Texas Jam 1984 and Rush

[TheGhostRider]

Long before  ACL and South by Southwest, there was the Texas World Music Festival.(More commonly known as Texas Jam). From 1978 to 1988 the Cotton Bowl and the Astrodome hosted these  massive concerts for fans. In 1984, Rush performed as the headliners of that years  shows in Dallas and Houston. They had previously played the Texas Jam in 1979. Other performers included Ozzy Osbourne, .38 Special, Bryan Adams, and Gary Moore. The Cotton Bowl show  also holds the distinction as one of the band’s largest crowds ever, with 70,000 people in attendance. Sadly, not much remains of these legendary shows. A poor quality audience recording of the Dallas show, some posters  and some photos of the Houston And Dallas shows is all that still exists today. 
 

 

Photos: https://www.rockinhouston.com/performers/texas-world-music-festival-texas-jam-dallas/346?page=2&groupBy=Years

 

 

Audience recording:  

 

Edited January 12, 2023 by TheGhostRider
Added context

[thizzellewashington]

Rush never really did too many festivals like that after the early days once they became a headlining act, so this is interesting.

[Lurkst]

I remember seeing a quote from Neil before one of these shows...

"Look at the size of the crowd out there. We're a hockey team, not a football team."

 

[ytserush]

Didn't know one of these was recorded.

 

They resisted doing festivals for a long time, but obviously relented on occasion. Without consulting Wandering The Face Of The Earth I'd say a few in '79 in Europe and those two from '84 are they only times before Sarstock in 2003 that they did festivals. After that it still wasn't a habit, but a little more common.

[Lurkst]

Almost every year during the 80s in the UK music press Rush were rumoured to be headlining Monsters of Rock at Donington. But they were never into the idea at all, and probably just as well. I don't know how the Power Windows setlist for example would have gone down with an audience of 50,000 metalheads.

 

 

Edited January 17, 2023 by Lurkst

[chemistry1973]

6 hours ago, Lurkst said:

Almost every year during the 80s in the UK music press Rush were rumoured to be headlining Monsters of Rock at Donington. But they were never into the idea at all, and probably just as well. I don't know how the Power Windows setlist for example would have gone down with an audience of 50,000 metalheads.

 

 

I recall this being a very confused time for Rush’s marketing. I recall them being advertised as a “metal band” a few times during the 80s.

 

The magazine ad for ASOH comes to mind.

[ytserush]

On 1/17/2023 at 8:38 AM, chemistry1973 said:

I recall this being a very confused time for Rush’s marketing. I recall them being advertised as a “metal band” a few times during the 80s.

 

The magazine ad for ASOH comes to mind.

 

On 1/17/2023 at 8:38 AM, chemistry1973 said:

I recall this being a very confused time for Rush’s marketing. I recall them being advertised as a “metal band” a few times during the 80s.

 

The magazine ad for ASOH comes to mind.

I don't know if the band had anything to do with it. Could have been the perception that others (mostly in the UK seemed to have at the time.)

I'm still dumbfounded that Marillion was in the metal section a lot of the time in the US. I always thought Kerrang! had a lot of undo influence with the product placement in those years.  Readers would thing that if it's on the cover of Kerrang! it must be metal.So that's where you would find it in the record stores.