MUSIC: Steve Mason

The former Beta Band member talks to Jeff Hemmings

With The Beta Band, Steve Mason, along with Gordon Anderson, released three acclaimed and top 20 albums, before parting ways in 2004. Steve subsequently released music under various monikers including King Biscuit Time and Black Affair before releasing the Boys Outside album in 2009 under his own name.

Earlier this year he followed up with the excellent Monkey Minds In The Devil’s Time, a more overtly political album, but still full of carefully crafted and inventive vignettes. Referring to the album’s title Mason says: “Half of it is a buddhist expression; to have a ‘monkey mind’ is an expression a buddhist would use, a mind that finds it difficult to concentrate and gets easily distracted.

‘The devil’s time’ alludes to the grip that the worldwide establishment is throttling all of us with, things like television, consumer capitalism, advertising, all these objects we are distracted by: Saturday night TV, war, fear… fear is sold to us on a daily basis, distracting us from the real enemy which is, in this country, what I would call the establishment, which is primarily made up of banks, the energy companies, the arms industry…”

Strong words from Mason, but most definitely heartfelt, and a breath of fresh air in a politically stale music scene that, despite all that is going on around us, is by and large throwing its collective hands up in the air in resignation. “I try and follow world affairs – the hard part is finding some semblance of truth, you have to get your news sources from as many places as possible, to get some picture that resembles the truth.

“When I was growing up there was a lot of politics around, almost every scene and every group you were into had some kind of political affiliation, not always overtly like The Redskins, but a lot of these groups had these beliefs that came across in interviews, and they took an interest in things like the miners’ strike.

But that completely disappeared. Along with a friend, we started a thing where we are trying to find out what Fife council are proposing with fracking. It’s little things that, even though it’s just two people meeting Fife Council every now and then. But it’s always better to do something rather than nothing at all. Always.”

Mason is enjoying a renaissance of sorts, Monkey Minds… being his most successful record since The Beta Band. “I’m lucky to have put out two albums in a row which are good… I had massive support form BBC 6 music, and I’ve got a great record label and management. I’m in a much better situation now, than I was after the Beta Band. That was a spectacularly dark period! Mentally, I’m as a fit as a fiddle, I can pay all my bills, and put food on the table. I’ve still not had to get a job, I’m still making music…”

Steve Mason, Concorde 2, Tuesday 29 October, 7.30pm, £16