Call Out The Instigator

Less than week to go before, last minute hitches withstanding, my debut album Gavin Martin's Talking Musical Revolutions is available on End Of The Trail Records via Rough Trade.

I turn 55 on December 14th and on December 16 my interview with Lazarus star Michael C Hall appears in my weekly Daily Mirror column - the same day that my album, consisting of spoken word pieces I have written and performed over the past 7/8 years, should be online.

Talking David Bowie Musical Revolutions (Parts 1 and 2) will be included of course.

See how its all linking up, professional and artistic life colliding?

Look up here I'm in heaven?

Ok, if you insist.

End Of The Trail Records boss Kelly Munro has produced the album adding my lyrical delivery to music by hot young acts such as Coquin Migale, Pip Hall, The Family Jools, Rattler and more.

I've been blown away how the words have fitted so well with the music, thanks to Kelly's keen ear (he's got two but, in deference to his hero Brian Wilson - End Of The Trail logo is a tribute to Surf's Up album cover - only chooses to deploy one). The splendid Ali Garvan at Brighton Road Studios has recorded/ co produced (? better check formal credit with Mr Munro)

The oldest track on the record was made differently from the tracks I have recorded in recent weeks with Ali and Kelly.

Long Hard Road To be Free is a song that came together when Pete Cattermoul of Teleman recorded my piece, in his Peckham living room, on the life, times and legacy of Marvin Gaye.

Eugenie Arrowsmith, daughter of ace photographer Clive responsible for a classic early Bowie Vogue cover shot (connections, connections), adds a beautiful vocal chorus.

I was 20 when I went to Los Angeles for the first time to interview Marvin, in person, on November 17 1982 for NME. The following night Marvin stunned the crowd delivering an accapella Lord's Prayer and Carlo's And Charlies on Sunset Strip.

Just over a year before Gaye's shocking death, shot dead by his own father, I knew that the trip was going to be a highlight of whatever career I was embarking on.

But just as this cataclysmic year ends Gavin Martin's Talking Musical Revolutions is, for non musical rhyme master me, a whole new departure.

Excited? Well, its nice to have a new outlet, at my advanced age.