Rush – Wandering the Face of the Earth

Rush – Wandering the Face of the Earth by Skip Daly and Eric Hansen

If ever there was a finer example of not judging a book by its cover.  

So let’s first discuss what this book is NOT as appearances can be deceiving.  When one first lays eyes on this ginormous coffee table behemoth, one might come away with the impression that this just might be an exceedingly comprehensive history of the band Rush chocked filled with pictures and intricate details of the band’s catalog; especially since you might find this book shrink-wrapped and can’t take a “peek” at the inside.  If this is what you are wanting or expecting, you’re likely to be highly disappointed.  What this book actually is, is a very detailed account of the band’s touring and live performances throughout its 40+ years of playing concerts all over the world.

Now, if you’re a Rush geek (such as myself), this just might be exactly what you do, in fact, want. Rush has a very hefty size of fans that actually love nerdy statistics and meticulous details pertaining to the band’s touring history.  We actually like to know what songs were played during each tour as well as other fine particulars.  So this books is essentially a very comprehensive list of every show the band has played on every tour along with selected facts around many of those shows. Each ‘chapter’ in this book contains a brief summary of the particular tour with a scattering of a few pics of the band during the specific trek.  Then, the detailed accounts of the tours are presented.  And, man, are these accounts detailed.

Sadly, all of these details aren’t necessarily captivatingly wonderful information.  In fact, once one gets about halfway through the book, it becomes almost compulsorily to simply ‘skim’ through the information.  Understandably, the earlier history of the band is represented honestly by stating that very little is known about some of the shows, and sometimes we’re told that no one knows for sure whether these particular early gigs ever happened at all. This is understandable, and one doesn’t feel cheated when the authors have to be vague on many of these early performances.

So what we DO get for every show (actual and presumed) is the date, the city, the name of the venue, the year the venue opened (this tidbit was actually HIGHLY unnecessary), the capacity of the venue, the actual tickets sold, and the names of any other acts that were on the bill.  The set list for each tour is actually listed at the beginning of each chapter, so any variations gig-by-gig are also included in these accounts as well.

We then get random press clippings about selected shows, as well as recollections by those closest to the band in attendance as well as the band members themselves.  Most of the latter is the most welcome, but to be honest, there simply isn’t that much of it here.  This shouldn’t be surprising.  I mean, if YOU played a couple of thousand shows during a 40+ year tenure, it’s highly doubtful you would remember details of, say, show #348.  So a lot of what we get here as far as ‘notes’ go simply seems unnecessary and repetitive.

It’s quite humorous that when one reads the press snippets of the last few years, there’s nothing but positive sentiments coming from critics all over the globe.  Those who know the band well know that this wasn’t always the case.  The newspaper frat could be quite brutal throughout most of the band’s history.  As a fan, though, this really didn’t bother me while reading.  Some of the observations in this book made me laugh out loud. My personal favorite: “Geddy Lee sounds like your neighbor’s cat after being attacked by a blow torch”.  Still, though, after reading several hundred snippets throughout this massive volume, these concert reviews, good and bad, wear thin after a while.

This biggest gripe for me concerning all of these ‘show notes’ is where exactly the facts came from and, more importantly, why the authors chose to include many of these rather worthless recollections.   For example, I seemed to read about ten times during the Power Windows tour that “Geddy tosses a ball backstage after the show”.   Reading this once would have been o.k., but at times it felt like the authors were desperately trying to stretch out the book so the pages could be as plentiful as possible.   

Other examples:

“Alex breaks a string on the song XXX, but quickly switches out guitars in order to finish the song”.

I swear I must have read such an incident about 50 times throughout this book.  Nothing personal, but I seriously doubt anyone reading this book gives a rip about a guitarist breaking a string on a guitar during a song. 

Another example: “Neil misses hitting one of the toms during the closing section of ‘The Camera Eye’ ”.  

Yes, the authors actually feel obligated to include things like this. Oy.  

Or: “Geddy accidentally sings the word ‘or’ instead of the word ‘and’ during the last chorus of ‘The Temples of Syrinx’. This might have been because he was flustered since he accidentally played the first note of the song on his bass with his index finger instead of his middle finger.”

OK, I made that LAST one up, but I swear that many of the comments read very close to this type of drivel.

Still, though, one has to admire the obvious tenacity required to put together such a compilation.  As most Rush geeks could probably tell you, it was only a matter of time before someone actually tackled such a project.  Despite its flaws of being a tad too detailed, this book still remains a ‘must’ for any serious fan of the band.  Just don’t expect a retrospective of the band’s career, details about the recording of the bands 20 albums, nor any reflections on the philosophic musings of lyricist/drummer Neil Peart.  Fortunately, there are plenty of other volumes out there if one is needing one of those particular itches scratched.