It's finally official. Gravel-throated barroom poet and overall cult legend Tom Waits has inked a deal with California indie punk record label Epitaph that will see the singer release an album of new material early next year.

It's a label run by and for artists and musicians where it feels much more like a partnership than a plantation," Waits said of the seemingly unlikely union in a statement issued late Wednesday. "I feel like I am part of a unique enterprise that runs like a muscle car.

The singer is currently holed up in a Northern California studio working with guitarist Mark Ribot, bassist/guitarist Larry Taylor, bassist Greg Cohen, and drummer Steven Hodges, the same team that worked with Waits on 1985's "Rain Dogs" and 1983's "Swordfishtrombones." Waits is also expected to bring Primus into the studio to work on the album, which should arrive in early 1999. The collaboration may be a bit of payback for Waits' guest appearance on Primus' 1991 album "Sailing the Seas

of Cheese.

The upcoming album will be Waits' first new recording since 1994's "Black Rider." Over the past several years, Waits' legacy has lived on through re-issues and compilations of his earlier work, like the recently released "Beautiful Maladies: the Island Years" which has been drawing rave reviews.

The Epitaph deal, which is for one album only, has been in the works for quite sometime, with rumors flying all the while. However, nothing was official until Waits sat down with Epitaph head Brett Gurewitz recently.

We shook on the deal over coffee at a truck stop," Waits said. "I know it's going to be an adventure, and as Warren Oates said, 'It feels good. I think we'll take it all the way.'

Waits now joins an Epitaph roster that also includes punk torchbearers like Rancid, Pennywise, Voodoo Glow Skulls, and Descendents.