In 1978, Rush conducted an infamous interview with English music paper New Musical Express, printed in the March 4 edition of the weekly mag, during which journalist Barry Miles accused the band of promoting "proto fascism".
The slur came during a somewhat heated discussion over political philosophies and economics, sparked by the fact that Neil Peart, the band's drummer and lyricist, credited "the genius of Ayn Rand" in the sleevenotes to the trio's 1976 album 2112, having taken influence from the novelist's 1937 story Anthem. At one point in the feature, Miles uses the phrase 'Work makes us free' as a comment on Peart's arguments about capitalism, fully aware that this phrase - or more specifically its German language translation Arbeit macht frei - was displayed at the entrance to Auschwitz concentration camp.
"The thing is, these guys are advocating this stuff on stage and on record and no one even questions it," Miles wrote in the article. "No one is on their case. All the classic hallmarks of the right-wing are there: the pseudo-religious language... which extends right down to the touring crew: road masters instead of road managers; the use of a quasi-mystical symbol—the naked man confronting the red star of socialism (at least I suppose that’s what it’s supposed to be). It’s all there.
"They are actually very nice guys. They don’t sit there in jack boots pulling the wings off flies. They are polite, charming even, naïve—roaming the concert circuits preaching what to me seems like proto-fascism like a leper without a bell."
