In the days following the death of Rush drummer Neil Peart, streams of the band's songs surged by 776% in the U.S., according to initial reports to Nielsen Music/MRC Data.
News of Peart's death was first reported on Jan. 10, though the founding member of Rush died on Jan. 7.
Jan. 10-13, on-demand audio and video streams of Rush's catalog of songs increased to a combined 24.54 million - up 776.4% as compared to the previous four days (2.8 million on Jan. 6-9). The act's most-streamed tunes during the Jan. 10-13 period was the 1981 hit "Tom Sawyer," with 2.82 million streams (up 305% as compared to the 698,000 streams it registered Jan. 6-9).
In terms of sales, Rush's catalog of songs grew by 2,304% to 19,000 (from 1,000), while the group's album sales gained 1,820% to 6,000 (up from a negligible figure).
It's expected that Rush's songs and albums will impact next week's Billboard charts (dated Jan. 25), including a likely re-entry on the Billboard 200 chart from the act's best-of collection The Spirit of Radio: Greatest Hits 1974 – 1987.