Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee Are Playing Rush Songs Again — For Their Ears Only
In our new interview, Lifeson catches us up on his busy post-Rush life, and explains in detail why he really, really doesn’t want to tour again
AS FAR AS Alex Lifeson is concerned, the band to which he devoted five decades of his life is over, but that doesn’t mean he’s done as a musician. The former Rush guitarist is hard at work on new music in his well-stocked home studio, recording guitar parts for the second album by Envy of None, the band he co-founded in 2021 with bassist Andy Curran (formerly of the Canadian rock band Coney Hatch), keyboardist/guitarist Alfio Annibalini, and the talented 27-year-old vocalist Maiah Wynne. He’s also started his own custom equipment company, Lerxst, which sells guitars, amps, and pedals capable of reproducing his classic sounds. At the same time, he reveals to Rolling Stone that he’s been jamming with his best friend and bandmate, Geddy Lee — but that definitely doesn’t mean they’re planning a tour, despite Lee’s best efforts to the contrary. Geddy mentioned you had some health issues recently. How are you doing?
Across his time in Rush, Alex Lifeson’s guitar sounds were as meticulous and purposeful as the music itself. Throughout the band’s varied discography, his virtuosic playing is presented through clear, bright and obviously considered tones – his care for the sound clearly exemplified by his constant experimentation with different effects, amps and guitars.
And so even though it’s a range of gear bearing his name (well, his nickname at least), calling any given Lerxst product an “Alex Lifeson signature” feels a bit redundant – the brand’s amplifiers, cabinets, pedals and loaded pickguards are something else entirely. Lerxst is instead a new brand in its own right – but one that’s totally dedicated to that library of sounds the Rush guitarist spent the better part of 50 years establishing.
READ MORE: Lerxst By-Tor review – far more than an Alex Lifeson signature overdrive pedal
While it was late last year that it began to ramp up the new products, the Lerxst brand first started over a decade ago, back when Rush were touring the Clockwork Angels album. The band was already collaborating with amp and pickup maker Mojotone for some staging aspects of the tour, and so when Lifeson had the idea of building his own amplifier, the solution was obvious – Mojotone, as well as being a brand in its own right, is also an OEM. Collaboration is its bread and butter.
And so in 2012, the Lerxst Omega was born. The limited-edition run of 50-watt amplifier heads was based on the Marshall Silver Jubilee Alex used for the Clockwork Angels album and tour. However, the tweaks that were made to the circuit represented the tonal preferences he had developed over his career playing with Rush.
“I used a lot of amps over that 50 year period. I knew what I liked and I knew what I didn’t,” Alex tells us. “My sound developed a lot, and certainly in the last 10 or 15 years, it settled into what it was at the end of Rush’s touring career.” The Omega amplifier evidently succeeded in capturing what Lifeson did like – even with the refresh of the brand last year, its circuitry has remained unchanged since that first limited run in 2012.
When it came to actually capturing the things Alex liked, Mojotone CEO Michael McWhorter tells us that a healthy appreciation of Rush across the business helped get things going on the right tracks: “I’m a huge Rush fan, and have been forever. And all of our designers here are too. So having that knowledge of the discography, of how Alex’s tone has changed over the years, and of the different equipment that he’s used – that foundation gave us an idea of where to start from.”
Michael also paints a picture of the actual amp design process as pretty seamless and enjoyable. “Sending an amp to Alex, and getting his feedback after he played it for a few weeks, seeing if he wanted it to change more or if he was happy – that was really an exciting time, a really fun process,”
Alex echoes this sentiment. “Mojotone has always been amazing to work with. We have a very good, friendly relationship. It’s not just a business thing – we’ve done some work together, person to person, the staff came up for shows and so on.”
“I remember that they were always very open to anything that I wanted changed, or anything that I was looking for. They were really encouraging me, saying ‘tell us what you want’ as we went back and forth. So we did do a couple of prototypes that way, but really I was happy right from the start – it was just minor tweaking that it needed.”
Late last year Lerxst launched its first foray into effects, with two pedals named after the pair of canine antagonists in the Fly By Night song By-Tor And The Snow Dog – the former, a drive, the latter, a fuzz. “I’ve been into effects since I first started playing guitar with my first Fuzz Face that I plugged into my parents’ TV,” Alex says. “And over the years I progressed from stomp boxes to high-end rack-mounted units. But I’ve always been interested in that sound-shaping aspect of guitar.”
“I love the idea of creating different sounds that don’t really sound like a guitar at all. That’s one of the things I love about the Envy Of None project – 70 or 80 per cent of the guitars on those records don’t sound anything like a guitar. That’s really a lot of fun for me. And of course, you need to be able to manipulate those typical, straight-ahead guitar sounds with all these great effects.”
