As an actress, Alicia Witt has been everything from a zombie victim on The Walking Dead to a country singer superstar in Nashville.

However she’s also a talented musician who will play her first Scottish gig on Sunday at Stereo – thanks to a Glaswegian guitarist.

“I did a series of shows in Frankfurt and Cologne earlier this year with Paul Carella, and I really liked him as a person and as a musician,” she explains.

“He’s from Glasgow originally. We were talking about how it’d be fun to do a UK tour when I was over for the London comic con anyway, and playing Glasgow seemed an ideal first show because he has a lot of friends and family there. I get in on Saturday so hopefully he’ll show me around at least a little bit, because I’ve never been to Scotland before.”

The flame-haired singer has been in the entertainment business since she was a child, with her first screen credit coming aged just seven, in David Lynch’s adaptation of the sci-fi novel Dune.

From there she’s had a varied screen career, with roles including the sitcom Cybill and slasher film Urban Legend in the 90s, through to roles in hit TV shows such as Nashville, Elementary and The Walking Dead.

When she comes on the phone she’s on her way to a meeting about a Christmas film she’s scripted for the Hallmark Channel, but music has always been an equal passion of hers, with her current project a new EP, 15,000 Days, where she worked with noted producer Jacquire King.

“Music is entirely me and not playing a role,” she says, describing her uplifting piano pop.

“When acting, whether I wrote the script or didn’t, it’s still a character whereas the music is so completely me. It’s a conduit to connecting with other people that I can’t get with acting. I can look out and play a song, and feel like I’m connecting people in the room together through that shared experience.”

The new EP comes two years after she released her album Revisionary History, where she worked alongside singer-songwriter Ben Folds. She believes her newest songs have a ‘youthful pop’ feel to them, while the EP title refers to her age, and the number of days she’s lived in her 41 years.

There is an irony there, given that the music industry and record companies are arguably even more ageist than the often criticised film industry. Alicia is enjoying turning those perceptions on their head.

“It’s a great time to be a woman of this age,” she says.

“There’s a power and confidence, even a sexiness, when you’re 40 that you don’t have when younger because you don’t have that confidence. And in music, because it seems to be an accepted truth that it’s a liability to be older, I’m trying to just go the opposite way and have it as a real asset, which for me it is.”

Alicia has raised funds for the EP through a Kickstarter campaign, and is optimistic that a second EP will follow. In the meantime, she’s continuing to work in both theatre and onscreen.

A recent memorable role saw her play the villainous Paula in The Walking Dead last year, a character who suffered a particularly unpleasant fate.

So Alicia, what’s it like to have your face eaten by zombies?

“The face getting eaten was just joy,” she laughs.

“That was so epic, because I got to die in a way that was fabulous, and not just getting shot or falling off a building. If you had to die in The Walking Dead then that was the way to do it!”

A new Netflix series, Disjointed, will arrive later this year while she has also filmed scenes for the new Twin Peaks series, reprising a role she played for one episode in the show’s original run. However given the secrecy the revival is being filmed with, Alicia is as much in the dark as viewers.

“I shot my scenes and I don’t even know what episode it’ll be in,” she adds.

“I’m loving the show and I’d be equally excited whether or not I was in it, but it certainly adds an element of extra intrigue knowing I’m going to appear some week. I have no understanding of where my scenes fit into the order of the episodes, or what happened prior to them, so I’ll be as surprised as everyone else when I see myself.”

Alicia Witt and Paul Carella, Stereo, Sunday, £18, 7.30pm

JONATHAN GEDDES