Geddy Lee Recalls First Time Rush Heard Led Zeppelin

Geddy Lee shares a bunch of fun stories in his new memoir My Effin' Life. Among them is the time Rush first listened to Led Zeppelin.

In an excerpt published by Rolling Stone, Lee talks about how original Rush drummer John Rutsey was able to see Led Zeppelin perform at a small Toronto club in 1969. He couldn't stop raving about the band to Lee and guitarist Alex Lifeson. Their first attempt to pick up Zeppelin's debut album was a flop, because their local record store had sold out of it. However, when a second order to the store came in, the young Rush got a copy.

Lee wrote, "I can still remember the three of us sitting there on the bed in utter awe, listening to the heaviosity of “Good Times Bad Times,” the fire of “Communication Breakdown” and oh, that drum sound!"

He added, " ... Zeppelin challenged the way we felt about our own sound: if it wasn’t heavy now, it felt just plain wimpy."

In the lead-up to the release of My Effin' Life, Geddy Lee did a number of interviews to promote the book. During two of those interviews, he mentioned maybe working with Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson again.

First, Lee touched on performing with Lifeson again under the Rush name. He shared with The Washington Post how Paul McCartney told the surviving Rush members to hit the road again at an after-party for the Taylor Hawkins Tribute Concert.

Lee said of performing as Rush following the death of drummer Neil Peart, "It had been a taboo subject, and playing those songs again with a third person was the elephant in the room, and that kind of disappeared."

He added, "It was nice to know that if we decide to go out, Alex and I, whether we went out as part of a new thing, or whether we just wanted to go out and play Rush as Rush, we could do that now."

Lee then shared in an interview with Long Island Weekly about possibly making new music with Lifeson. He touched on finding some leftover songs from his 2000 solo album, My Favourite Headache, how much fun he has in the recording studio and that he has some ideas he wants to "flesh out on my own."

"So, of course, my lifelong buddy and bandmate Alex and I would like to get back into the studio together and see what might happen," said Lee. " ... Once I finish all this crazy crap that I agreed to do — the book tour and the TV show and find some space for myself — I'd certainly like to start playing something."

Few bands have enjoyed legendary decades-spanning career like Rush. Fewer still have been able to take their final bow on their own terms. Once Rush reached arena-headlining status, they never had to "downsize," or even go on package tours. They rarely played multi-act festivals and towards the end of their career, even stopped using opening acts on their tours, so that they could play longer shows. They also were always able to play a lot of new music at their shows, and fans responded. They've had classic songs on every album, starting with their self-titled debut in 1974, up through their final album, 2012's Clockwork Angels. Of course, that made it difficult to narrow down this list to just 50 songs -- and of course so many of you will disagree with the songs we included, the songs we didn't include, and the order. That's part of the fun of lists, though.