Rush frontman Geddy Lee has opened up about a strange encounter that made him feel late drummer Neil Peart’s presence during the band’s Fifty Something tour with new drummer Anika Nilles.
Lee was asked directly whether he had ever sensed Peart’s presence since the drummer’s death in 2020. The question prompted him to recount an unusual moment involving a bird that appeared shortly after the tour’s opening night.
When asked, “Did you ever feel Neil Peart’s presence since his death in 2020?” Lee responded:
“Spooky question! Well, it’s funny. I’ll tell you a little story. After the opening night, we were staying in L.A., and I was texting Al [Alex Lifeson]. We were in the same hotel, but we were texting each other.”
Lee then described noticing something unusual near his hotel room door.
“My door to my room was open a crack, and I don’t know if you’ve seen the posters [for Rush’s Fifty Something tour] that have two birds on a wire and the one bird is flying away,” he continued. “I looked in front of me, on the floor, and there was a bird on the floor that looked just like that bird in the poster.”
He went on to explain how the encounter unfolded.
“I was kind of shocked. And, you know, I love birds, so I approached it, and it flew by me and flew into my bedroom and sat on the edge of my bed,” Lee said. “And when I approached it, it was like it was looking at me, and then it flew out the door. So, I quickly ran to the computer and was texting Al this crazy story that had just happened.”
Lee’s remarks add a personal moment to Rush’s ongoing reunion tour, which features Nilles stepping in on drums following Peart’s passing.
The eerie encounter Lee describes carries extra weight given the significance of the tour itself. The Fifty Something tour kicked off on June 7, 2026, at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, California. A second opening-night performance followed two days later at the same venue on June 9.
The run represents Rush’s first live outing in 52 years without Peart behind the kit. It marks a poignant new chapter for the band.
The tour began as a modest run of shows across seven cities in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. It has since grown considerably, with the run now extending across North America through December before additional international dates unfold in 2027.
For Lee and Lifeson, the tour also carries deep personal significance beyond the loss of their longtime bandmate. It marks the first time the two founding members have performed Rush’s music together in more than a decade, making the emotional stakes of the opening night, and the strange visitor Lee encountered afterward, all the more resonant.
Against that backdrop, Lee’s story about the bird takes on an added layer of meaning. The imagery he describes, a bird behaving just like the one depicted on the tour’s own promotional posters, seemed to underscore just how present Peart’s spirit felt to him as the band stepped back onto the stage without him for the first time.
