Hello all! Some very exciting news, but first of all… the streets are dusted with sugary-looking frost and Nigella Lawson is bloody everywhere – it can only mean one thing: MERRY CHRISTMAS! Between now and the big day I have plenty of gigs lined up in Leicester, London and maybe even a few other places too so check the gigs page or follow me on Twitter to see where I’ll be popping up.

**SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT**

Well, 2011 has smiled upon me. I’ve had the good fortune of some fantastic publicity and the pleasure of some truly incredible gigs with people such as Josie Long, Robin Ince, Dick Gaughan, Robb Johnson, Sam Duckworth and Emmy the Great. I have consequently been advised that I have moved beyond the stage where it’s acceptable to sell CDs which were made on an 8-track when I was 16. It is therefore my pleasure to announce the following:

MARK MY WORDS, my new album, will be released on MONDAY 12^TH DECEMBER from this website.

The album will feature some old songs that I can’t bear to part ways with, re-arranged and re-recorded with the band to do them justice: Inspector Morse (be strong, be resilient, be young, be fucking brilliant), Aeroplanes and Stars, The Last Time We Ever Spoke, Black and Blue and ‘The Topshop Song’. It would also appear that I couldn’t stop writing angry, anti-tory songs this year, and so less than a year after Tell Me A Story was launched I had a whole sheath of new material to record. In addition to Emily Davison Blues, Tonne of Bricks, Maggie Thatcher’s Dream and Orbit, which were unavailable in physical form until now, Mark My Words will also contain 5 previously unrecorded songs – including The Revolution Will Not Be Televised and They Shall Not Pass. (For a preview of They Shall Not Pass, listen to Josie Long and Andrew Collins’ BBC6music show here, at about 1.27 but hurry! It’s only up ‘til Saturday.)

The artwork for the CD is quite close to my heart as it is compiled mostly of pages from song books I’ve scribbled in over the years; I hope you’ll like it too.

Mark My Words contains 14 songs in all and is priced at £10. It will be available from the SHOP on Monday 12^th December.

**Please note that this first run will be an extremely limited edition. We will only have 100 copies (hand numbered by me) of Mark My Words to sell. **

I would also like to bid a fond farewell to the Feel Better and Grace Petrie albums. They have served me well over the years and I’d like to thank everyone who worked on them and bought them, but they don’t really reflect me as an artist anymore, and I am therefore retiring them from this site. In the unlikely event that anyone is particularly attached to those records, I thought I’d better warn you, so:

**Please note that Feel Better (downloads and CDs), Grace Petrie (downloads) and Feel Better and Tell Me A Story Double Packs will be DISCONTINUED AS OF MONDAY 12^TH DECEMBER, and will be unavailable thereafter.**

Gosh, I’m using a lot of therefores and thereafters today.

Other stuff…

I can’t begin to describe how much has gone on in the last couple of weeks, but here are the headlines:

The Guardian: Dorian Lynskey wrote a lovely, thoughtful article for the Guardian on the new protest music movement sweeping the country including a stop off at my gig at UCL in October. You can read it here.
Dick Gaughan: I played on Sunday with Dick Gaughan in Sheffield, which was a complete honour. My thanks to the audience who were fantastic, to Caitlin for accompanying me and to Dick, who was as charming and interesting to talk to as he was mesmerising to watch.
Strike!: The November 30 strike effort was particularly strong in Leicester, where I played to a thoroughly overcrowded rally. The strikers have my thanks, solidarity and respect. Michael Gove, in particular, has my loathing. Special thanks to Nick Holden for a fantastic and inspiring video of the day which you can see here.
The Monograph: Leicester music newspaper The Monograph interviewed me for their winter edition, you can read the interview containing my two (hundred-odd) pence worth on just about everything here. I would like to thank John Helps for his work on the article and Amy Brammall for the photographs, including the one above.
Other stuff… Look out over the coming weeks for me in Clash and Diva magazines, and you can also spot me (ramping up my lesbian street cred hugely) on AfterEllen’s music section here.
And finally… As card-carrying Christmas fans, Caitlin and I have recorded a version of Fairytale of New York to join other local acts’ festive covers on a compilation CD made for Leicester’s Whitenoise Christmas Festival on December 18^th. The proceeds go to Loros, so do pick one up if you’re heading down.

As ever, thank you for the messages of support I have received recently. Here’s wishing you all a wonderful festive season, filled with love and fun and hopefully enough fuel to warm yourselves on these cold winter nights.

GP xxx