Gordon Lightfoot is working on his first new album in 15 years

Canadian icon Gordon Lightfoot is working on his first new album in 15 years. The 80-year-old singer-songwriter recently told Billboard magazine that the still untitled album, which will be his 21st, is "kind of philosophical and it's kind of funny. It's got a great beat and my arrangements are real good, too. I write all my own arrangements for my band."

Lightfoot's last album was 2004's Harmony, but the recording was cut short due to a near-fatal ruptured artery. "It was stuff that I recorded a year before I became ill," he said. "The guys then overdubbed all their parts on the very last album. I wasn't actually able to complete that album in a professional way. The songs were good, but the production was not up to radio standard."

Lightfoot says he's been healthy since then and exercises regularly, resulting in his new songs coming from "more of an optimistic point of view really. It's gonna be fun, it's gonna be an album where negativity is at the minimum and positivity prevails."

The material for the new album is finished, but it will still take a year to complete, he says, adding that, unlike on Harmony, he will be there to see it through to the very end.

"If I'm still walking around we'll finish it," he says.

Lightfoot is also heading out on his 80 Years Strong tour that will see him play a number of Ontario dates in April, beginning in Richmond Hill on April 3.