Geddy Lee Releases Song Demo About Neil Peart’s Family Tragedy

Geddy Lee has released two demos “I Am… You Are” and “Gone,” which was written about the family tragedy of his late Rush bandmate Neil Peart.

The two demos are taken from Lee’s 2000 solo album My Favorite Headache. Lee wrote “Gone” in response to the 1997 car accident that took the life of Peart’s daughter, Selena Taylor, who was 19 years old. In less than a year, her mother passed away which marks the second tragedy in Peart’s life.

In a recent interview with Q104.3, Lee explained:

“When you lose somebody, you relive a lot of your other losses. And I was thinking about, ‘How does one deal with a sudden disappearance of someone from your life, especially a daughter?’ So I wrote this song with Ben [Mink].
“It was the first song we wrote for My Favourite Headache, and we demoed it, but it just felt… it was beautiful, but I felt it was too raw. It was too close to the bone. I didn’t think it was appropriate to release it, out of respect for Neil and the way he was. I didn’t feel it was right. So we shelved it.”

While talking about “I Am… You Are” he shared:

“It’s about me in the midst of a difficult conversation with my wife, which happened more than once in my life. I think the personal nature of that made it also maybe something I wasn’t prepared to follow through with.”

The Lost Demos of Geddy Lee

Last year, Lee rediscovered both songs and felt “amazed.” The tracks feature the original guitars and vocals added with new drums. Co-writer Mink recorded a violin solo, which Lee described as “a corker.” He continued:

“And it really lifted me up and made me remember how much fun it is to make records. … [T]hey will be released to radio, and I hope people get a kick out of them. I call them the lost demos, ‘cause that’s what they were, really. I’d forgotten completely about them.”

Stream the demos below.