Performer: Rush
Songwriters: Alex Lifeson
Original Release: Snakes & Arrows
Year: 2007
Definitive Version: Snakes & Arrows Live, 2008
My buddy Dave sent me the word last year: Rush was touring, and to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Moving Pictures, they were going to play the entire album start to finish—as if I needed any more incentive to see them for the 10th time!
They were going to play two dates in July in Chicago at Your Bank Name Here Pavilion on Northerly Island, which I had been to for the first time only the year before to see Crosby, Stills & Nash. It’s a cozy outdoor venue, and I loved that I would have the chance to see Rush there. Laurie and I chose the second night—it would be the day after we got back from a long weekend at Torch Lake after the Fourth—and I got tickets when they went on sale about 25 rows back and to the side. They’d be great seats for sure.
Laurie, being unemployed at the time, was coming from home; I’d be coming from work. We’d meet up downtown and hike out to the show, which was out past Adler Planetarium. (It’s where Meigs Field used to be, until Mayor Daley snatched up the land and tore up the runway, because he could.) I took a change of clothes to work; it was supposed to be in the 90s.
There also was a chance of rain, and the tickets said rain or shine, so, well, OK, rock ‘n’ roll. We didn’t have ponchos, but it’s supposed to be warm, so what would getting a little wet matter? We’d be oblivious to that soft summer rain.
Well, you would have had to have been oblivious, period, to not notice the rain. The show was scheduled to start at 7:30, and at about 6:30, a massive thunderstorm struck. We cabbed it from where we met up for dinner downtown, and by the time we made it to the show, the rain was easing up--temporarily. We were drenched by the time we made it to our seats. Fortunately, it was warm, so it wasn’t cold. It could have been worse: The beer taps could’ve been dry.
The rain eventually did stop, but the tarps stayed on Rush’s equipment. When I saw on my cellphone that it was almost 8:30, I said to Laurie, we’re right at cut-off time. Because of curfew, they had better get out on stage soon or call it.
No sooner had the words left my lips when a stagehand trudged out sheepishly and asked, “Well … how’s everyone doin’ tonight?” Yep, they called it. No show: the first concert cancellation I was a part of. It was rain or shine, not thunderstorm or shine. I can’t say I disagreed with the decision. Fear not: A make-up date would be announced shortly.
So back home we trudged through the puddles; our shoes squishing with each step but with Hope in our hearts (if not in our ears) that a pleasure delayed was not in fact a pleasure denied. I’ve waited this long to finally see the boys play The Camera Eye—the centerpiece opus of Moving Pictures—I can wait a little longer.
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