RUSH vs Iggy Pop: Let The Games Begin

Back in the early seventies, when Iggy and the Pop toured the Raw Power album, there was this rock trio called RUSH. One of the guys in the band, Geddy Lee, went to my Dad's school, Northview Heights (a few years before he went to the same school).

When he first started going to Northview he noticed a poster for a Friday night gig in the school cafeteria. The poster pictured these three rockers with shag hairuts dressed in what looked like skin-tight metalic Sweet outfits. At that time Rush were on their first album and they kind of sounded like a Canadian version of Led Zeppelin.

In those days my Dad and his friend's hated Led Zeppelin but really liked Iggy Pop and the New York Dolls. I reckon they were more into punk before it was really known as punk, although years later, my Dad met Iggy several times in NYC, Toronto and the UK.

Getting back to Rush performing a gig at their high school, well, it was a choice between my Dad seeing Rush in concert at his high school or seeing Iggy Pop at the Victory Burlesque Theatre on the corner of Spadina and Dundas Street (the place has now been converted into a Chinese bank).

My Dad and his friends said - "Who do Rush think they are? We give this band three years and they'll be gone."

Thirty-Three years later Rush have morphed into one of the biggest album rock bands on the planet.

Not only did they pick up a new drummer along the way (Neil Peart), but they've just released one of their best studio albums of their entire career ("Snakes & Arrows"). Gone are the shag haircuts and the tight sequin trousers and platform shoes.

Stranger things have been known to happen (www.rush.com).