Nokia’s first ever touch screen phone, the 5800 XpressMusic, looks set to hit stores in the UK in February next year. It’ll be curious to see how things go. A lot will be riding on the success of this phone, for their music service and the future direction of their company, as far as mobiles go.

Nokia has said that the device – the first specifically designed to host the Comes With Music service – would be available in time for Christmas. However, the manufacturer later revealed that the handset’s release would be delayed until the first quarter of 2009 for engineering and marketing reasons, and to hone their music service.

The 5800 XpressMusic is likely to be a welcome addition to Nokia’s line, with the Comes With Music service yet to take off as the manufacturer hoped (it’s struggling). One of the reasons attributed to the slow start has been the lack of cutting edge handsets that the service has been available on (makes sense; without phones to use it on, what’s the point?).

We reported last week that Nokia is also understood to be preparing to offer Comes With Music on new N96 handsets (with no plan to update existing customers, which caused quite a bit of anger, no doubt).

No final price has been set in the UK as of yet.