BY way of introduction, American émigré singer-songwriter Josh Rouse sums up his new album The Embers Of Time as “my surreal expat therapy record”.

Released this month on Yep Roc Records, the Nebraskan’s 11th studio set draws on his “bouts with existential psychotherapy” in his adopted home of Valencia, Spain.

“The record rocks in a gentle way,” says Josh, who visits Pocklington Arts Centre on Saturday. “It’s a Midwestern acoustic folk record, I suppose. Not as influenced by Spain as I have been more recently.”

Instead, therapy has played its part in 10 songs of bittersweet balladry. “I started going to therapy – I’d never been before – and it was Gestalt therapy [an existential/experiential form of psychotherapy that emphasises personal responsibility], where I was going through my past, getting in touch with my feelings, trying to live in the present, so the new album is my heart-on-my-sleeve record, but not too serious.”

Josh thinks he had met his therapist once before, in a social context in Valencia, and had then seen him reading a book, which prompted him to ask him what he was reading. It turned out to be a book on psychology, and one thing led to another.

“I was feeling pretty isolated living in Valencia,” says Josh. “We’d lived in the centre and moved out to the suburbs when we had the kids, but then felt isolated as there was no English-speaking community.”

The therapy sessions have not followed the conventional route. “I like to ask questions, asking my therapist for advice when technically they’re just supposed to listen,” says Josh, whose life combines family responsibilities and his music career, with the therapy having its role too.

“You’re a father and a somewhat famous singer-songwriter, you have a family, and you’re not just a mail man; going to the therapist is how I’m dealing with this.

“I keep my manager in the loop and as long as I keep making music I’ll be happy, though I may have to deliver mail one day. But it’s wonderful to have people still listening to my music after so long. I’m 43 now, and I guess persistence is the key.”

Josh moved to Valencia and stayed, even though he still misses America.

“I’d been touring around the world for 10 years, and at that point I wanted to learn another language and submerge myself in another culture,” he recalls. “I met a girl, and that was reason enough to move out there.”

The press release for Josh’s album talks of his “self-admitted crisis of confidence”, but he questions that description.

“It was just a minor existential crisis, mid-life crisis, whatever you want to call it. I think living in another country helps the anxiety,” he says. “It wasn’t a feeling like writer’s block, but the thought that nobody cares. You have made so many records, you’re not new, and you’re not cool like Bob Dylan or Leonard Cohen, and you think, ‘how do you still get attention?’.”

One way is to make a record as well received as The Embers Of Time. “Hopefully it will appeal to as many people as possible; I don’t have a specific audience in mind,” says Josh, who will be touring with a Spanish bass player and guitarist and an American drummer.

One musician who will not be there is Jessie Baylin, a singer-songwriter from Nashville, whose voice graces one of the new album’s stand-out tracks, Pheasant Feather.

“I’ve always really liked her voice,” says Josh. “We didn’t sing the song as a duet at the same time; I sent her the tape and she recorded her part, but I think our voices marry really well together. I was so pleased with the way that came out.”

A “surreal expat therapy record”, no less, but what does Josh mean by “surreal”? “I just kind of woke up one day and 10 years later I’m still living in Valencia, I have two kids and it’s a long way from the cornfields of Nebraska,” he says.

Josh Rouse plays Pocklington Arts Centre on Saturday, 8pm. Tickets update: still available at £15 on 01759 301547 or at pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk