In a new interview with Pete Pardo of Sea Of Tranquility, RUSH guitarist Alex Lifeson revealed that he recently met up with a couple of the members of METALLICA. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): ”The guys from METALLICA were in [Toronto] last week. And I got together with Kirk [Hammett, METALLICA guitarist] and Rob [Robert Trujillo, METALLICA bassist]. We went out for dinner and then we got together and jammed afterwards — actually, right here [at my house]. They came over after dinner and we played for a few hours, and it was great.
“Often in the past, if you jam with a a bunch of people, we’d play a 12-bar bluesy thing; everybody can play that: ‘Let’s do that.’ But when you play with great musicians like those guys are, places you go is, it’s just unbelievable,” Alex explained. “It’s so remarkable. And God, I loved every second that we did that. The three of us just were oozing with enthusiasm, that whole thing. And that’s pretty cool.”
Less than two years ago, Trujillo spoke to Meltdown of Detroit’s WRIF radio station about his participation in Geddy Lee‘s four-part TV documentary series “Geddy Lee Asks: Are Bass Players Human Too?” The Paramount+ series featured the RUSH legend digging into the lives of Trujillo, former NIRVANA bassist Krist Novoselic, PRIMUS bassist/vocalist Les Claypool, and former HOLE/SMASHING PUMPKINS bassist Melissa Auf Der Maur. Robert said that it was surreal for him to be spending time with his musical idol whose playing had influenced him from his teenage years. “I played in backyard party bands at age 16 and we played [RUSH‘s] ‘La Villa Strangiato’, we played ‘YYZ’, we played all those classic songs,” Robert said. “The harder, the better back then. And we probably butchered them, but we would play these backyard parties and play RUSH songs in the same way that we also played Ozzy [Osbourne] songs and we played BLACK SABBATH songs and VAN HALEN and all these different bands. So you can imagine hanging out with one of your heroes and just trying to stay grounded. At the end of the day, everybody’s a human being and you always wanna treat people with respect and, again, stay grounded. But at the same time, you’re going, ‘Damn, that’s Geddy Lee.'”
Trujillo and Hammett played a rendition of RUSH‘s “La Villa Strangiato” during METALLICA‘s April 26 concert at Rogers Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Lifeson made his mark on the music industry over 50 years ago, redefining the boundaries of progressive rock guitar. His signature riffing, copious use of effects processing and unorthodox chord structures befitted him the title by his RUSH bandmates as “The Musical Scientist.” While the bulk of Lifeson‘s work in music has been with RUSH, he has contributed to a body of work outside of the band as a guitarist, producer and with the release of his 1996 solo album “Victor”. Lifeson ranks third overall in the Guitar World readers’ poll of “100 Greatest Guitarists” and is also included in Rolling Stone‘s “100 Greatest Guitarists Of All Time.”
ENVY OF NONE, the band featuring Lifeson, Andy Curran (CONEY HATCH),Alfio Annibalini and singer Maiah Wynne, released its second album, “Stygian Wavz”, on March 14 via Kscope.
Source: blabbermouth.net
