Rush [ tickets ] vocalist and bassist Geddy Lee [ tickets ] resurfaced recently, revealing in a January interview with Jam! Showbiz reporter Paul Cantin that he has been working informally with other musicians on songs that could eventually appear on a solo album.

Lee said that he has been writing new material with longtime friend Ben Mink [ tickets ], a fiddle, guitar and mandolin player who is best known for his work as a co-songwriter with fellow Canadian K.D. Lang. Rush fans might also recognize Mink's name from the prog rock band's 1982 "Signals" album, on which he played violin and electric violin.

Lee was elliptical as to the new material's musical style, revealing only that it is "all over the place" and "interesting. " He was not certain that the music would appear on a solo album, but might go that route.

''The problem for me is I love writing, I love making music.'' he told Jam! ''But I am not really driven by the kind of ambition to feature myself on a solo album. I would love to see this material I have been working on see the light of day. Inevitably [releasing a solo album] will be the direction I may have to take to get it exposed.''

Rush last performed live in 1997, supporting its 1996 release "Test for Echo" (Atlantic). In 1998, the band released the live box set "Different Stages,'' which features a live 1997 performance of the group's anti-totalitarian epic ''2112'' in its entirety and a 1978 Hammersmith Odeon show in London.

Although Rush's current inactivity has led some to speculate that the band is through, Lee said that the band is on hold while drummer Neil Peart puts his life back together following the 1997 death of his daughter in a car accident and the death of his wife from cancer in 1998.

In the event that the band doesn't continue, it is not likely that fans will see the release of unreleased studio material. Lee has said in the past that the band usually doesn't finish songs that aren't good enough to be on an album, so there probably is no material in the can.