Are you missing life in the Academy?
Yes, I am. I was getting quite close to David (singing tutor) and he was starting to teach us a few things which were sinking in, so it's a bit of a shame.

But I'm looking forward now, I've got a few things to look forward to like songwriting, recording and getting a band sorted. So it's all about looking forward.

We had a Gary's magic moments on our pages, what were your favourite moments?
I think all the songwriting, working with John McLaughlin who I'm going to be writing with again in the future. And when I did ' You're gorgeous' - That was pretty cool, I was confident on stage. It was a good laugh.

Was that your favourite performance?
Actually 'Faith' would have been my favourite, but I wasn't entirely confident with the song as I had just learnt it.

What about life in the house with the students? There was a moment where you split Paris' trousers in a play fight...
Yeah, I was getting my a**e completely whooped and then his trousers split - so there you go, I'll have some of that!

Gary catches up on Toon life with BBC Tyne.

Apart from friends and family, what did you miss when you were in the Academy?
I missed the cinema - big style! I went to see Terminator 3, but I wasn't completely impressed. I missed my dogs, girlfriend and mates too.

You weren't allowed to listen to much music in the house.. now that you're out, what are you listening to on your walkman?
The Foo Fighters, The Colour and The Shape

What did you do when you got back to Newcastle?
I saw my Auntie and two cousins, then on Saturday night I went out with all the lads. We went to Mood. It was the first time I'd been there - it was really cool, just went a bit mad.

On the BBC Three, the songwriter tutor John got in touch and said he wanted you to go into the studio and write some tracks with him. What's happening with that?
I knew he was kind of interested, but when he rang up, I realised he was being serious. Everyone seems really behind us. One of the main things is that John McLaughlin, who's a really respected songwriter, likes my songs and wants to co-write with me to get them perfect. Hopefully I'll get to do a few when I'm gigging around.

One thing about you is that you are a major songwriter and that came through on the interactive but not on the show because the students had to perform covers. Is that something you were disappointed about?
Definitely. Not everyone has iInteractive. The funniest thing was, we sat down with Richard Park for a little meeting about himself, about why he was qualified to critique us.

The show had been going on for about two weeks and Richard turned around and said to me 'So Gary, do you write songs?'

I was thinking 'you're the Headmaster of this place and it's obvious you're not watching any of the show.'

Did you have much contact with Headteacher Richard Park?
He came in a couple of times to make it seem like he was watching! Nah, I spoke to him a couple of times and he was quite cool. He's not actually as bad as he is on the show. I think he does exaggerate his opinions slightly.

Will you keep watching Fame Academy?
Yeah, definitely. Just Saturday gone, I thought James was really good. Alistair gave the same peformance again and I think people might start getting a bit bored of that. I was a bit gutted I missed the Robin Gibb masterclass.

So what's next for Gary? are you moving down south?
I'm just going to travel up and down for the next few weeks and see if it is completely necessary for me to move down there, which I imagine it will be. The management company I'm dealing with wants me to start gigging straight away, so people don't forget about us and start building a fan base. So I'll be gigging up and down the country.