Nick Mason doesn’t want his new band Saucerful of Secrets to get "too big".
The Pink Floyd drummer is currently on tour performing the iconic progressive rock band’s records ‘A Saucerful of Secrets’ and ‘The Piper at the Gates of Dawn’, which featured the group’s late singer-and-guitarist, Syd Barrett – who died of cancer in 2006 at the age of 60 – and he’s admitted he’s "concerned" they could get too popular and "risk" becoming a commodity rather than a fun project.
In an interview with The Guardian newspaper, he admitted: "I’m concerned it doesn’t become too big.
"You don’t want it to get to the stage where the improvisation has to go out of the window because there’s too many people there and it seems like a risk."
The new band features Spandau Ballet’s Gary Kemp, Guy Pratt, Lee Harris and Dom Beken, and the rest of Pink Floyd have been supportive of the project, though bassist Guy says he doubts surviving member David Gilmour would fancy coming down to watch one of their shows
He said: "I’m fairly certain that the last thing David Gilmour wants to do with his evening is stand in the back room of a pub in Putney surrounded by 300 obsessive Pink Floyd fans."
Nick hadn’t realised just how ahead of his time Syd was when writing the songs on their earlier records, and when he listened back to 1972’s ‘Obscured By Clouds’ – which was written by himself and the group’s co-founder and former member Roger Waters – again he was amazed at how "modern" it sounded.
He said: "I hadn’t really examined these songs in 40-something years. It was a real eye-opener.
"Syd’s way of working and his writing, and some of the other things we did, you just think, ‘God, this has got such a modern feel to it.’
‘Obscured By Clouds’! You could take that to Ibiza."
Before their debut concert at Dingwalls in London in May, Nick hadn’t played live since Pink Floyd’s Live 8 appearance in London 13 years ago.
The recent shows were also Nick’s first live musical tour since he and David went on Pink Floyd’s ‘Division Bell Tour’ in 1994.
The Saucerful of Secrets continue their tour at London’s Roundhouse in Camden on September 24.
Nick Mason doesn’t want Saucerful of Secrets to get ‘too big’
