Neil Peart, legendary drummer for the band Rush, has died at 67,
Member of legendary band known for playing elaborate drum kit
Neil Peart, drummer and lyricist for groundbreaking Canadian prog-rock band Rush, died Tuesday at age 67, according to a statement issued by a family spokesperson.
The statement said Peart died in Santa Monica, Calif., from brain cancer, “from which he suffered” for three and a half years.
Born in Hamilton — he grew up in St. Catharines — Peart joined Rush in 1974, after the band’s first album, replacing original drummer John Rutsey.
Over a career that spanned four decades, Rush thrilled millions of rock fans and enjoyed success in both the U.S. and Canada. Several of their albums — “2112,” “Moving Pictures,” “All the World’s a Stage” and “Exit … Stage Left” — have sold more than one million copies each in the U.S. alone.
Peart was known for his proficiency at playing an almost impossibly elaborate drum kit, which in addition to the traditional kick, snare, and tom drums could at any given time include bells, chimes, symbols, gongs and electronic elements.
“Neil Peart was, in fact, one of the greatest drummers the universe has ever seen. He ranks up there with all the best,” said Alan Cross, a broadcaster and music historian. “We have lost one of the most important musicians this country has ever produced.”
Cross said Peart used his diverse collection of percussion instruments in innovative ways that went far beyond merely keeping a beat.
There could be a “very melodic sense of what he was doing, every bit as much as a guitar player,” Cross said. “Nobody sounded like him.”
Knowing that a local band could make it big on the world stage was a major source of inspiration for musicians in the city, said Dave Bidini, a member of the Toronto band the Rheostatics, who grew up listening to Rush in the 1980s.
Bidini, who wrote the 2016 documentary about Rush called “Time Stands Still,” said a turning point for the band came in 1976, when they played Massey Hall for three straight nights.
“That was a big deal in Toronto musical culture, having a band from Toronto achieve that measure of success. There weren’t a lot really before them,” Bidini said.
Although a member of one of the most famous bands Canada ever produced, Peart famously eschewed the spotlight. He was reluctant to indulge in the typical trappings of rock stardom and often avoided meet-andgreets with fans and interviews with the media.
“Even as a kid, I never wanted to be famous; I wanted to be good,” he told the Star in 2015, a few months before Rush embarked on its 40th-anniversary tour, which would be the band’s last.
But while Peart could appear closed-off to the public, Bidini said that when among friends he was generous and openhearted.
“He was always hilarious, and always telling a story,” Bidini recalled.
An avid motorcyclist, while on the road with Rush, Peart would ride to shows on his BMW motorcycle rather than travel with the rest of the band and its entourage.
His travels fuelled one of his passions outside of music — writing. He wrote seven nonfiction books, including travel memoirs, and co-authored a science-fiction novelization of Rush’s 2012 album, “Clockwork Angels.”
In his 2002 book, “Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road,” Peart recounted the motorcycle trip he took across North America to cope with the grief of losing both his daughter and wife in the span of 10 months.
His daughter, Selena Taylor, was killed in a single-car crash on Highway 401 outside of Brighton, Ont., in August 1997. Soon after, his common-law wife, Jackie, was diagnosed with cancer and died.
What followed was a dark period for Peart during which Rush effectively went on hiatus. It would be five years before the band would play together live again.
“He ran for those years,” Rush singer Geddy Lee told the Star in 2013.
By the time they stopped touring, Rush was a staple on classic rock radio. But Peart was proud the band never stopped evolving.
“Not all of our albums or song experiments are successful in the artistic sense. But each was important and took us somewhere else,” he said in 2013. “We’ve been lucky enough to always do what we want to do and have an audience for it.”
In 1997, Peart, with band mates Lee and Alex Lifeson, became the first rock musicians to be inducted into the Order of Canada. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013.
Peart is survived by wife Carrie and daughter Olivia Louise Peart.