Some eagerly-awaited news for our European friends; the first three dates of David Gilmour's 2006 tour, to coincide with the release of his new album, have now emerged.

The venues known so far are of a similar size to his 2001/2002 dates, which should mean a nice, intimate performance.

David Gilmour - Live 2006

The two French dates below were given in the new issue of Rock & Folk magazine in that country, with the announcement of the shows attributed to David himself.

As yet, we don't have full details of the tour; we expect a number of other venues to be confirmed in due course, and will bring news of this as we get it. So, here's what is known so far:

There was a website offering tickets for the Hamburg show - www.karsten-jahnke.de who is the promotor for the show, but these have now been removed from their site. We understand that tickets for the Paris shows go on sale on 28th November, from the venue and normal ticket agents.

We know how keen you lot are to grab tickets as soon as they become available!

More information on upcoming dates, with ticketing details and so on, to follow as soon as we have it...

UPDATED 24th NOVEMBER: The full list of dates is expected to be confirmed next week; as yet, we don't know where David will be playing nor on what dates, other than those below, which have appeared this week - please don't ask! As soon as we have the info, we'll let you know.