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Rush Songs Never Played Live

By-Tor X-1

By-Tor X-1

Archivist
Staff member
( * asterisk means it is debatable, but no hard evidence that they were played)

Take A Friend (Rush) * (undoubtedly would've been played with John on drums, though most people list it due to lack of hard proof) *
Making Memories (Fly By Night) * (possible, yet commonly assumed not, though not enough documentation exists to prove either way) *
Rivendell (Fly By Night)
The Fountain Of Lamneth (Caress Of Steel) * (at least four individual attendee reports recall the song being played, though still no hard proof) *
Lessons (2112)
Tears (2112)
Madrigal (A Farewell To Kings)
Different Strings (Permanent Waves)
Emotion Detector (Power Windows)
Open Secrets (Hold Your Fire)
Second Nature (Hold Your Fire)
Tai Shan (Hold Your Fire)
High Water (Hold Your Fire)
Chain Lightning (Presto)
Anagram (Presto)
Red Tide (Presto)
Hand Over Fist (Presto)
Available Light (Presto)
Face Up (Roll The Bones)
The Big Wheel (Roll The Bones)
Heresy (Roll The Bones)
Neurotica (Roll The Bones)
You Bet Your Life (Roll The Bones)
Cut To The Chase (Counterparts)
Alien Shore (Counterparts)
The Speed Of Love (Counterparts)
Everyday Glory (Counterparts)
The Color Of Right (Test For Echo)
Totem (Test For Echo)
Dog Years (Test For Echo)
Carve Away The Stone (Test For Echo)
Peaceable Kingdom (Vapor Trails)
The Stars Look Down (Vapor Trails)
Vapor Trail (Vapor Trails)
Sweet Miracle (Vapor Trails)
Nocturne (Vapor Trails)
Freeze (Vapor Trails)
Out Of The Cradle (Vapor Trails)
Bravest Face (Snakes & Arrows)
Good News First (Snakes & Arrows)
We Hold On (Snakes & Arrows)
BU2B2 (Clockwork Angels) (not to be confused with BU2B)
 
Hi By-Tor X-1. I really appreciate and admire your efforts with this site. Just mind boggling, after decades of seeking out cassette tapes of live recordings, of unknown generation, to find this highly organized site, with carefully curated and researched presentations of all known recordings from the glory years. It means so much.

Great list here of songs never played live. Not a surprising list. The most surprising thing is how SHORT it is. The band played massive chunks of their new albums every tour, and plugged in some gaps in the latter years of the 3 hour shows.

I was really impressed with some of the deep cuts they played in the last handful of tours - like Presto, Losing It (of course), Entre Nous, Between Sun and Moon, and the acoustic Resist. I am also impressed by deep cuts they played on the tour of the album with the track - like Double Agent on Counterparts tour and War Paint on Presto tour.

From the list above, I would have loved to experience live performances of any of the 70s stuff (goes without saying), and from later albums: Available Light, Cut To the Chase, Alien Shore, Dog Years, and Vapor Trail. I think each of those songs would have been really effective live, in ways that would be surprising, like Presto and the acoustic Resist were.

Keep up the great work,

Rocky Chains
 
@rocky chains
I'm really glad you appreciate the site! Sometimes I seem to loose sight of how many people actually care that much about all this stuff. It always seems the Rush fanbase cares way less about live recordings when compared to other bands.

With that being said, things should hopefully be a lot more substantial around here soon. I have plans for a more substantial path for the site going forward, getting everything available much quicker.
 
Of all the songs that made this list, Different Strings always struck me as the strangest omission. That and Entre Vous were always a couple of my favorites, but I respect Rush for putting that time towards their longer pieces like Jacob's Ladder and Natural Science. Rush were never as medley-heavy as some other bands (i.e., Genesis), and I think they were better for it.
As for Presto, I didn't even realize they played that song until I read this post! I skipped on Time Machine because I assumed it would be "Moving Pictures and greatest hits," but looking at the setlist, I might have to scoop up a copy after all.
 
P.S., I'm not a fan of how much attention Snakes & Arrows got. In my opinion, that album was painfully mediocre compared to the other two current century Rush albums, and is the only one of the three that doesn't stand toe-to-toe with their back catalogue in my eyes. How could they do Vapor Trails dirty like that??
 
I don't know about the medley thing. Rush's did those encore medleys with "older" songs for a long time that would change up a bit with every tour. They could get quite lengthy. Though most of the time I felt they were structured pretty well.

I agree with you on S&A. I was talking with someone about this just a few days ago, definitely my least favorite Rush album.

It would've been really great if more of Vapor Trails would've been played, some of those songs are really good. I always just figured it was due to the personal nature of the album for Neil, some he may have just been more comfortable leaving off the stage.
 
By-Tor X-1 said:
I don't know about the medley thing.
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On second thought... I think you're right.
I think recency bias is coloring my opinion, because their 80s tours were chock-full of medleys. Even then, they still did a Cygnus-X1 medley and chopped 2112 down for R40.
Perhaps I never thought about Rush's medleys, because they still felt like proper performances of the original songs. To compare with Genesis, their medleys feel disingenuous by comparison. From the 80s onward, they wouldn't touch anything from the earlier days unless is was compromised in some way. Rush on the other hand could still play something like What You're Doing very comfortably on their final tour.
Yes would be a better example of a band that would shy away from medleys. The only one I'm aware of is their Tormato tour 'big medley". Outside of that, they'll unapologetically spend half the setlist on several different 20-minute pieces, depending on the tour.
By-Tor X-1 said:
I always just figured it was due to the personal nature of the album for Neil, some he may have just been more comfortable leaving off the stage.
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Now that you mention it, I always wondered how anyone could get through a performance of How It Is, Ghost Rider, or Secret Touch without tearing up, let alone Neil. If emotional significance was the issue, they certainly played the most loaded songs off the album, at least from my perspective.
Under that lens, I'm glad they performed as much music off the album as they did. Seeing as their early 2000s tours were a triumphant return from hiatus, Vapor Trails never got the same level of "brand-new album" setlist presence for its first tour. As for Snakes & Arrows, it really only had a huge showing for the initial Snakes & Arrows tour, and fell off pretty hard after Time Machine.
 
Spetts said:
To compare with Genesis, their medleys feel disingenuous by comparison. From the 80s onward, they wouldn't touch anything from the earlier days unless is was compromised in some way.
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They had a 20-minute “old medley” on the 1992 tour, most of which was pre-’80s.
 
Dave said:
They had a 20-minute “old medley” on the 1992 tour, most of which was pre-’80s.
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Actually, this might be the best example of what I'm getting at. They played most of The Lamb (title track) and a good chunk of Firth of Fifth, but you're not going to convince me that the rest are uncompromising performances of the songs. As for I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe), I'm not a fan of that piece in particular, and this version made me feel like the band don't like it, either. Outside of the old medley and Turn it On Again, they didn't touch anything older than their self-titled album, which was only two albums ago at this point.

I get the feeling that Genesis really fell out of favor with their old songs. There's nothing wrong with that! People grow, tastes evolve, and the music you love at one point in your life probably won't be your absolute favorite forever. Genesis moved on from the older stuff, and for what it's worth, We Can't Dance from '91 is one of my favorites, so I don't think it was a mistake.

So, if I enjoy their newer stuff, why do I care what they did with older material?

Because, in my opinion, Rush handled their legacy much better throughout the years. I finally gave Time Machine - Live in Cleveland 2011 a listen, and was pleasantly surprised by how organic the setlist felt. They didn't play Moving Pictures in its entirety for a bullet point on the tour poster; they did it because they enjoyed performing it, and wanted to present the music. The same goes for their other tours. Even though they still used medleys and truncated versions of longer pieces, I never felt like they were playing Tetris with their setlist to please as many fans as possible.

Rush have a rare combination; They always challenged themselves with their newer music. Yet, I never got the vibe that they were trying to escape their past. They seemed proud of it, and I think that's why even the later Rush shows are so special.

...either that, or I'm overthinking classic rock bands to justify my Rush addiction. You decide!
 
Spetts wrote: "Even though they still used medleys and truncated versions of longer pieces, I never felt like they were playing Tetris with their setlist to please as many fans as possible.

Rush have a rare combination; They always challenged themselves with their newer music. Yet, I never got the vibe that they were trying to escape their past. They seemed proud of it, and I think that's why even the later Rush shows are so special."

I think there were some examples of of playing Tetris with the setlist in the earlier days to please the fans. My guess is that they didn't like the song Fly By Night so much, but kept it in the setlist through AFTK tour in truncated form as a nod to its status as a radio staple. Other truncated songs were done because Rush loved them and wanted to enjoy them, but they cut them down in order to be able to squeeze them into their 2 hours set time cap. Examples are the medley of 1980, the return of Beneath, Between, and Behind, and hanging on to bits of Hemispheres in 1981. I similarly think that by the 1980s they had moved on from their 70s catalog, aggressively. For example, 2112 was jettisoned as a serious presentation after Moving Pictures tour. Rush maintained Overture and/or Temples in their set to please the fans for the rest of the 80s. In the Mood was retained I think as some kind of a tradition/inside joke among the band and fans. The tell to me that they were done with the 70s stuff in the 80s, is all the goofing they did with Alex "singing" in Overture (Geddy: "wow, what a singer!"), and the "plumbers who fix your sinks" bit in Temples. Xanadu and La Villa got very short shrift on the Signals tour and then went missing. Even Overture was jettisoned, for the one and only time, on the GUP tour, which seemed to be the very leanest tour in terms of 70s material (Finding My Way notwithstanding). Trees was included on PW tour, I think as a gift to fans. La Villa reemerged bit by bit starting in 1988, I think as a nod to fans but Alex wanting to play the solo! And I think they enjoyed tinkering with the arrangement (cutting out seconds here, a minute there) just for a fun challenge.

But maybe that's just me being disappointed in the 80s. That's when I became a concert-going Rush fan. I got into the band around 1982, but did so via their first 3 albums. I was all about the full By-Tor, the Necromancer, Here Again, the intro to Before and After, The Fountain of Lamneth, In the End, etc. Power Windows was the first album I was able to buy on the day of release - what a disappointment. I was hopeful that they'd continue the somewhat harder edge of GUP, but instead it was more synth based, accented by those random 80s electronic noises. And then my first tour experience - PW in 1985 - with the Steinberger bass, the rat-tailed Neil, the Grand Designs encore coming out of Overture - was half ways a bummer (although it was thrilling to see those guys moving!). In any case - I grew to appreciate PW and all the albums, and very much enjoyed the latter era Rush performances of those songs.

In my narrative, Rush began to revisit their back catalog with more reverence and personal affection starting in 1990. They brought back a truncated Xanadu, and the Spirit/2112/La Villa/In the Mood encore was a serious presentation. I recall the isolated spotlights in Overture really set the mood for that one. The medley in 1992, like the medley in 1980 and 1990, was a labor of love, clearly. They didn't bring back Anthem for the fans only. They brought back Alex's double neck in 1994 for another truncated Xanadu a spirited run at Hemispheres Prelude, the latter was also for them as much as for the fans.

And then 1996 I think there was a complete embrace of their past and present. For the fans, and for the band. No opening act. A 3 hour presentation. The full 2112, bringing back Natural Science, etc. The Different Stages package mirrored that ethic with the inclusion of the 1978 recording and the album insert featuring memorabilia from past to present. Beginning on that tour, they went back to full songs for the most part, or full sections of long songs.

Anyway, what a privilege to have been able to see so many shows on so many tours!
 
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rocky chains said:
My guess is that they didn't like the song Fly By Night so much
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Oh jeez, you're 100% right. Everything I know is a lie??

Your observations 80s tours are completely true as well, don't know why that decade keeps slipping my mind.
A Show of Hands indicates how the band felt at the time pretty blatantly. The only pre-Signals songs on that CD are Witch Hunt and Closer to the Heart, and their full Hold Your Fire tour setlist wasn't much broader.

Admittedly, my perception on the band is very skewed. After all, I didn't start listening to them until after it was all over. I only know them from old recordings, and I've mostly been listening to their later stuff recently. I think most Rush fans would agree that the band ended strong, but it's easy to overlook the countless years of performing that got them to that point. They certainly had their growing pains, and I suppose their enthusiasm for the back catalogue took a while to come to fruition.

Moral of today's story? It's always good to get another perspective!
 
mjkinsey2112 said:
BU2B2 (Clockwork Angels) was played live here is my video from the PNC Bank Arts Center.
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This is BU2B, not BU2B(2). BU2B(2) was a very short interlude on Clockwork Angels that never got brought out live whereas BU2B was played during all dates on the Time Machine Tour.
 
I'm realizing that my comments toward Genesis apply to several bands of that decade. It seems that many bands from the 70s downplayed their back catalogues in the 80s. Even then, I can already think of a couple exceptions, like Emerson, Lake & Powell or Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe (oh, what wonderful band names!)
I don't know why I felt the need to single out Genesis or put Rush on a pedestal like that, other than fanboyism. Please forgive my bad take, and the subsequent dumb argument.
 
NewWorldMan said:
I did find a Chain Lightning from the L.A. Forum 1990 Presto Tour
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That's 100% fake. Someone just added crowd noise to the studio version and called it "live".
There are also complete audience recordings of both nights at the LA/Inglewood Forum which are uploaded here. They have the regular setlist.
 
I stand corrected. What's funny is they show a bootleg CD of the L.A. Forum show in the video and the track listing excludes Chain Lightning from the set list.
 
I am a little disappointed that we aren't able to remove any songs from this list with the current '50 Something Tour'. Although I obviously appreciate the more Rare Tracks we got like; AFWtK, Anthem, the Full 2112, A passage to bangkok, etc. I just thought for sure that they would try to cross one of that list. A man can dream I guess...


Edit: Time Stand Still with Amiee Mann could be considered a first for sure. I hope they use one of those performances on the Live Bluray..
 
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I was really hoping for "Freeze" and the complete "Fear" Series on this tour, or at very least, another never-played song from their 90s/00s albums (since there are so many to choose from).
 
From what I have been made to understand, they've previously rehearsed, and others they're currently rehearsing, several other songs that haven't been played on the 2026 tour yet, but the couple I know by name are songs that have been played in the past (albeit one hasn't been done in a VERY long time)
The source of this seems pretty reliable, but I am still leaving room for reasonable doubt until something can 100% solidify the rumors.
 
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