It's official! Rush announced very early this morning that the band will be embarking on a 2nd leg of the Time Machine Tour next year. They confirmed 7 dates in the UK and Ireland and promised that more European dates would be announced very soon. Indeed, tickets are already on sale for a May 29th show in Frankfurt, Germany, and on Monday Finnish television channel SuomiTV reported that Rush will play the Hartwall Arena in Helsinki, Finland sometime in May. Tickets for the UK and Ireland shows go on pre-sale this coming Tuesday, November 23rd and on general sale next Friday, November 26th at 9AM GMT. The announcement also confirmed that Rush will be playing a selection of North American dates starting in March and going through July. Although no specific dates were mentioned, the band will focus on places that the tour missed in 2010. Some North American cities/venues that have been bandied around as possible tour stops thus far are Madison Square Garden in New York City; Cleveland, OH (likely Quicken Loans Arena); Hershey, PA (likely the Giant Center); Baltimore, MD; Biloxi, MS and Hamilton, ON. There's also a big full-page feature on Rush and the UK tour in today's edition of the UK's Sun magazine which you can check out a scan of at this link. I'll be updating the tour section over the weekend to reflect the new 2011 tour.

Alex Lifeson's Toronto night club The Orbit Room held their 16th anniversary party last Friday evening. Just as in prior years, Big Al Lifeson showed up for the event and mingled with some fans. Alex sat in with house band The Dexters for the first set and the Dave Murphy Band for the second set. For the first set they played For What It's Worth by Buffalo Springfield, White Rabbit by Jefferson Airplane, Pass the Peas by the JBs and the Peter Gunn Theme by Henri Mancini. Al and the Dave Murphy Band played Tom Sawyer, In The Mood, Limelight and The Who's Won't Get Fooled Again. The Canadian Music Scene posted a BUNCH of cool photos from the party at this link. There are also several great pictures and video courtesy readers Andrew W and DukesRocks in this post.

Earlier this week, Neil Peart updated the Bubba's Book Club section of his website where he reviews and recommends books that he's been reading. In this latest installment Neil reviews just 2 books: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon and The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver. You can read both reviews at this link.

While Geddy was in the UK last week accepting Rush's Classic Rock Living Legend award he stopped by 106.1 Rock Radio to chat with Steve Berry. The two covered many of the same subjects that were touched upon in Geddy's BBC and Planet Rock interviews last week including Rush's plans for touring Europe in the late Spring. You can listen to the interview in 2 parts at this link.

It's hard to believe, but this coming Monday, November 22nd marks the 5th anniversary of Rush's R30 live DVD. The video was recorded on September 24, 2004 at the Festhalle Frankfurt on Rush's R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour. Last year a Blu-ray version of the video was released and R30 was certified 5X Multi-Platinum (500,000+ copies sold) by the RIAA on September 1, 2010. We just learned earlier today that Rush will be returning to the Festhalle Frankfurt for a show on May 29th. Happy anniversary R30!

Eric over at the Power Windows site has made some updates to the Downloads section of his website, updating the Smartphone Wallpapers and adding some Rush Firefox personas. Thanks Eric! And Andrew Olson has expanded the Drums of Neil Peart page on his Neil Peart site to include detailed information about every kit Neil has played and giving each kit its very own page. Thanks Andy!

Gibson.com posted an article earlier this week where they list the top 10 guitar riffs of the 1980's and Rush's Limelight made the cut at #10. Here's what they had to say:

You've got to love Alex Lifeson. Blessed (or cursed) with sharing trio space with one of the best bass players on the planet and probably the best drummer on Earth, Lifeson still manages to stand out with imaginative solos and, in the case of this Moving Pictures tour de force, major league riffage - his best since "Passage to Bangkok."

Thanks to John at Cygnus-X1.net for the heads up.

Swedish reader Lex Rushon let me know that TV4 in Sweden ran a little story on Rush last Wednesday, November 10th. It's in Swedish but contains some interview snippets with Geddy Lee that are in English. You can watch the clip at this link. Geddy talks a lot about the positive influence that games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero have had on introducing a younger generation to Rush's music.

Reader RushFanForever let me know that Neil Peart is featured in an ad for Roland V-drums on page 2 of the latest issue of Canadian Musician magazine.

NMR Distribution will soon be releasing a 1000-piece Rush Signals puzzle to complement its 1000-piece Moving Pictures puzzle. Thanks to Marshall B for the heads up.

Reader cakes and sparrows let me know that Rush has finally gotten the Discographies treatment on Twitter. For some background info on Discographies you can check out this link.

RushFanForever let me know about a new coffee table book from UK author David Phillips called A Drummer's Perspective which features a collection of over 200 photographs celebrating the world of drumming. Photographs of Neil Peart and dozens of other drumming greats are included. The book goes on sale next month and can be pre-ordered at this link.

Last week I posted a rough cut video of a new television commercial for AT&T high speed internet which has a central theme/storyline revolving around a Rush t-shirt. The commercial began airing over the weekend and I posted the final cut version to YouTube yesterday. In the 30-second commercial, a new father is riding around on a giant computer mouse (to simulate surfing the internet) while wearing a black Rush explosion logo t-shirt. He's traveling from store to store trying to decide what to purchase for his new baby daughter. He finally ends up going into a music store and happily buys his daughter a Rush onesie to match his t-shirt. Both the t-shirt and the onesie are also now available for purchase at the Rush Backstage Club. In yet another classy move, Rush is donating proceeds from the commercial and sales of the shirts to War Child Canada in Haiti. You can watch the final cut of the commercial below or at this link.

That's is for this week. Have a great weekend!

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