King Creosote, the Mercury Prize-nominated, Fence record label-creating folk-star is back.

After a gap of seven years, Fife’s Kenny Anderson returned this week with a new KC album, I DES.

Why did it take seven years to make?

In the aftermath of 2016’s Astronaut Meets Appleman album I felt I’d maybe over-egged the acoustic epic pudding and put home recording on to the back burner.

Gogs Maclean was keen to re-record a live version of my 2003 Psalm Clerk album up at An Tobar.

When we got to Mull, August 2018 or thereabouts, I’d gone off the idea, so we recorded four newish songs, one of which Des Lawson went back to during the boredom of the first lockdown, and Walter de la Nightmare became the unwitting start of a new album.

In August 2020 I became addicted to modular synth modules, and this may account for my lack of new songs since.

Instead of songs, I have amassed hours and hours, hundreds of hours, of what the modular synth enthusiasts call “patches”, recorded on to cassette.

Blue Marbled Elm Trees from the new album is a joy. What was the inspiration and are the girls in the song your daughters?

I took a year out in 2017 to celebrate turning 50, playing 50 gigs in my local boozer,
the then-named East Neuk Hotel.

I had planned to revisit my back catalogue start to end, but it was Paul Savage at Chem19 who suggested I take this opportunity to kill off King Creosote altogether, start afresh on the other side.

That got me thinking about my ideal funeral… The girls are indeed my three daughters, and the elm has been my favourite tree variety since the Langlands Primary School gym teacher put me in the house team of Elm.

We usually made second or third place, good training for the years ahead.

Did being nominated for Mercury Prize for your album Diamond Mine with Jon Hopkins help your career in 2011?

Jon made the remark that winning the Mercury was often the kiss of death for a band, but in our case, it was the losing of it. He went on to play with Coldplay immediately after and it was Chris Martin’s kind words that probably made as big a difference.

I reckon losing the Mercury is worth way more than winning any of the copy cats.

How do you find streaming?

I haven’t streamed a note, not once. I miss Groucho’s in Dundee more with each month that passes as I gave up my internet in 2018, and that put paid to Amazon purchases, and my mobile got binned in 2021 once my eldest daughter worked out how to save my Two Dots progress using her Facebook account.

Is streaming worth it for artists? Probably once you hit the billions of streams I reckon. I’ve a fair bit to go until I alight the gravy train, several millennia at the last count.

You launched Fence back in the 90s. Are you proud of the acts you helped through the years like KT Tunstall?

I am immensely proud of the silliness of our live events, starting in Aikman’s Bar & Bistro in 1997, and the gang mentality among fans and bands alike when it came to Homegames and Halloween dos. KT was well on her way, likewise James Yorkston, by the time we figured out how to run a website. They helped us get off the starting blocks.

You met KT when she was 16. Did you know she would do well?

Apart from her skills with voice and guitar, I was struck by how Kate could charm and command the room, two things I daren’t even try in my grown up mid-20s. I still relied on a band back then to batter an audience into submission, and balked at the idea of playing solo.

Plans for the rest of the year?

After this month’s gigs I don’t think there’s anything to be done until late January. I for one am content with my nursery school pick-ups and dad duties, the odd 80s DJ set or spinning wonky tape loops at a JAMP night.

I know where I’m hoping to go next, but my lyrics have become very political and accusatory, unsubtle to the point of not sounding like King Creosote sentiments at all. A new monicker might get me through this patch, we’ll see.

Are you celebrating your quarter of a century, since debut solo album, in any way with a dram or a tour?

King Creosote reaches the grand old age of 30 in December 2024. I’m going to hold off for that landmark.

Optimistic given the way of the world these days I know. We could all use a dram right now, and that from somebody who cannot stomach the stuff.

www.kingcreosote.com.