A New Era Begins: Anika Nilles Officially Named Rush’s Drummer

When Geddy Lee praised “great drummers” in a 2023 Guardian interview, fans may have expected shoutouts to household names. Sure enough, the Rush frontman mentioned Tool’s Danny Carey and Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Chad Smith. But then came a surprise:

“I heard this drummer the other day, I think her name is Anika [Nilles]. She played on the last Jeff Beck tour, and I thought she was terrific.”

It turns out Lee’s offhand remark would foreshadow something much bigger. Not only did Anika Nilles impress one of prog rock’s most respected bassists—she would ultimately become the drummer responsible for bringing Rush back on the road for the first time since the death of Neil Peart in 2020.

From Final Show to Silence

Rush’s last concert took place on August 1, 2015, in Los Angeles, closing out their career-spanning R40 Tour. Shortly afterward, Peart retired from performing, citing chronic physical pain and his own demanding standards.

“He was struggling throughout that tour to play at his peak, because of physical ailments and other things that were going on with him,” Lee told Eddie Trunk in 2018. “He’s a perfectionist, and he didn’t want to go out and do anything less than what people expected of him. That’s what drove him his whole career… and I totally respect that.”

Peart’s private battle with brain cancer ended with his passing in January 2020. In the months that followed, the idea of continuing Rush seemed unthinkable. Lifeson admitted he couldn’t even pick up his instrument with purpose.

“Every time I pick up a guitar, I just aimlessly kind of mess around with it and put it down after 10 minutes,” he told WFAN. “Normally, I would play for a couple of hours without even realizing it.”

Despite a flood of inquiries from hopeful drummers—many of them sent just weeks after Peart’s passing—Lee and Lifeson were not ready. “Dude, wait two months. At least two months, if ever,” Lee said of the unsolicited messages.

A Quiet Introduction

So how did Rush move from mourning to momentum? According to Lee, it began with a tip from within their own camp.

“My bass tech, Skully, was working with Jeff Beck on tour,” Lee recalled at an October 2025 press event at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. “Sadly, before Jeff passed away, he was touring with this drummer named Anika Nilles—an incredible drummer. Skully would come home raving about her. What a brilliant player she was, and a great person.”

Curious, Lee checked her out online. “She’s all over YouTube. She’s fairly well known in her own world of music,” he said. As the idea of playing again started to feel possible, Nilles seemed like a compelling choice. “I said, ‘Check her out. Maybe that’s an interesting way to go.’ One thing led to another… and we decided to see if it would work.”

Born on May 29, 1983, in Aschaffenburg, Germany, Nilles comes from a family of drummers and began playing at the age of six. In 2010, she made a bold decision to leave a secure career in social education to chase her dream of becoming a professional musician.

“It was really risky,” she told Modern Drummer in 2017. “I always knew that I wasn’t happy at that job, but when you get money and you are safe, it’s not easy to quit.”

Her breakthrough came with a viral drum video for her original track “Wild Boy,” followed by an even more widely shared performance of “Alter Ego.” In 2017, she released her debut solo album Pikalar, earned multiple awards from international drum magazines, and eventually joined Jeff Beck on his 2022 European tour.

“For me, music is all about emotion,” Nilles told 15 Questions. “On drums, that emotion comes through in dynamics—playing with sound and silence just as much as with notes. And of course, it’s also about the player’s touch.”

Filling a Legend’s Shoes

Replacing Neil Peart is, by any measure, one of the most daunting assignments in rock. And both Lee and Lifeson knew it.

“No matter who the drummer is, they all have their own perception of what it’s like to play a Rush song,” Lee said. “And they may not line up with the way we play Rush.”

So the band decided to keep things quiet. They invited Nilles to Canada—not for a formal audition, but as an exploratory session. “At that point, we weren’t really sure we were going to tour. It was all an experiment.”

That experiment paid off.

“I’m very happy to say that she is fantastic to play with,” Lee confirmed. “We’ve had a number of sessions with her now, and we’re going on the road with her.”

Lee, now 72, appreciated the generational and musical distance Nilles brought. “She came to Rush music without any preconceptions. That made things interesting, but also challenging. We had to explain nuances, work on subtleties. She had to get into Neil’s headspace.”

“You can play a drum fill—lots of drummers can play Neil’s fills—but to combine that with the feel of those songs so it sounds like Rush… that’s work,” he added. “And she’s winning.”

Rush’s 2026 tour will not only mark a return to the stage, but a celebration of their 50-plus-year legacy—with a new spark behind the kit and a renewed sense of purpose.