Limelight (Rush song)

"Limelight"
Single by Rush
from the album Moving Pictures
B-side	"YYZ"
Released	February 1981 (1981-02)
Recorded	October – November 1980
Studio	Le Studio, Morin Heights, Quebec
Genre	Arena rock[1]
Length	4:26
Label	Mercury
Songwriter(s)	Geddy Lee Alex Lifeson Neil Peart
Producer(s)	Rush Terry Brown
Rush singles chronology
"Entre Nous" (1980) "Limelight" (1981) "Vital Signs" (1981)
Audio sample
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Music video
"Limelight" on YouTube

"Limelight" is a song by Canadian progressive rock band Rush. It first appeared on the 1981 album Moving Pictures. The song's lyrics were written by Neil Peart with music written by Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson. "Limelight" expresses Peart's discomfort with Rush's success and the resulting attention from the public. The song paraphrases the opening lines of the "All the world's a stage" speech from William Shakespeare's play As You Like It. The band had previously used the phrase for its 1976 live album. The lyrics also refer to "the camera eye", the title of the song that follows on the Moving Pictures album.

Released as the lead single from the album in February 1981, it charted at No. 4 on the U.S. Billboard Top Tracks chart and No. 55 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, and remains one of Rush's most popular songs commercially. "Limelight" was one of five Rush songs inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame on March 28, 2010.^[2] It was listed at No. 435 on Rolling Stone's "Top 500 Greatest Songs of All Time" in 2021.^[1] Lifeson's guitar solo in "Limelight" was also listed as Guitar World's 26th greatest guitar solo of all time.^[3]