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Canada’s prog-rock power trio Rush has a very specific and very devoted fan base: math-nerds who love metal, and stoner geeks obsessed with time signatures and rock complexity. Among these folks, drummer-lyricist Neil Peart is a god, the Mr. Spock of rock’n’roll, an unemotional godhead nestled in the cool core of a planet-sized drum kit, reading Ayn Rand and dreaming up introspective visions of boyish alienation.
So it must have been jarring when great personal tragedy thawed out Peart’s anti-image a few years ago, after the 1997 car-accident death of his daughter and the 1998 passing of his wife of 20 years due to cancer. Since suffering these losses, Pear has been on a pilgrimage to make sense out of his journey from grief to wisdom and acceptance.
Part of his process has involved penning a trilogy of reflective travel memoirs. Traveling Music is the third volume in this achingly cathartic series and it details Pear’s lone trek from Los Angeles to Texas, mixed with vignettes from his childhood and his teen years, and behind-the-scenes glimpses of his life with Rush. As surprising and warm as its precursors…, this memoir is a must have for all die-hard worshippers of one of classic rock’s last living uber-groups.
