Adrian Edmondson needs no introduction, but we'll do one for you anyway. You all know him from his Young Ones and Bottom days, and you should have seen him dancing so elegantly for Lets Dance for comic relief. One thing you may not know is that he is an incredibly talented musician. We caught up with him before he sets off on a 20 show tour with his newest project, The Idiot Bastard Band.

R13: Thanks for speaking to us! Could you introduce T.I.B.B to us?
AE It's myself, Phil Jupitus who you probably know, Neil Innes who you should know! He's from the Bonzo Dog Dudah Band and is the honorary 7th Python. Finally Rowland Rivron who's been a general idiot on the television for the past couple of years.

R13: What brought you all together?
AE I did! I've always had a love for comedy music. The first album I ever bought when I was 10 was a Val Doonican record with 4 Irish comedy songs on it. I've always had this strange collection of comedy songs in my head and I lived with Rowland when I first moved to London with Simon Brint. We used to record a lot together and make up ridiculous songs for our own amusement. Spool on a few years and Phil and I did the Bonzo Dog 40th anniversary tour. We all knew each other and we sat having tea one day and decided why not?

R13: How did you get going?
AE We started off with a residency in the back room of a pub that held about 50 people and we did that over a few months every Monday night. The rule was you all had to bring a new song every week, which built our repertoire very quickly! It was always kind of done in the sense of a live rehearsal, so you'd turn up and hand people bits of paper with chords on it. If you can play music, you can play music and people just seem to get it.

R13: You mentioned that the decision to do this was made over tea and biscuits, is this going to be a rock and roll tour behind the scenes or a cream tea with mates tour?
AE We are going to do an awful lot of shagging, I'm going to ride Phil like a rented mule. Then I think Rowland's got Neil for the first week... I enjoy a cup of beer from time to time and we intend to have fun.

R13: Who is the biggest joker in the pack?
AE Rowland has always been the risk taker. I've been with him in a theatre where he threw himself off the balcony in the foyer. I kind of caught him, Rik Mayel was with me and we sort of grabbed him in time but he was drunk enough to do it! We used to do early tours with The Comic Strip and The Young Ones. Rowland was in the band for both and he loved to crawl around the outside of hotels many stories up to knock on people's windows, to surprise them. We also used to have a game where you rolled into a ball and down the stairs of a hotel, it's great when there's lots of old people around you just stand up and shout who left that bottle there? And walk off!

R13: You've changed style a lot throughout your career, going from punk to folk and now into more comedic music. Do you see yourself as one style more than another?
AE I've never really seen myself as a comedian, I like to think that I pedal joy. I'm after maximum joy for myself and everyone else, unless you're being annoying!

R13: You played Glastonbury with the Bad Sheppards, but your small shows with The Idiot Bastard band went down very well. Which do you prefer to play?
AE The best gig I've ever done of any kind was with the Bad Sheppards at the beautiful days festival in Devon. I'd quite like to do that again! Everyone was on form and the thing about live entertainment is the crowd have to want it as well. You can't force a load of sceptics; everyone needs to want to have fun. Most audiences do, once you've paid the money to go see something most people just want to have a good time and we try to grab that and do something with it. It's a bit of a pisser if you've turned up and you don't really want to be there!

R13: All the videos I've seen suggest a real atmosphere at Idiot Bastard gigs, what kinds of audiences are you getting?
AE We get the strangest audience I've ever seen. From 16-70 year olds. I don't know who they are or what we do that grabs their attention, but those who do come just seem to get it. They'll see those 4 people and they'll see the instruments we play and think I'll like that I'm coming! I like that they are usually surprised in a good way. They are usually surprised at just how good we are musically. Neil especially is good at everything he plays and Rowland is an ex national jazz orchestra drummer! Phil's a bit crap but we cover for him.

R13: A lot of your songs seem to be influenced from simple encounters in life, On a Train in particular had me in stitches. Is this where you find your motivation?
There's a nice new song actually called The Drunk Who Fell Upon Arriving Beastly. It is a song about the feeling you have when you arrive at your door at 4 in the morning and you've forgotten your key and have to wake up your wife to get in. Some funny songs come out of the ether, you can't do a course to write a funny song, it just happens and you can't force it.

R13: You won a best video MTV award in the 80's and have been involved with music for years, how has your song development process changed?
AE I now use a wonderful application on the Ipad called Studio mini XL. It's a little 8-track recorder that I use as a notepad to write with. In fact today Rowland sent me over some vocals via the net and I'm trying to add the guitar to it. You can put down ideas so you don't forget them and in the modern age when everyone's quite busy it's a great way to keep developing ideas while were off doing other things.

R13: Finally before you go, The BBC recently announced the return of the Bottom characters in a new series set in an old peoples home. The last time we saw you and Rick together on TV was your now infamous Swan dance for dance for comic relief. Will we ever see you dance like that again?
AE They'll be plenty of dancing on this tour, I hope! Rowland won that the bastard! I do like dancing, if I had the time I'd do it an hour a day. Elegant violence is my motto! The violence we did in those days had an element of elegance that real fights just don't have!

The Idiot Bastard Band tour starts on November 1st at the Buxton Opera House, Adrian Edmondson will return to your TV screens in Hooligans Island in 2013.