25 years on from his debut with the Stone Roses, Ian Brown is still enjoying life in the music business.

Earlier this autumn the 46-year-old Warrington-born singer released his sixth solo album, My Way, and he feels he's on peak form.

"I feel it's my best work, yeah. I certainly put the hours in," he says. "I started writing it about this time last year, not constantly, but on and off. We worked right through the winter, started recording it in early spring and finished it on July 7, so we've gone through all seasons."

It's quite a personal album – how was it writing about those sorts of themes?

"The first song we wrote was Vanity Kills and Dave McCracken who co-wrote it, who I co-wrote Dolphins Were Monkeys with as well, he was signed by Roc Nation and was asked to write a song for Kanye West. Amanda Ghost wrote the melody, Dave wrote the music and they wanted me to write some lyrics and it had to be a sort of autobiographical song for Kanye.

"So we had a few 'pow wows' and Amanda told me about him cos she knew him and Amanda text him while I was there and said 'Kanye, I've got Ian Brown to do the lyrics' and I was made up 'cos he texted straight back and said, 'Ian Brown – Stone Roses, hell yes' and I was like, 'fantastic'.

"So we wrote him a song but we were a little bit late with sending it in and Amanda had said it's gotta be like a My Way for Kanye, so I took that and thought, 'right, I'm gonna keep that for myself, I really like it'. So that gave me the brief to make the album.

"Me and Dave were also asked to write a song for Rihanna and after finishing it (Stellify], even though she could probably sing it better, I thought "I'm gonna keep this", so I kept it. That set us off then. We thought, right it's gonna be a 'my way' album – I'm gonna write about my life in music. I'm gonna write about coming off the dole, going into music, what happened along the way-that was my brief."

You've said you're anti-nostalgia so how does that work with singing about those themes?

"It's not nostalgia to me, it's my life and all things come around. There's a point to everything and everything comes around in a circle eventually. By nostalgia I mean repackaging, remastering, reselling, squeezing a lemon. That made me think about the Roses, as I've never addressed them in songs before."

Was that difficult for you, or did you feel like it was the right time?

"It was easy – I feel great about the Roses, I don't feel bad about it."

There's a couple of mentions of them throughout the album – did it just happen or did you think, right I'm going to sing about them now?

"Oh yeah, everything's deliberate."

Do you get many requests from people to work with them? You mentioned Kanye and Rihanna…

"If I like the music, then I'll do it. At the moment I'm working with a band called Sohodolls. I met them on the M6 about two months ago. I told them I was a bit busy with my own album but give it a couple of months and we'll get it on.

"I've just written some songs for a Muslim singer called Sami Yusuf, who's an Islamic singer who sings in Arabic and he's really big in the Middle East. He wants to write an album in English, so he's written the music and the melodies and I've just got to do the lyrics.

"I'm always happy to collaborate. I'm supposed to have done something with Scratch Perverts for the last five years, but they've not got it together yet. Coldcut are supposed to be sending me a song, Unkle have asked me to come and do something on their next album. So if someone's got talent and some sort of work and they're a little bit different, I'm there."

You've included a cover on this album, what made you choose In the Year 2525?

"I wanted to write a song about global warming 'cos I've not heard anyone sing a proper song about global warming or the effect that it's going to have, being the end and everything. So I then had to come up with a song that's better than In The Year 2525.

"Them lyrics were written 40 years ago but they still resonate as powerfully today as they would have done then. I couldn't manage it and didn't come up with a tune that was better than that, so I thought 'Well, you know what? I've got a Mariachi sound sometimes anyway, so if I got a trumpet on it I could make it sound like one of my own songs anyway'.

"And I was lucky because Dave (McCracken] worked on the last Mr Hudson single so I got Mr Hudson playing guitar on it as well. He came down and put flamenco guitar on it. So it's my tune now."

Later this month Brown embarks on a UK tour, which includes two dates at the O2 Academy Leeds. He says he's looking forward to all the dates, especially Ipswich and Southend "cos I've never played there".

Do you have any stand out gigs from past tours?

"Glastonbury '05 was probably my favourite show because it was the biggest crowd I've ever played to. It was pretty emotional and everyone was singing along. There were thousands of people bobbing up and down and we played really well.

"Usually I do a show, I feel great about it and the next day I've forgotten it. But one day, if I make it, when I'm 90 and I'm sat out in the back chair with my Filipino nurse putting a blanket over me, maybe I'll think about when I played Nottingham Rock City on my birthday, or my first Brixton Academy, but Glastonbury's the show that I think about every few weeks and think 'wow, that was ace'."

Do you always take the same band out with you?

"The last five and a half years I've had the same line-up and they never let me down. Drummer's never dropped a beat, guitarist has never hit the wrong note – they're super reliable and great, great players and we gel really well so I've got no reason to change it at the moment. These guys still sound fresh."

Ian Brown plays at the O2 Academy Leeds on Thursday 10 December and Friday 11 December. Tickets are still available for the first date from Jumbo and Crash Records or from www.ticketweb.co.uk.