Better All the Time: Canadian Prog-Rockers 'Rush'

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IT'S AN ACCOMPLISHMENT for a band to last 30 years in the music industry, but not an unheard-of one. It's just about impossible, though, to find a group of rockers hitting a new peak at the three-decade-plus mark.

That, arguably, is what Rush has done. Canada's most famous progressive-rock trio will play before an undoubtedly large and long-haired crowd this Saturday night at the Nissan Pavilion as part of its "Snakes and Arrows" tour.

Fans might recall that the band played in front of a packed crowd at the same venue last summer as part of the same tour. This time around, however, the band's latest release is not the studio album by that name as it was last summer, but "Snakes and Arrows Live," the band's fourth live album to be released since 2003.

It's easy for skeptics to write the latest live album and tour leg as cheap ways for the band to drain its dedicated fan base of a few more of its hard-earned dollars. But see the show and give the album a listen — the band has somehow become a tighter, more energetic, and all-around more enjoyable live act than ever before.

Rush fiends can expect revved-up renditions of concert staples such as "Tom Sawyer," "Limelight" and the Morse-code-driven instrumental "YYZ" on Saturday night, but they should also be prepared to hear frantic, hard-hitting (musically and lyrically) new-millennium Rush songs, like "One Little Victory," "Far Cry" and "Armor and Sword" which, amazingly, somehow don't seem dwarfed by the aforementioned prog-rock classics. How many bands can pull that off?

» Nissan Pavilion, 7800 Cellar Door Drive, Bristow, Va.; Sat., 7:30 p.m., $35-$125; 800-551-7832.

Written by Express contributor Greg Re
Photo by Andrew MacNaughtan