UPDATE - 12/13@9:36AM: The official tour announcement is out! The San Juan date is confirmed and it's also revealed that they'll be kicking off the tour there - contrary to the rumor that they'd start in Atlantic Canada. They also confirm that the full itinerary will be announced in mid-January and they'll play over 40 more dates. Nothing is mentioned about South America.

UPDATE - 11/21@1:53PM: Dates in Chile, Argentina and Puerto Rico are close to being confirmed. Details in this post.

I have some exciting new updates regarding the 2008 leg of the Snakes & Arrows tour. Before getting to these I thought I'd recap what we already know.

A couple months ago I reported that Rush would be playing several indoor dates in the US and Canada in the Spring of 2008, kicking off in March with a two or three night stand in Atlantic City. The tour would then move up the east coast to Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Maine, and Atlantic Canada to wrap up the first set of dates before heading south for a handful of dates in late March through early April including New Orleans, New Mexico, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Mississippi.

A few days later I reported that the band would end the 2008 leg in July with a headlining performance on the closing day of a concert commemorating the 400th anniversary of Quebec City.

Then early last month Alex Lifeson confirmed in an interview that the band would indeed be touring in 2008, playing another 46 or so shows.

Now I've just obtained new information which corroborates most of the above and adds to it.

First off, some very good news for Atlantic Canada; that seems to be where the tour will likely kickoff. They'll then work their way south with the band playing the new Prudential Center in Newark for a metro-NYC date, replacing the Atlantic City dates. As far as I know they will still be hitting New Orleans, New Mexico, Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi and points in between - and also will be playing about a dozen dates in the Western US.

There's also some very good news for our friends south of the equator; Rush will be playing several dates in South America. Indeed, they'll be down their for nearly 2 weeks which likely means around 8 shows give or take. Brazil, Argentina, Peru, and Chile are about 80% confirmed at this point. The band also plans on recording one of these shows, but I'm unsure of the details or how this recording would be utilized.

All in all the tour has 48 open slots that may or may not all be filled. And it still looks like the tour will end with the band playing at the 400th anniversary celebration in Quebec City on July 4th - which would be Rush's biggest full-length show ever as a crowd of nearly half a million fans are expected.

The official tour date announcement will occur in the 2nd week of January with tickets going on sale at the end of January and early February. They will be releasing the Workin' Them Angels single to coincide with the tour announcement, and plan to release a video for the song which will use portions of the video recordings for the live DVD that was filmed in Rotterdam. They had originally meant to release the single a week or two ago but decided to go this route instead to better market the tour.

That's all for now. I'll end with this disclaimer: the above information is not yet official and could change. That said, my source has been very reliable in the past and I have no reason not to believe them on any of this information. Also, before you start shooting off emails asking me for more details, I can assure you that I'm not holding anything back; what you see above is exactly what I know too - no more, no less. I'll be sure to post any further updates as soon as I hear them.

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