R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour DVD News Archive

"I said I played this song so many times before, that the melody keeps repeating"

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Filmed using 14 hi-definition cameras in 16x9 widescreen format on September 24, 2004, at the Festhalle in Frankfurt, Germany, R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour was released November 22nd, 2005 (Nov. 28th in the UK). A 2 DVD set, the first disk contains the Frankfurt concert, while the second contains interviews plus rare and classic footage from the late seventies to the Tsunami relief benefit concert in 2005 (two Easter Eggs are also included). The Deluxe Edition also includes two limited edition RUSH guitar picks and a souvenir backstage pass, as well as a two audio CD version of the show; CD's will not be sold separately but will be available via Anthem/Atlantic Records on all digital download services. This is not the complete show as eight tracks have been cut from the show: Bravado, YYZ, The Trees, One Little Victory, Secret Touch, Red Sector A, La Villa Strangiato and By-Tor and the Snow Dog (click here for the complete tracklist).

Where the previous concert film (Rush In Rio) spent a lot of camera time focusing on the crowd, R30 is all about the band and the performance. And what a performance it is! Everything you expect from a Rush concert is caputred here in high definition: the light show, the smoke, the lasers, the humorous in-concert animations...and of course, the musicianship. Visually, the show has a very clean look to it, with all three members dressed in black, and Peart's drum set is stunning throughout with its black speckle finish and gold plated hardware.

The concert opens with the complete Monty Python-esque animation sequence which concludes with Jerry Stiller's humours introduction of the band. Later, the DVD contains the complete "Darn That Dragon" film which is a nice change in pace as it allows you to catch your breath before the second half of the show. The editing and camera angles capture the performance like no previous Rush concert video: camera angles alternate from audience view eye-level which gives a great view of the overall show, to on stage views focusing on the playing and the interactions between the performers, to unique shots from directly above the performers which give a unique perspective on just how Geddy and Alex (via foot pedals) and Neil trigger their arsenal of sounds and effects.

As a treat for the fans, the second disk is loaded with goodies and will have die hard fans wanting more. Included are a selection of live videos from the vault dating back 30 years, a few sound check snippets, and the recent Canada for Asia performance of "Closer To The Heart" which includes Rush performing in studio with "Bubbles" from the Trailer Park Boys and Ed Robertson of the Barenaked Ladies. The real bonus, however, are the interviews. After watching these interviews, not only do we get a taste of the band members' personalities and what makes them tick, but we also get a glimpse into how steadfast Rush has been through the years in maintaining their convictions and beliefs which allowed them to stay together and productive for so long!

R30 DVD sold 28,000 units (rounded to the nearest thousand) during its first week on sale (for the week ending November 29, 2005) as reported by Nielsen SoundScan. R30 ranked second on Billboard's Top Music Video chart after its first week, and fourth after two weeks. After dropping out of the top ten the third week, by the fourth week it was back in the top 10 at #10 and was certified 3 times platinum by the RIAA (i.e. 150,000, 2-DVD sets shipped, which does not include internet sales). After seven weeks R30 was still on Billboard's Top Music Video chart and had moved up to #7. After 17 weeks, the album was at #24 on the U.S. Billboard Music Video Charts.

R30 won two awards for authoring design and video presentation in the Independent Release catagory, at "The 9th Annual DVD Awards" held in Los Angeles on August 8th, 2006.

In Their Own Words...

"'I approached the band's management SRO about filming Rush on their anniversary tour and they turned me down being so close to their Rush In Rio project. As the tour went on they decided it would be a great idea but it was too late to film Radio City Music Hall and Red Rocks although we talked about it, we just couldn't get crews into the cities at the right time.'" - Pierre Lamoureux, Producer and Director of R30, allheadlinenews, Oct. 12, 2005

"We have a tendency of screwing these decisions up pretty well. At the beginning of the tour, I said, 'Hey, are we gonna film any of these shows? And if we are, let's plan it now, well in advance.' And everybody said, 'Well, we just put out "Rio." Why do we want to do two DVDs back to back? Let's just go out there and have fun.' Then, of course, we were halfway through the tour and were playing really well and the crowds were great and everyone says, 'Hey, let's record this for posterity in case we get hit by a bus or something.' So, we about-face and throw the plans together to film the show in Frankfurt since we were just about done with the American tour." - Geddy Lee, Mtv.com, Dec. 28, 2005

"One of the German shows, we're going to be filming. And its not that we have a specific DVD release in mind for it, but just kind of as a historical record of 'this' tour." Geddy Lee, Phill Jupitus Breakfast Show, BBC Music 6, Sep. 8, 2004

"A crew of 14 cameras is shooting footage for what will ultimately become Rush’s second DVD music video. The fact that the cameras are HD, shooting in 1080p, indicates the band and its management plan a long and profitable revenue life for this project, well into the arrival of the next generation of high-density disc formats (HD-DVD and Blu-ray Disc) and the proliferating number of high-def broadcast outlets in the U.S. and elsewhere...The video shoot was financed by the band and its Canadian management company, Anthem Entertainment, and will cost several hundreds of thousands of dollars by the time post-production and 5.1 mixing are finished." - Rushing Into Something New, FOH Meets DVD on the Rush European Tour, FOHonline, Jan. 2005

"Well, basically nobody was in a big hurry to do another live project, because we've got about 60,000 of them out there, but when we were touring Europe on the last tour, we hadn't been to those countries in 10 years - some of them 20 years. And there was such an exuberant response from the crowd; it just seemed like a unique opportunity to capture the band in that kind of environment. The venue is very old. We've played there a couple of times. It's always a strange atmosphere for North Americans to come over there and play in one of these buildings that Hitler used to do speeches in and so forth. So it's always got kind of an ominous vibe for us. But the crowd is always great and a lot of fans hadn't seen us in a long time." - Geddy Lee, Billboard.com, Oct. 12, 2005

"Sometimes that kind of pressure inspired us to rise to an exalted level, as had happened the previous tour in Rio de Janeiro, and for other performances we had recorded and filmed over the years. However, other times that kind of pressure had the opposite effect, making us tense and...lousy. Frankfurt, sadly, was the second kind. I had a cold coming on, and felt fuzzy headed, and all of us were edgy, overconcentrating and overanalyzing. It seemed like we had to fight our way through the show. I made a nasty mistake right in the first song, the 'R30 Overture,' and never really recovered. Something bad happened in 'Earthshine,' and again in 'One Little Victory,' and at the time I though they had all been my fault. (The next night, after I had tormented myself all day about it, gone over theose parts in my head all day, and even rehearsed that part of 'Earthsine' in the Bubba-Gump room before the show, Alex old me it had been Geddy in 'Earthshine,' and Geddy told me it was Alex in 'One Little Victory.')" - Neil Peart, Roadshow

"Rio was all about being in that 12th row center seat and feeling the energy of the crowd, whereas R30 is more about the performers and the production. It's a tighter sound - a tighter mix with less ambience and less crowd...this is probably the best-sounding live performance of us I've ever heard." - Alex Lifeson, Sound & Vision Online, Feb. 2006 issue

"My brother, who does a lot of work with us in terms of...He's kind of an intermediary between us and our video projects and there was a time where he just spent some time in the vault just kind of looking at what we had, cataloging what we had. And he found all this old footage that we had kind of forgotten about, and brought it to our attention. Once we knew about it, we said, 'Well, we'll look for the right opportunity to use all those pieces.' And then when we decided to do the R-30 tour and then subsequently made the late decision to film one of the shows on R30, it seemed the perfect opportunity to add another disc with all these pieces." - Geddy Lee, Ultimate-Guitar.com. - Dec. 6, 2005

"Here's an interesting piece of trivia, the guy that filmed the 'Xanadu' and 'Farewell To Kings' stuff that's on there went on to be the director of American Idol,' laughs Geddy". - More Sugar, May 2006

"Some of the songs were dropped from R30 due to technical reasons but also we didn't want to have too many similarities with Rush In Rio. Why not? Well, I think now that it was a dumb decision of ours. In fact I regret not having put the whole show on those disks. But I promise you, all those songs that were cut will eventually see the light of day, in some shape or form." - Geddy Lee, Aardschok Magazine, March 2006

"Sure, the footage from Exit Stage Left is classic, and you can’t beat the wild Brazilian crowd in the Rush in Rio DVD, but if you can only get one Rush DVD it has to be R30. The setlist, sound quality, and camera angles just can’t be beat. The R30 Overture that opens the show has all-instrumental snippets of “Finding My Way,” “Anthem,” “Bastille Day,” “A Passage to Bangkok,” “Cygnus X-1,” and “Hemispheres,” plus a hilarious cameo from Jerry Stiller. The lack of vocals on this medley allows Alex Lifeson’s PRS-fueled guitar tones to really stand out. He and the boys run through a whole bunch of Rush favorites including “Xanadu,” “Subdivisions,” “Red Barchetta,” and “Tom Sawyer” (with a killer Lifeson solo). The show kicks ass from start to finish and Lifeson is in fine form the entire time with his trademark arpeggios, fiery solos, and a humongous tone that fills the arena. If the gig was all you got this would still be a must have. When you factor in all the DVD extras like a bunch of live-in-the-studio performances from back in the day and soundcheck footage, this is an amazing piece of work and a great example of Lifeson working his magic." - "50 Essential Guitar DVDs", Guitar Player, Feb. 2008

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