Wishing you a magnificent year ahead; I hope you find 2012 more exciting and more prosperous (in the broader sense of the word) than current news cycles might suggest.

In lieu of any real news yet, here are 10 new T-T-ish things for you to check out, if you want…

Earlier in 2011 I sang and played piano on She Makes War’s brilliant new album Little Battles.

I’m very proud to say I performed the role of Grandfather in MJ Hibbett’s new rock musical Dinosaur Planet which is out this month via Artists Against Success.

Thank you very much if you came out to see me over the past month, on Franz Nicolay’s UK tour, or one of the shows I stuck around it. I’ve had a brilliant, exhausting time and finishing so close to Christmas has left me even more excited than usual about domestic things like seeing my family and getting time off.

I’m happy to announce my UK tour dates in November and December, mostly supporting brilliant NY punk rock vaudeville signer Franz Nicolay (Hold Steady / Against Me). The confirmed shows are now up on my LIVE page.

The Guardian has taped a session featuring two of my songs using A.A. Milne poems, for their Children’s Books website.

My punk/folk rising star friend Frank Turner just released his fourth album England Keep My Bones. It’s a great record but more importantly, I sang on it. Buy it from iTunes HERE.

To mark the occasion, journalist Brad Barrett has re-published his 2008 joint interview with me and Frank from 2008, where he got us to question each-other. Read it on his blog HERE.

I’m very proud to announce a selection of my ‘Empties’ photos are being used in a new collaborative book from the Dark Mountain group, edited by Paul Kinsgnorth and Dougald Hine. Dark Mountain Issue 2 is at the printers and will be available this month, so watch this space.