was it pouring, but it was blowing in straight on us. My electronic

midi marimba ceased functioning, and I would hit it and nothing would happen or

some totally unrelated sound. So I'm restructuring my parts as we go.

And the crew's scrambling around beside me trying to get it going, and meanwhile

I'm just departing from it. Okay, it's not going to work accepting that

It was just awful.

When we went to Mexico, we had no idea that song was so popular in Latin

America.

And so we hadn't prepared it.

In Mexico City, we rehearsed it that afternoon, played it like a lot of

and then just played it that night, and it worked out.

We were a little more prepared in Brazil, because at least we knew we were

to have to play it a few days before, so we rehearsed it in sound checks.

I was listening to my solo from last tour, and thought, well, I'm not really

finished with that framework yet. And there was still a development that I

have done there, but then I thought, no, it's been five years, I really want to

start fresh. So I kept some elements of it, but put them in a whole different

configuration, just in the framework that I dreamed up.

And there's some things about it that are autobiographical, there are parts of

that solo that have always been in my drum solo, and parts that are fresh.

every tour in parts that are fresh every night.

It's designed to be kind of my little experimental area, stuff that I'm

interested in. The history of drumming is in there, from rudimental drumming to

African drumming to jazz drumming, rock drumming.

And there are parallel stories being told, I guess, is something that I try

get at. So it's not just an exhibition to me. I want it to have a framework

a listener's point of view that will understand there are threads of

going on here.

Well, the Rio show was an amazing feat of endurance from our road crew's point

of view. I mean, if ever I believed they were the greatest crew in the world, it

was proven on that last show in Rio.

Our crew didn't get in.

I don't think they got into the hotel until about 12 in the afternoon.

And usually when we start to set up a show, they're in about 7 in the morning

the venue starting the first trucks. But I don't think the first piece of gear

hit the stage until about 2 o 'clock in the afternoon.

So for them to get the show up in time to do a show at 10 o 'clock at night was

just unbelievable.

It was a very, very tense day, and it was clear that we were not going to get

sound check that day. So here we are, big

show in Rio.

We're filming it.

We're recording it, and there's no sound check out front, which I don't think

was a big deal because we've already done 70 shows, and we knew we could pull

out.

But no check for the soundtrack.

No check for the film people.

I mean, when we hit the stage, that was it.

Cameras better work or all goes for naught.

It's actually going to be kind of a fun thing. The show's going to just get set

up in time to start.

So it's going to have a whole different dynamic to it.

It's been...

A fascinating time working with these guys, seeing the growth of the band over

all of these years since 1976 into a situation where we're in Brazil now

massive stadiums, particularly last night in Sao Paulo where they played the

,000 people, which in fact was the biggest show in the history of Russia.

There is such a great rock following here in Brazil.

Rock music and what Rush does is a great match.

And as a result of that, consistently in the polls, year on year for the last 10

years, it's been Rush, Rush and more Rush.

The trucks were so late arriving from Sao Paulo to Rio that it was a question

even if the show could go off.

anywhere near close to time.

And yeah, they were setting up right till a minute before we walked on stage,

think. So it was about as...

against the odds, as you can imagine, but it was, again, the measure of

professionalism and good spirit. I remember my drum tech, Lauren, coming in

before, everything's all right, and the meeting room is working, you know, and

there was this sense of conquering adversity and carrying on regardless.

was the spirit the three of us had, and sure enough, that spread down through

the crew as well. I am a big fan, a real big fan, maybe one of the oldest fans

of Rush in Brazil.

Because when we could get no records of that band, my father had one, and I

could listen to Spirit of the Radio, and I got the whole spirit.

The last show, too, is a sense of grand finale. You want it to be triumphant.

You want it to be great. It's something you're going to remember and carry away

with you as a souvenir of it. So, yeah, in addition to the cameras, in addition

to the recording truck, there's always the sense that we wanted a souvenir that

was going to be satisfying and memorable.

We know and the audience knows that we're playing songs that we want to play

songs that we're proud of and that we enjoy playing.

And that has to convey itself, I think, to the audience, that we're never, ever

just going through the motions.

It means so much to us to do it well.

But I think also that has to reach the audience, but they know we can't.

So why do you think this tour was so easy and so smooth, David?

Easier than the soup, yeah. The soup made it a lot easier for us.

Yeah, that's about it. I don't think we could have played as well as we did

without that soup.

No, we're not joking. That soup was so good.

You have no idea.

I think I have a shrimp caught in between my teeth.

What's a shrimp caught?

Is that something they sleep on?

When they're like having a little nap?

Because they are a shrimp.