With the release of his new mini-album, ‘You’ll Land Among The Stars’, independent singer-songwriter The Gleeman enters a bold new chapter. The record marks the first instalment of an ambitious run of releases planned across 2026, showcasing a prolific creative resurgence and a renewed determination to challenge the music industry’s assumptions about age, opportunity and artistic relevance. Rich in cinematic storytelling and emotional candour, the songs explore love, loss, friendship, ambition and mortality, themes shaped by a lifetime of lived experience.
Beyond the music itself, The Gleeman has become an outspoken advocate for greater visibility and support for older emerging artists through his #MatureMusicMatters initiative. As he celebrates the arrival of You’ll Land Among The Stars, he reflects on the meaning behind the album, his songwriting process, and the deeply personal journey that brought him back into the spotlight.
Hi The Gleeman, how are you? How’s your week been?
In general, I’m very excited about embarking on the next stage of the journey and getting some new music out into the world! This week specifically? Hmm, been struck down with the winter lurgi and answering this whilst supping on a Lemsip!
What can you tell us about ‘You’ll Land Among The Stars’?
The mini-album is the follow up release to my debut album ‘Something To Say’ which came out in Nov 2024. The majority of that album though was recorded in 2020, so having continued to write with renewed vigour in the intervening years, I have found myself with a bit of a bucketful of songs that I need to let free and ‘You’ll Land Among The Stars’ is the commencement of that second chapter.
The title feels symbolic, what does it mean to you personally?
Well, you’ve asked! There are three mantras which I try to guide my life by.
The third is ‘Nobody Knows Anything’. It’s a quote from the screenwriter William Goldman from his book ‘Adventures In The Screen Trade’, which is essentially a comment, with particular regards to art, that despite how much experience anyone has, no one knows for certainty what is going to work. It’s a great mindset to have in the music industry where you are inevitably going to have to deal with rejection. Music as an art form is always going to be subjective. As an artist we all have our insecurities as it’s a very exposing place to put yourself, but I find my resilience is high. You don’t like it? Fine. There’s music I don’t like, it doesn’t mean it’s not got merit. OK, let me go find someone who does…
The second is ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Get’. Fairly self-explanatory, but I am amazed at those that are too afraid to ask, too afraid to try, or have decided they are going to fail at the outset. In my book, generally the worst that can happen is for you to be told ‘No’.
The first is a quote by Norman Vincent Peale: ‘Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars’. Again, of great value as an artist in the music industry but can just as much be applied to life in general. Be bold, aim high, dream big. If you guide and align your decision making with those ultimate goals, then even if you don’t attain them, or even whilst you are still striving for them, your achievements will be significant.
The songs on the album are very story-driven. How do you approach writing them?
There are always exceptions, but my song-writing process normally goes like this: I never actually plan to write a song. They will start forming sometimes just when sitting at the piano or playing guitar. Something will happen that feels good musically, I’ll spitball some melody ideas but then lyrically I always try to first land on an aesthetically pleasing main hook of the song that suits the melody, which will often end up being its title.
When I have that main phrase (my favourite phrase/song title to date, mostly for its quirkiness quotient is ‘The Legendary Planetary Émigré’ which was the opener on ‘Something To Say’, although another up-and-comer called ‘Too Many Dinosaurs’ comes close!) I then work back from there in terms of where the song goes thematically and lyrically. I will question whether it’s a phrase that connects with any personal experiences that I could write from or whether it’s something that needs a more fictional story crafted from it and around it. On this particular release they all happen to be the latter.
You’ve said you want to become the oldest debut artist to reach the UK Top 40. Why is that important to you?
Well I guess I have already kind of failed at the one, though the debut ‘Something To Say’ did get into a couple of the UK Official Charts, including at No. 36 in the Official Record Store Chart, so it was at least a top 40 position, so I’ll hold on to that one and there is always a chance it could climb into the main Top 40 another time! Failing is fine though, it’s all part of the pathway. I know looking back that I couldn’t have done it any better than I did, I gave it absolutely everything I that had and some that I didn’t.
Quite honestly though, it’s wrong that achievement is even still attainable for a 53-year-old (at the time) as someone should have done it before now. Our age does not restrict our creativity or ability to take on a new challenge or new career, but the music industry at large remains obsessed with youth in terms of its support for new artists. It is important to me as I am trying to blaze a trail, to prove it can be done, to pave the way for others and give hope where there currently is none and a UK Top 40 chart placement is a tangible measurement of success.
What inspired the movement #MatureMusicMatters?
I’ve spent the last 20 odd years at the helm of a business in the ‘normal’ commercial sector, but my immersion into the music industry over the last few years has been quite an eye opener. It is so intrinsically broken on so many different levels it actually beggars belief and it generally commercially favours every single entity within in it apart from those that actually create the art. So it’s a tough gig regardless, before you bring age into it.
Age is a protected characteristic under the UK equality act, as much as race, religion, gender and the others are, but in the music industry (which also probably extends into wider society to be fair), age seems to be the poor cousin. Diversity and inclusivity has rightly been a focus in the music industry and elsewhere, but unfortunately age as a protected characteristic just doesn’t get on the agenda. I could give many examples of direct and indirect age-related inequality in terms of available opportunities and supporting platforms but we could be here a while, but let me use this one to highlight how systemic an industry wide issue it is…
The BRITS Awards have a category called The Rising Star award (previously The Critics Choice Award) to recognise ‘new and emerging’ UK talent, nominees are selected by an ‘independent panel’ of industry folk.
In its 18 years, there has never been a single nominee over the age of 31 (the average nominee age is approx. 23). This represents a subset of about just 18% of the UK adult population. It’s incontrovertible high-level evidence that the music industry remains a closed door to new older artists. Let’s look at that through the eyes of another protected UK characteristic, race. Approx 82% of the UK population identify as ‘white’, we’ll flip that on its head and simplify for example purposes a scenario where we have a country whose population is 82% black and 18% white where only white people have ever been nominated and not a single black person, for The Brits Rising Star award. There would be an absolute reckoning, right?
MatureMusicMatters is a rally call for artists and supporters of any age to get behind and help challenge the industry against its current age prejudices. I’ve immersed myself somewhat into the business side and have had conversations with a number of senior industry players to try to effect positive change, people are generally empathetic and receptive but it’s tough, though I will keep on trying. Part of the problem is that that the current woeful underrepresentation of new older artists means that there are few that even have a foothold enough in the industry to raise a voice, so if there is anyone reading this who would like to offer support in any way then please reach out, I am always happy to hear from allies.
How has your life experience shaped the stories you tell in your songs?
It infiltrates everything in one way or another, and it is a reason why there should be more new music by new older artists supported by the industry. There are many of my songs that just could not have been written by a young person who wouldn’t have lived the associated experiences or gained the required perspectives through time spent on the planet. I often come across articles that suggest that as they get older people are less inclined to discover new music from new artists, but that is far from my experience. The issue is that the music industry has not and does not market and support new music from new older artists that would relate to and resonate with them.
The largest Radio station in the UK is BBC Radio 2, it currently has approx. 13M listeners, its targeted at those aged over 35 but its listeners average age is 53. BBC Radio 1 (targeting 16-29 age group), 1Xtra and Asian Network all have a dedicated BBC Introducing slot on their playlists to support new music from new artists, all of them plus 6 Music have a dedicated BBC Introducing radio show to support new music from new artists (Radio 1 actually has 3 different shows a week!). Radio 2 has neither and are currently failing their listeners in terms of supporting new artists that would relate to their demographic and hence the BBC are failing a large swathe of the population against its main Royal Charter mission of acting in the public interests and serving all audiences.
What’s been the most powerful moment on this journey so far?
Two equally stand out for me. The first was a project I did in support of War Child to raise awareness about the impact on children that the ongoing conflict in Ukraine has been having. It involved a Kyiv based children’s choir and UK based Ukrainian refugee children featuring on a Christmas song that I wrote. It all came together in the space of a week, the associated mini ‘making of’ documentary highlights some of the children’s quite traumatic experiences due to the war but also shows the joy that participating in this project gave them.
The second was my involvement with the Music For Dementia campaign and a later video recording of a song performance with Vicky McClure’s Our Dementia Choir to help raise awareness of the power that music has in dementia care, a disease that I lost both of my parents to. Among radio play, TV appearances, chart positions, gigs and all the other trappings that you chase as an artist, it is those two instances that I am most proud of and have been the most moving and fulfilling.
What first drew you back to music after time away from it?
I’ve never really been away from it, it has been a constant in my life, it was just something that stayed private for a very long time. The change was the decision to get an album recorded to the best of my ability and to see what I could do with it commercially. I had always been writing songs on and off over the years and recorded a few basic home demo’s, but put them in a drawer, never really played them to anyone, never performed, but it was an itch that I always knew I would have to scratch one day. I can’t say there was one particular thing that finally set me on the road, partly that time continued to tick by (it was getting a bit now or never), my children had grown up and watching my parent’s lives change irrevocably via their descent’s into dementia all played their part.
Who or what have been your biggest musical influences?
My formative musical years were the 80’s. The first album I ever owned, which my parents bought for me as a surprise, was ‘Kings Of The Wild Frontier’ by Adam And The Ants, they were also the first live gig I went to at St Austell Coliseum in Cornwall when I was 8 or 9, which was responsible for lighting the musical fire in my belly. I recently spent some time in the studio with Marco Pirroni, guitarist and co-songwriter for Adam And The Ants / Adam Ant, who laid down some guitar on some of my new songs, which was quite a special full circle moment for me (I did allow myself one fanboy moment and got him to sign my original copy of that first album my parents bought for me!). Otherwise of the era it was bands such as Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Queen, Dire Straits, Pink Floyd and singer-songwriters Elton John and Billy Joel, both of whom who have remained big influences through the discovery of their back catalogues. Later discoveries The Beatles, Paul Simon, Fleetwood Mac would have all contributed, but as an older artist you have had many years where you’ve soaked up a lot music from various genres and artists, which all add to the greater whole.
What was the most challenging song on the record to write — and why?
Depends what you mean by ‘challenging’. If you are having to wrestle with a song too much, there is an argument not to pursue. From experience I’ve found that the real winners are the ones you don’t have to fight with too much and come easily. The most challenging thematically on this record though would be ‘My Final Song’. I wrote it so it could work from two perspectives: A final song on an album or at a concert thanking people for coming along for the ride as fans and for listening, but on the other as a farewell to family and friends from someone who is dying, the recorded version with associated sound effects steer it more toward the later. We are not always comfortable thinking about death, but it’s the one great leveller, none of us are getting out of here alive. I’m also a big advocate for the legalisation of assisted dying (see ‘ The Hurting’ on ‘Something To Say’). I don’t mean to be flippant and none of us know what is in store for us, but, given certain circumstances, I like the idea of having a Deathday Party, where this would be the closing song of choice. A celebration of a life with friends and family around you, reminiscing, telling stories and everyone getting a chance to say what they want to say, don’t save it for a funeral when I won’t be around to hear it….
