This new band features two members of the previous band HeadRUSH.

Though this site is up, there are many things to add and modify before it can escape the clutches of construction. So, here is a toast to the ultimate success of  the band that is Shred Barchetta.

UPDATE: The new band Shred Barchetta is now rehearsing for shows in the coming spring.

Now for a message from our sponsor:

http://www.bmwbmw.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=8693&hilit=drummer

[Fiction piece from Road & Track -- November 1973, pp.148-150]

It was a fine morning in March 1982. The warm weather and clear sky gave promise of an early spring. Buzz had arisen early that morning, impatiently eaten breakfast and gone to the garage. Opening the door, he saw the sunshine bounce off the gleaming hood of his 15-year-old MGB roadster. After carefully checking the fluid levels, tire pressures and ignition wires, Buzz slid behind the wheel and cranked the engine, which immediately fired to life. He thought happily of the next few hours he would spend with the car, but his happiness was clouded – it was not as easy as it used to be.

A dozen years ago things had begun changing. First there were a few modest safety and emission improvements required on new cars; gradually these became more comprehensive. The governmental requirements reached an adequate level, but they didn’t stop; they continued and became more and more stringent. Now there were very few of the older models left, through natural deterioration and . . . other reasons.

The MG was warmed up now and Buzz left the garage, hoping that this early in the morning there would be no trouble. He kept an eye on the instruments as he made his way down into the valley. The valley roads were no longer used very much: the small farms were all owned by doctors and the roads were somewhat narrow for the MSVs (Modern Safety Vehicles).

The safety crusade had been well done at first. The few harebrained schemes were quickly ruled out and a sense of rationality developed. But in the late Seventies, with no major wars, cancer cured and social welfare straightened out, the politicians needed a new cause and once again they turned toward the automobile. The regulations concerning safety became tougher. Cars became larger, heavier, less efficient. They consumed gasoline so voraciously that the United States had had to become a major ally with the Arabian countries. The new cars were hard to stop or maneuver quickly, but they would save your life (usually) in a 50-mph crash. With 200 million cars on the road, however, few people ever drove that fast anymore.

Buzz zipped quickly to the valley floor, dodging the frequent potholes which had developed from neglect of the seldom-used roads. The engine sounded spot-on and the entire car had a tight, good feeling about it. He negotiated several quick S-curves and reached 6000 in third gear before backing off for the next turn. He didn’t worry about the police down here. No, not the cops . . .

Despite the extent of the safety program, it was essentially a good idea. But unforeseen complications had arisen. People became accustomed to cars which went undamaged in 10-mph collisions. They gave even less thought than before to the possibility of being injured in a crash. As a result, they tended to worry less about clearances and rights-of-way, so that the accident rate went up a steady six percent every year. But the damages and injuries actually decreased, so the government was happy, the insurance industry was happy and most of the car owners were happy. Most of the car owners – the owners of the non-MSV cars – were kept busy dodging the less careful MSV drivers, and the result of this mismatch left very few of the older cars in existence. If they weren’t crushed between two 6000-pound sleds on the highway they were quietly priced into the junkyard by the insurance peddlers. And worst of all, they became targets . . .

Buzz was well into his act now, speeding through the twisting valley roads with all the skill he could muster, to the extent that he had forgotten his earlier worries. Where the road was unbroken he would power around the turns in well controlled oversteer, and where the sections were potholed he saw them as devious chicanes to be mastered. He left the ground briefly going over one of the old wooden bridges and later ascertained that the MG would still hit 110 on the long stretch between the old Hanlin and Grove farms. He was just beginning to wind down when he saw it, there in his mirror, a late-model MSV with hand-painted designs covering most of its body (one of the few modifications allowed on post-1980 cars). Buzz hoped it was a tourist or a wayward driver who got lost looking for a gas station. But now the MSV driver had spotted the MG, and with a whoosh of a well muffled, well cleansed exhaust he started the chase . . .

It hadn’t taken long for the less responsible element among drivers to discover that their new MSVs could inflict great damage on an older car and go unscathed themselves. As a result some drivers would go looking for the older cars in secluded areas, bounce them off the road or into a bridge abutment, and then speed off undamaged, relieved of whatever frustrations cause this kind of behavior. Police seldom patrolled these out-of-the-way places, their attentions being required more urgently elsewhere, and so it became a great sport for some drivers.

Buzz wasn’t too worried yet. This had happened a few times before, and unless the MSV driver was an exceptionally good one, the MG could be called upon to elude the other driver without too much difficulty. Yet something bothered him about this gaudy MSV in his mirror, but what was it? Planning carefully, Buzz let the other driver catch up to within a dozen yards or so, and then suddenly shot off down a road to the right. The MSV driver stood on his brakes, skidding 400 feet down the road, made a lumbering U-turn and set off once again after the roadster. The MG had gained a quarter mile in this manner and Buzz was thankful for the radial tires and front and rear anti-roll bars he had put on the car a few years back. He was flying along the twisting road, downshifting, cornering, accelerating and all the while planning his route ahead. He was confident that if he couldn’t outrun the MSV then he could at least hold it off for another hour or more, at which time the MSV would be quite low on gas. But what was it that kept bothering him about the other car?

The Author with Neil Peart

They reached a straight section of the road and Buzz opened it up all the way and held it. The MSV was quite a way back but not so far that Buzz couldn’t distinguish the tall antenna standing up from the back bumper. Antenna! Not police, but perhaps a Citizen’s Band radio in the MSV? He quaked slightly and hoped it was not. The straight stretch was coming to an end now and Buzz put off braking to the last fraction of a second and then sped through a 75-mph right-hander, gaining ten more yards on the MSV. But less than a quarter mile ahead another huge MSV was slowly pulling across the road and to a stop. It was a CB set. The other driver had a cohort in the chase. Now Buzz was in trouble. He stayed on the gas until within a few hundred feet when he banked hard and feinted passing to the left. The MSV crawled in that direction and Buzz slipped by on the right, bouncing heavily over a stone on the shoulder. The two MSVs set off in hot pursuit, almost colliding in the process. Buzz turned right at the first crossroad and then made a quick left, hoping to be out of sight of his pursuers, and in fact he traveled several minutes before spotting one of them on the main road parallel to his lane. At the same time the other appeared in the mirror from around the last comer. By now they were beginning to climb the hills on the far side of the valley and Buzz pressed on for all he was worth, praying that the straining engine would stand up. He lost track of one MSV when the main road turned away, but could see the other one behind him on occasion. Climbing the old Monument Road, Buzz hoped to have time to get over the top and down the old dirt road to the right, which would be too narrow for his pursuers. Climbing, straining, the water temperature rising, using the entire road, flailing the shift lever back and forth from 3rd to 4th, not touching the brakes but scrubbing off the necessary speed in the corners, reaching the peak of the mountain where the lane to the old fire tower went off to the left . . . but coming up the other side of the hill was the second MSV he had lost track of! No time to get to his dirt road. He made a panicked turn left onto the fire tower road but spun on some loose gravel and struck a tree a glancing blow with his right fender. He came to a stop on the opposite side of the road. the engine stalled. Hurriedly he pushed the starter while the overheated engine slowly came back into life. He engaged 1st gear and sped off up the road, just as the first MSV turned the corner. Dazed though he was, Buzz had the advantage of a very narrow road lined on both sides with trees, and he made the most of it. The road twisted constantly and he stayed in 2nd with the engine between 5000 and 5500. The crash hadn’t seemed to hurt anything and he was pulling away from the MSV. But to where? It hit him suddenly that the road dead-ended at the fire tower, no place to go but back . . .

Still he pushed on and at the top of the hill drove quickly to the far end of the clearing, turned the MG around and waited. The first MSV came flying into the clearing and aimed itself at the sitting MG. Buzz grabbed reverse gear, backed up slightly to feint, stopped, and then backed up at full speed. The MSV, expecting the MG to change direction, veered the wrong way and slid to a stop up against a tree. Buzz was off again, down the fire tower road, and the undamaged MSV set off in pursuit. Buzz’s predicament was unenviable. He was going full tilt down the twisting blacktop with a solid MSV coming up at him. and an equally solid MSV coming down after him. On he went, however, braking hard before each turn and then accelerating back up to 45 in between. Coming down to a particularly tight turn, he saw the MSV coming around it from the other direction and stood on the brakes. The sudden extreme pressure in the brake lines was too much for the rear brake line which had been twisted somewhat in his spin, and it broke, robbing Buzz of his brakes. In sheer desperation he pulled the handbrake as tightly as it would go and rammed the gear lever into 1st, popping the clutch as he did so. The back end locked solid and broke away, spinning him off the side of the road and miraculously into some bushes, which brought the car to a halt. As he was collecting his senses, Buzz saw the two MSVs, unable to stop in time, ram each other head on at over 40 mph.

It was a long time before Buzz had the MG rebuilt to its original pristine condition of before the chase. It was an even longer time before he went back into the valley for a drive. Now it was only in the very early hours of the day when most people were still sleeping off the effects of the good life. And when he saw in the papers that the government would soon be requiring cars to be capable of withstanding 75-mph headon collisions, he stopped driving the MG altogether.

Article written by Richard Foster.

One of my favorite all time guitarists would of course be Alex Lifeson. He is really stepping up his stage act recently. During the Snakes and Arrows tour, there are multiple “Barbie Doll” groupies known as “Big Al’s Babes” standing on stage in front of Alex Lifeson, holding “Post-It” notes with various sayings on them, apparently created by the roadies.

Sayings have included: “I Like The Drummer”, “My Grampa Says Your Cool”, “Can I Roll Your Bones?”, “I’m A Dino-Whore AKA Suckasaurass”, “I Was Conceived While My Dad Was At A Rush Concert”, “I’m Not Wearing Any Panties”, “My Mom Thinks Your Hot!”, “I’m Only Doing This To Pay For College”, “Freebird!”, “I Thought ZZ Top Had Beards”, “Bass Player’s Cute! Is That His Real Nose?”, “I Golf Naked”, “Nice Dinosaurs-You Must Be A Caveman”, “If It’s Too Loud You’re Too Old”.

There’s no bread, let them eat cake
There’s no end to what they’ll take
Flaunt the fruits of noble birth
Wash the salt into the earth
But they’re marching to Bastille Day
La guillotine will claim her bloody prize
Free the dungeons of the innocent
The king will kneel, and let his kingdom rise

Bloodstained velvet, dirty lace
Naked fear on every face
See them bow their heads to die
As we would bow as they rode by

And we’re marching to Bastille Day
La guillotine will claim her bloody prize
Sing, o choirs of cacophony
The king has kneeled, to let his kingdom rise.

Lessons taught but never learned
All around us anger burns
Guide the future by the past
Long ago the mould was cast

For they marched up to Bastille Day
La guillotine – claimed her bloody prize
Hear the echoes of the centuries
Power isn’t all that money buys

- Rush, Bastille Day from Caress of Steel

Bastille Day is the French national holiday, celebrated on 14 July each year. In France, it is called Fête Nationale (“National Celebration“) in official parlance, or more commonly le quatorze juillet (“14 July”). It commemorates the 1790 Fête de la Fédération, held on the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789; the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille fortress-prison was seen as a symbol of the uprising of the modern nation, and of the reconciliation of all the French inside the constitutional monarchy which preceded the First Republic, during the French Revolution.

On 5 May 1789, Louis XVI convened the Estates-General to hear their grievances. The deputies of the Third Estate representing the common people (the two others were the Church and nobility) decided to break away and form a National Assembly. On 20 June the deputies of the Third Estate took the Tennis Court Oath, swearing not to separate until a constitution had been established. They were gradually joined by delegates of the other estates; Louis started to recognize their validity on 27 June. The assembly re-named itself the National Constituent Assembly on 9 July, and began to function as a legislature and to draft a constitution.

In the wake of the 11 July dismissal of Jacques Necker, the people of Paris, fearful that they and their representatives would be attacked by the royal military, and seeking to gain ammunition and gunpowder for the general populace, stormed the Bastille, a fortress-prison in Paris which had often held people jailed on the basis of lettres de cachet, arbitrary royal indictments that could not be appealed. Besides holding a large cache of ammunition and gunpowder, the Bastille had been known for holding political prisoners whose writings had displeased the royal government, and was thus a symbol of the absolutism of the monarchy. As it happened, at the time of the siege in July 1789 there were only seven inmates, none of great political significance.

When the crowd — eventually reinforced by mutinous gardes françaises — proved a fair match for the fort’s defenders, Governor de Launay, the commander of the Bastille, capitulated and opened the gates to avoid a mutual massacre. However, possibly because of a misunderstanding, fighting resumed. Ninety-eight attackers and just one defender died in the actual fighting, but in the aftermath, de Launay and seven other defenders were killed, as was the ‘prévôt des marchands’ (roughly, mayor) Jacques de Flesselles.

The storming of the Bastille was more important as a rallying point and symbolic act of rebellion than a practical act of defiance.

Shortly after the storming of the Bastille, on 4 August feudalism was abolished and on 26 August, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen proclaimed. 

-From Wikipedia…

By Christopher Borrelli | Tribune reporter

April 15, 2009

 

 

If you have waited decades for the signal to come out of the closet and declare your allegiance to “The Holy Triumvirate,” as Jason Segal dubs Rush in “I Love You, Man,” consider this your official notice.

 After 35 years as one of rock music’s most persistent punch lines—the singer sounds like a girl, the songs are long and pedantic, some fans are obsessive, the band is indulgent and Canadian—Rush is suddenly cool.

In fact, even more remarkably, liking Rush is cool.

“You heard right,” said TBS sports announcer Chip Caray, grandson of legendary Chicago Cubs announcer Harry Caray. “I’m a fan of Rush, to put it mildly. I tell people, and they go, ‘Really?‘ which is sad. How many hate what they do? [Rush enjoys] what they do. One song goes, ‘The pride of purpose in an unrewarding job.’ I’m a 44-year-old who quotes Rush—so be it. I’m proud to be a fan, and I don’t mind saying it. We’re everywhere now.”

Recently, the band played a major role on “The Colbert Report“; they have had gushing profiles in Rolling Stone and non-ironic interviews in Entertainment Weekly; they’ve been a plot thread in “I Love You, Man,” referenced on “Family Guy” and effusively adored in the new coming-of-age drama “Adventureland.” Later this year, the band will receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

But even more notable, perhaps, is that these days Rush is less likely to be a target of snark than reverence. And with reason: The Rushinati have infiltrated the power structure. For instance, the Rushinati control the media: Stephen Colbert is a fan; “I Love You, Man” director John Hamburg and “Adventureland” director Greg Mottola are big fans; Victor Lisle, creative director for WGN-AM (owned by Tribune Co.), will talk your ear off about the grandeur of a Rush concert; Metallica lobbied for Rush’s inclusion in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame during its own induction speech this month; Paul Rudd is a longtime fan, as is Billy Corgan, who, before forming Smashing Pumpkins, honed his chops covering Rush in high school bands.

“The Rush fan is a serious guy,” said Mottola, who also directed “Superbad.” “He has a fervor in his eyes. I have a vivid memory of a Rush guy doing a drum solo at my high school talent show and taking more time than anyone needed. But Rush inspires that kind of … insistence. They have this unswerving integrity, and it’s translated to some fans into a sort of religion.”

In Chicago—for decades, one of the band’s primary markets—the Rushinati have stayed silent but present. They have held the mound at Wrigley Field (former Cub Matt Clement is a die-hard Rushinati). They are college instructors. They run computers at financial institutions. They own scores of businesses around Chicago, and they have their hands on the world’s purse strings.

Sterling Smith, 44, a Chicago economic analyst and vice president of trading firm FuturesOne, said he has been a devoted fan since high school—so devoted he routinely attends fan gatherings in the area, gatherings which are attended, incredibly enough, by several dozen like-minded Rush devotees who work at the Chicago Board of Trade. “Talk to any male on the floor [of the Board of Trade] and if they’re under 55, I would bet you they’re at least 50 percent likely to be a fan. And I think I know why: The Rush fan is a person who values precision and analysis, and the music is often about the rights of the individual—and any of these things would be interesting to someone who trades commodities all day. We’re a mathematically oriented group.”

Indeed, Alex Lifeson, Rush’s guitarist, said he has noticed that fans who grew up with Rush seem “a little more detail-oriented in their professional lives.” He said, in middle age, they seem disproportionately made up of engineers, chemists, economists and businessmen.

“Just yesterday I got an e-mail from an astronaut,” Lifeson said. “A guy up in the space station. He brought a copy of our last album with him into space. I mean, this is amazing. You know how many Rush fans there are within NASA? A lot. I’ll leave it at that. And I’m not just talking about the guys out in the field. Our fans are inside, close to the big programs. They run everything.”

It wasn’t always like this.

For Chris Schneberger, 38, who teaches photography at Columbia College, it has been a long road. “I kept [my Rush fanhood] to myself when I was in college,” he said. “I admit I always felt a little ashamed by it. For years, I felt like one of those early Christians who would draw a crescent in the sand and wait for someone to come along and draw a fish beside it—to give out a signal that they are part of a brotherhood. But I think I’m at the age now where I have stopped caring.”

For Dan Langosch, 42, who lives in Naperville and runs IT for a major bank, to be committed to Rush was “to carry around a chip on your shoulder. They sing songs about the space shuttle. They don’t play love songs really. But some of the sci-fi aspects [of the music] faded, and I think, like the band, the fans have learned to relax a little more and deal with real life. But being an outcast is fine.”

Indeed, director Hamburg said that when he was thinking of a band to put at the center of “I Love You, Man,” it came to “the question of what band would two guys in their late 30s feel a genuine bond over. Rush was ideal because when you meet another fan certain truths are self evident: Neil Peart is the greatest drummer ever, and ‘Limelight’ is the greatest song. But what I noticed is that fans are coming out of the woodwork, and they don’t all look like organic chemistry majors.”

Or perhaps we all do.

Everyone is a nerd these days. “We’ve only had to wait 35 years for this to happen,” Lifeson said. Tolkien is mainstream. Comic book movies are the new westerns. And the idea of an 18-minute song called “Cygnus X-1 Book II: Hemispheres” would not seem out of place on a new Kanye album. “To be honest,” Lifeson said, “I’m not listening to music like I was when I was in the ’70s. And when I do, you know who’s really great? I’d rather listen to Radiohead. Everything else—who has the patience?”

cborrelli@tribune.com

You were made an officer of the Order of Canada in the ’90s. To what does that entitle you?
I can arrest you for asking that question. (laughs) It’s like a good-citizenship award— they give you two medals, a big one and a little one. It entitles me to respect, which is why I wear it around the house. And in the bedroom at night. It’s important to get respect there, so I wear the big one.

Read the complete article on Blender.com…

http://www.blender.com/DearSuperstarGeddyLee/Blender-Blog/blogs/1168/63524.aspx

 httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQhF30FJZYM

MusicRadar.com recently spoke with Alex Lifeson and asked him what he thought were his three best guitar solos. Alex chose Freewill, Kid Gloves and Limelight. Very interesting. Here’s what Lerxst had to say about each solo:

1. Limelight (1981)

I love the elasticity of the solo. It’s a very emotional piece of music for me to play. The song is about loneliness and isolation, and I think the solo reflects that. There’s a lot of heart in it. It’s a feel thing: you have to feel a solo as you play it, otherwise it’s going to sound stiff. I never had that problem with Limelight. The first time I laid it down in the studio, I feel a real attachment to it and I could tell it was special. Even now, it’s my favorite solo to perform live. I never get tired of it. Each time I’m about to play it, I take a deep breath and I exhale on that first note. I guess that sounds corny, but for me, it releases something.

2. Kid Gloves (1984)

That song is from our Grace Under Pressure album. What I like about the solo is, it’s the opposite of Limelight: it’s got a hip, kind of slinky attitude, a little goofy humor. When I play it, I feel a certain confidence, also like a prankster, which is not the way I am in real life at all. What’s funny about it, too, is that it has a plot to it, and I only realized that after I recorded it for the first time – I never have a plot in mind when I’m recording solos; I always just kind of wing them. The Kid Gloves solo guided me; it’s like it knew what it wanted to be and I just had to allow myself to follow.

3. Freewill (1980)

It’s a really hard solo to play. I think I feel a certain amount of pride in that fact alone. Every time I play it, I’m amazed I got through it. It’s so frenetic and exciting. The rhythm section too – Geddy and Neil are all over the place. It’s probably one of the most ambitious pieces of music Rush has ever done. In a sense, everybody’s soloing at the same time. Recording it, I didn’t have anything planned; I was just responding to what the other guys did. Basically, I was just trying to keep up! But I think it worked out pretty well. I’m rather happy with it, and I can usually find fault with everything I do.

Many thanks to Rushisaband.com for the info.