Steve Mason

Concorde 2, Madeira Drive, Brighton, Thursday, February 11

FORMER Beta Band frontman Steve Mason is back with arguably his most upbeat-sounding album yet: Meet The Humans.

Duncan Hall spoke to the new Brighton resident about moving to the city, and the making of his third solo album.

The Guide: What made you want to head south?

Steve Mason: There’s rarely any thinking behind what I do. I’m from Scotland and had moved back there after spending ten years in London. I was literally living in the woods in Fife.

I came back off tour one time, walked back in the house and thought “What am I doing here?” I was literally the weirdo in the woods. I thought it was time for a change.

Why Brighton?

Whenever I came to play Brighton I always got a good vibe from the place. I used to go on scooter rallies years ago so I’ve been to most British seaside resorts and like them all for different reasons. Some have a faded glory, some are like hell-holes, but Brighton has been looked after. It gets a lick of paint now and then, although the bit between the pier and Concorde 2 needs a bit of work. I like the Victorian feel, and it’s such a nice mix of people. Everyone is so relaxed. It’s everything I liked about London transported down here and put by the sea. The people are decent – they aren’t ambitious maniacs like in London.

How much of the album was written here?

To be honest a lot of the album was written before I moved down here. I finished recording it in June last year, so it has been sitting around for a while waiting for the right time to get it out. I wrote three or four songs here. The next album will be the Brighton album – whatever that might be. Packed with references to vegetables perhaps.

The new album sounds much more upbeat, although there is a darkness to lyrics like Water Bored.

I have always tried to do that. In The Beta Band we had quite frivolous melodies going on, and then lyrics that were quite frightening.

My solo stuff is a bit dark in places, but I guess the music got a bit lighter. The lyrics aren’t really dark any more – they’re quite serious, but compared to what I’m capable of it’s not as bad. I feel different these days.

They are so much more to play live too – it’s nice to do something with a little bit of tempo, rather than ponderous dark songs. I feel a bit more on top of things, a bit more positive about my life, although not necessarily about the world in general.

Is it partly down to that theme running through the album of meeting people? Is it harder to be negative in a crowd?

I was a master of being negative in a crowd! I used to make the crowd feel miserable. I think it’s more having shirked off the dark I’m able to appreciate the crowd and people. Coming down here has been really good as everyone is so welcoming. I feel more able to conduct a social life, go out down the pub and meet people.

Where did the title Meet The Humans come from?

I was in The Monty [in Montpelier Place, Brighton] which is run by Mick Robinson, a good friend of mine. We were having this conversation about moving to Brighton – I was saying it was about time I came out of the woods to meet the humans. He smiled and I thought that’s it. I’m going to take him the album when it’s done so he can stick it on the wall.

How different was making this album to 2013’s politically themed Monkey Minds In The Devil’s Time?

Quadrophenia is one of my favourite records, and I really like Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake and Chill Out by The Orb. I like that you can put them on and have a long experience, linked together by bits in between songs. I’ve always had a fascination with what’s going on all over the world.

People have frustrations about what’s going on in the country, with capitalism and democracy, and ask what they can do about it. My medium is music, so I felt compelled to nail my colours to the mast. I ended up with a pro-anarchist, post-scarcity political concept album – although the over-riding message of the album was one of love and compassion for your fellow human beings. These are the most important things. We are all human beings, we are all connected – and one day we will all be called to account, although not by me fortunately.

How does Meet The People contrast with that album?

With this album I wanted to get a really good collection of songs together, which were all quite different from each other but all hung together. There are lots of examples like The Stone Roses’ first album. I’ve had a long time to listen to it and it works well as a whole thing.

It seems to feature a lot of different aspects of the Steve Mason sound.

That’s who I am – I’m the Beta Biscuit Time Man with a touch of Black Affair. It’s whether we choose to enhance them or try to dilute them. I don’t want to become a pastiche of myself – that wouldn’t be fun.

You never wanted to slot into a genre?

I always felt the reason why The Beta Band was such a mad band was that we never wanted to be tied down with anything. We always let our imagination go mad. If you’re lucky enough to make a living out of your art you owe it to everyone including yourself to let your imagination go beserk.

Whether it is painting, or music, or sculpture there should never be any barrier between your heart, head and medium. I always try to make sure it’s straight from the heart.

Are you enjoying having total control over your work?

Anything made by committee is always, in my opinion, completely worthless. That is what is great about working with [record label] Domino. Once every two years they will call me up and say: “New album?” and I’ll say: “S***!” and work like mad for six or seven months. They want to hear the demos to make sure I’m not just recording white noise, but I’ve not got the pressure of a band like Coldplay.

Are you happy with Domino?

I like having a label like that. A lot of labels don’t have anyone in control – they don’t know what they’re doing. They don’t listen to the artist.

I was talking to a guy who was managing a young woman, who is 20 or something like that. He was looking into getting her a deal, and I was telling him to be careful. If she signed to a major label they would try to change her. This girl is really talented, she writes her own stuff and looks amazing. They would ruin what she has and drop her – leaving her sat there going: “what was that?”.

In the mess the music industry is in now the artist should be in control.

How much has the industry changed in the last 20 years?

There’s so little money in the industry now – the labels need you to go off and record, and return with a fully formed album. It saves them money, and it shows you’re committed and prepared to do the work.

What did Elbow’s Craig Potter bring as producer?

I’m lucky as a solo artist I can play most instruments and take the demos to a pretty much finished standard. When you’ve been doing it for a long time you’re used to getting your own way, and everyone looking to you to be in control of every single situation.

What I’m used to is going into the recording studio with the demos to make them into better quality. Craig spent a long time looking at each song and really listening to it. He came up with a couple of ideas for some changes and I was quite excited by them – they weren’t things I would have come up with. With the song Hardly Go Through the demo was driven by a drum machine, it was a normal 4/4 drum beat. I could see there was a good song there, but it wasn’t particularly inspiring. He said to take it into this Velvet Underground type sound, make it a bit harder, and he got Joe Duddell to do some strings. It suddenly became really different.

Craig and I clicked immediately – in terms of creative decisions it was very easy as we were both working towards the same thing.

Doors 7.30pm, tickets £16. Call 01273 673311.