There's been a lot of talk about this topic around the Internet lately since the rare March 5 recording from the Randhurst Arena became public knowledge. It's surprisingly hard to get a clear cut consensus, so it's unfortunately become a topic of debate. My purpose of this post here is to document all resources on this topic, viewing it from all perspectives from the standpoint of a historian, and engage constructive historical discussion to elaborate on how to interpret available information. Yes I have my opinion and conclusion about this topic, but I don't plan to reflect on my personal standpoint until the end of this post. I welcome discussion and any sort of facts to compare with the rest of what we know. I did discuss some of this throughout various posts in the Randhurst Arena thread, but those bits worth mentioning again will be mentioned here where it is more organized. Whichever side you stand on, we can preface with the fact that due to poor/minimal available historical documentation, Rush's touring history has been pieced together gradually over the last several decades during the era of the Internet, and changed multiple times with new information, some minor and some major.
As it currently stands, the two official sources list the 2112 tour as starting in early February (February 6 or February 9), either of which are likely reflected on all other non-official sources (except this site). With old sources, March 15 was once considered the start start of the 2112 tour, while January 10 was considered the end of the Caress Of Steel tour. Sometime later, eleven tour dates between February 6 and March 8 became better known about and documented online. At the time it may have seemed obvious to place these as part of the 2112 tour, seeing the hiatus between January 10 and February 6 was a larger gap, not really knowing what songs were performed, and otherwise not having any documentation specifically stating when the tour started. Either way, what we can conclude in the current year as of this writing, 2112 tracks seem that they did not debut live until the March 15, 16, 17, and 18 string of shows at The Starwood. This is not only loosely suggested by the Starwood poster using the then-new photograph of the kimono-wearing band featured inside the 2112 album (no documented posters prior use any 2112 related imagery), but is proven by a "Record World" magazine article from March 1976 that specifically states Rush would start touring to promote 2112 on March 15. (Immense thanks to fellow researcher Alice for finding this obscure and invaluable document!) Prior dates only featured songs from the first three albums, proven by the audience recording of March 5 and a newspaper review of February 21.
Do you place all trust in an official source as the only true and definitive information? Surprisingly the official Rush website is known for plenty errors, be it incorrect cities, dates, venues, undocumented shows or reschedulings. Just spend some time comparing the official site to the 2019 book "Wandering the Face of the Earth: The Official Touring History" (or Cygnus-X1.net's online mirroring of the book) and you will start to see many discrepancies. One that note, as a very related example, the official site only lists four of the eleven shows played between January 10 and March 15. The official site also states the 2112 tour starts on February 9, not accounting for the February 6 date in the Wandering book and on CX1. With all that being said, it is an extreme stance to assume that the official site IS definitive or 100% reliable, it is as fallible as any other source. Again, this information over the years has been difficult to determine due to minimal documentation available. Whenever the official site was constructed, it would make sense that the web designer just copied whatever information they were given on hand, not necessarily done by a someone who had knowledge of the band or their history. Whether the web designer was a fan or not probably doesn't mean much however, if no other information was known at the time. Over the years fans have corrected a lot of these discrepancies with their own documents, such as dated photos, tapes, ticket stubs, memories, etc. Other discrepancies are even present between the two official sources. The "Wandering" book is an officially licensed book and sold through the official Rush store. It is without doubt a book wouldn't have been officially supported without being able to trust its contents. The book has many contradictions with the official website, is extremely well researched for accurate dates, venues, cities/towns, etc, and accounts for a lot of details that may have been since presented by fans in contrary to the official site. That does not mean the book is without error itself though. Wisely, the book does at least make clear note that it is indeed hard to place a definitive date for the start and end of the earlier Rush tours, the "lines of demarcation". Which tells you to consider that these dates are potentially open for question. The boundaries of the debut Rush tour, Fly By Night tour, Caress Of Steel tour, 2112 tour, and All The World's A Stage tour are all questionable to a degree, whichever source you look at. All we have is rough guesses based on what evidence is presented, some may be right and some may be wrong.
What does this all mean, and how do we interpret this information? It has no doubt shown to be controversial, even if to you the answer may seem obvious one way or another. Here's where my personal stance comes in: I personally find zero difficulty accepting that the 2112 tour started on March 15, which multiple pieces of evidence clearly seem to indicate, and I especially don't see how you can downplay what is stated in that March 1976 contemporary "Record World" magazine. In trying to understand and view it from the opposing belief, I feel it could be a subconscious fixation to the long held and widely known belief that the Caress of Steel tour ended on January 10 at Massey Hall, and in account for the length of time off the road following that concert to record the new 2112 album. However, I strongly suggest everyone to consider what we are seeing with the evidence presented. I also strongly suggest to consider the following: Would it not make sense that the band took a break from the road to record their new album, though due to completing it close to two months before the planned release (March 26), that they'd not hit the road again with 11 shows between February 6 and March 8 continuing to promote only their first three albums a bit longer with their setlist structures used January 10 and prior, and wait until it was much closer to release before debuting the new material live? Does this constitute as the 2112 tour just because they took a break to record the new album? Do you want to call it a "pre-2112 tour" or "2112 warm-up tour" when no 2112 tracks were played? Or does it by all accounts seem to be an extenson of the Caress Of Steel tour? It could be argued that with only information on two of these eleven concerts, that perhaps they did play some 2112 tracks at some shows. I find it hard to believe that they would have done this, then omitted them again from the setlist for some shows. Sure 2112 is a long piece, but I could easily see them playing Something For Nothing during these eleven shows, but that does not seem to have been the case. If they did play any 2112 tracks during these eleven shows, then yes, we could consider it the beginning of the 2112 tour. Also, periods of time off between concert dates are not unheard of during one respective tour, just skim over all the tour date listings to see that. For one reason or another sometimes they took a bit of time off, some reasoning obvious while some are not.
Depending on how long you've been paying attention, way early on I was myself trying to figure out how to explain the March 5 recording as part of the 2112 tour. It was hard to explain, and I kept concluding with it being the 2112 tour but a "COS concert in spirit" due to being extremely early in the tour. Though I quickly I came to the realization that the currently held beliefs are likely yet another bit of the Rush touring history that is being shown in need of reevaluation. It felt wrong, and I felt it just couldn't possibly be right calling it as such. This stuff can be complicated, but not that complicated. I was hesitant for a while to make so bold of a claim, not wanting to be the only person pushing something that I knew would be a hard sell for many due to long held beliefs about the January 10 concert. Luckily I soon realized many people also felt the same way as I did, and as time went on I learned even more from other pieces of documentation, that what was being suggested surely did seem to be the case.
Any serious historian would openly consider ALL facts and theories on hand, whether they believe something or not. Fixating on long held beliefs or blindly following one source is never productive, no matter what the topic may be. I can't help but wonder what Geddy and Alex would say? Of course they wouldn't remember precise details on dates, we know their touring memory has proven fallible, but I don't think they'd consider a chain of dates performing songs from the first three albums to be part of the 2112 tour in any way, even if they recorded the album already.
Whatever the case may be, this information is all publicly out there to examine and interpret, and the passage time will tell what the future will ultimately conclude from all of this.
As it currently stands, the two official sources list the 2112 tour as starting in early February (February 6 or February 9), either of which are likely reflected on all other non-official sources (except this site). With old sources, March 15 was once considered the start start of the 2112 tour, while January 10 was considered the end of the Caress Of Steel tour. Sometime later, eleven tour dates between February 6 and March 8 became better known about and documented online. At the time it may have seemed obvious to place these as part of the 2112 tour, seeing the hiatus between January 10 and February 6 was a larger gap, not really knowing what songs were performed, and otherwise not having any documentation specifically stating when the tour started. Either way, what we can conclude in the current year as of this writing, 2112 tracks seem that they did not debut live until the March 15, 16, 17, and 18 string of shows at The Starwood. This is not only loosely suggested by the Starwood poster using the then-new photograph of the kimono-wearing band featured inside the 2112 album (no documented posters prior use any 2112 related imagery), but is proven by a "Record World" magazine article from March 1976 that specifically states Rush would start touring to promote 2112 on March 15. (Immense thanks to fellow researcher Alice for finding this obscure and invaluable document!) Prior dates only featured songs from the first three albums, proven by the audience recording of March 5 and a newspaper review of February 21.
Do you place all trust in an official source as the only true and definitive information? Surprisingly the official Rush website is known for plenty errors, be it incorrect cities, dates, venues, undocumented shows or reschedulings. Just spend some time comparing the official site to the 2019 book "Wandering the Face of the Earth: The Official Touring History" (or Cygnus-X1.net's online mirroring of the book) and you will start to see many discrepancies. One that note, as a very related example, the official site only lists four of the eleven shows played between January 10 and March 15. The official site also states the 2112 tour starts on February 9, not accounting for the February 6 date in the Wandering book and on CX1. With all that being said, it is an extreme stance to assume that the official site IS definitive or 100% reliable, it is as fallible as any other source. Again, this information over the years has been difficult to determine due to minimal documentation available. Whenever the official site was constructed, it would make sense that the web designer just copied whatever information they were given on hand, not necessarily done by a someone who had knowledge of the band or their history. Whether the web designer was a fan or not probably doesn't mean much however, if no other information was known at the time. Over the years fans have corrected a lot of these discrepancies with their own documents, such as dated photos, tapes, ticket stubs, memories, etc. Other discrepancies are even present between the two official sources. The "Wandering" book is an officially licensed book and sold through the official Rush store. It is without doubt a book wouldn't have been officially supported without being able to trust its contents. The book has many contradictions with the official website, is extremely well researched for accurate dates, venues, cities/towns, etc, and accounts for a lot of details that may have been since presented by fans in contrary to the official site. That does not mean the book is without error itself though. Wisely, the book does at least make clear note that it is indeed hard to place a definitive date for the start and end of the earlier Rush tours, the "lines of demarcation". Which tells you to consider that these dates are potentially open for question. The boundaries of the debut Rush tour, Fly By Night tour, Caress Of Steel tour, 2112 tour, and All The World's A Stage tour are all questionable to a degree, whichever source you look at. All we have is rough guesses based on what evidence is presented, some may be right and some may be wrong.
What does this all mean, and how do we interpret this information? It has no doubt shown to be controversial, even if to you the answer may seem obvious one way or another. Here's where my personal stance comes in: I personally find zero difficulty accepting that the 2112 tour started on March 15, which multiple pieces of evidence clearly seem to indicate, and I especially don't see how you can downplay what is stated in that March 1976 contemporary "Record World" magazine. In trying to understand and view it from the opposing belief, I feel it could be a subconscious fixation to the long held and widely known belief that the Caress of Steel tour ended on January 10 at Massey Hall, and in account for the length of time off the road following that concert to record the new 2112 album. However, I strongly suggest everyone to consider what we are seeing with the evidence presented. I also strongly suggest to consider the following: Would it not make sense that the band took a break from the road to record their new album, though due to completing it close to two months before the planned release (March 26), that they'd not hit the road again with 11 shows between February 6 and March 8 continuing to promote only their first three albums a bit longer with their setlist structures used January 10 and prior, and wait until it was much closer to release before debuting the new material live? Does this constitute as the 2112 tour just because they took a break to record the new album? Do you want to call it a "pre-2112 tour" or "2112 warm-up tour" when no 2112 tracks were played? Or does it by all accounts seem to be an extenson of the Caress Of Steel tour? It could be argued that with only information on two of these eleven concerts, that perhaps they did play some 2112 tracks at some shows. I find it hard to believe that they would have done this, then omitted them again from the setlist for some shows. Sure 2112 is a long piece, but I could easily see them playing Something For Nothing during these eleven shows, but that does not seem to have been the case. If they did play any 2112 tracks during these eleven shows, then yes, we could consider it the beginning of the 2112 tour. Also, periods of time off between concert dates are not unheard of during one respective tour, just skim over all the tour date listings to see that. For one reason or another sometimes they took a bit of time off, some reasoning obvious while some are not.
Depending on how long you've been paying attention, way early on I was myself trying to figure out how to explain the March 5 recording as part of the 2112 tour. It was hard to explain, and I kept concluding with it being the 2112 tour but a "COS concert in spirit" due to being extremely early in the tour. Though I quickly I came to the realization that the currently held beliefs are likely yet another bit of the Rush touring history that is being shown in need of reevaluation. It felt wrong, and I felt it just couldn't possibly be right calling it as such. This stuff can be complicated, but not that complicated. I was hesitant for a while to make so bold of a claim, not wanting to be the only person pushing something that I knew would be a hard sell for many due to long held beliefs about the January 10 concert. Luckily I soon realized many people also felt the same way as I did, and as time went on I learned even more from other pieces of documentation, that what was being suggested surely did seem to be the case.
Any serious historian would openly consider ALL facts and theories on hand, whether they believe something or not. Fixating on long held beliefs or blindly following one source is never productive, no matter what the topic may be. I can't help but wonder what Geddy and Alex would say? Of course they wouldn't remember precise details on dates, we know their touring memory has proven fallible, but I don't think they'd consider a chain of dates performing songs from the first three albums to be part of the 2112 tour in any way, even if they recorded the album already.
Whatever the case may be, this information is all publicly out there to examine and interpret, and the passage time will tell what the future will ultimately conclude from all of this.
