BRETT: There is a beautiful tribute to Rush that’s been posted from his cousin. It’s over at RushLimbaugh.com. The American Mind: “Rush Lives On — A Threnody for My Mentor,” by Stephen N. Limbaugh III.” That is up over at RushLimbaugh.com.
Well, remember when Rush celebrated Stephen Limbaugh’s new album debuting at number 16 on the Billboard charts?
RUSH: Oh, hey, folks, one more thing — a little family thing here. Now, you’ve heard me talk about my cousin once removed, my cousin Steve’s son, Stephen Limbaugh III. He’s a musician in Hollywood and we’ve put links to some of his piano performances on our website and steered you to them. And he performed during, I think it was, Golden Globes, Golden Globes a couple Sunday nights ago.
He’s composed, he’s written, and composed and then performed a classical CD or album called ‘Pants,’ P-A-N-T-S. And it’s debuted at 16 on the Billboard classical chart. And he was so excited, he sent me the screen shot of it on the Billboard number 16 there. And everybody’s just so proud and thrilled, and I wanted to mention this because he sends me a note.
He says, “I gotta give you all the credit. Your example, your encouragement has been one of my greatest assets.” I wrote him back and said, “Look, pal, you did this. (laughs) I didn’t even know that you had composed an album, much less recorded it. You did it on your own. You show up at 16 on the Billboard chart to open. You did it!”
He is the second member of our family not to go to college.
Ah, second member. I’m the first.
He’s the second member not to graduate from college. So he and I have a kindred relationship. And just like my parents were worried to death what that might mean for me, I counseled his parents many a night saying, “Don’t sweat it, he is gonna be fine. Just look at me.” That did not comfort them. Well, it did, but it didn’t. But, I mean, this is great. So congratulations to Stephen III. The LP is “Pants,” 16 on the Billboard classical chart.
BRETT: You know, Rush was always such an inspirational person. He would inspire people that he would never meet just by his example, encouraging them to go pursue their passion, their dream to go and take the shot — and many, many of them did it. You just heard that example, that perfect example talking about Stephen Limbaugh III, because here’s somebody who went and pursued his passion, fraught with risk.
But if you’ve got that fire, if you’ve got that drive inside of you, you certainly can’t quench it by doing anything but pursuing it, and that’s so hugely important. And that really was such a tremendously huge underlying theme in the show over all these years, because it’s about chasing that dream. And when people tell you, “You can’t do it,” it should motivate you more to go ahead and do it.