Mark Gardener and Goldrush played Liverpool Barfly on Monday 2nd June.

In this unique tour Goldrush play a full set of their own, followed by Mark playing a few songs acoustically before being rejoined by Goldrush who will back him on a mixture of solo material, Ride classics and a few other surprises.

BBC Liverpool caught up with Mark Gardener.

How did the tour with Goldruush come about?

I came back to England in December, and a friend of mine said you must come see Goldrush. I thought they were great and they realised Iwas about to launch into my Neil Young part of life and said "If u need a backing band...?" So it worked out really well.

They'll be another big Oxford band I'm sure. I'm not a control freak and I've always enjoyed being in groups and for now it's working really well for both of us.

They do a full set, then I come on and do a few acoustic numbers including Ride stuff, then they come on, and we do some of the newer stuff we've been doing.

Do you still enjoy playing Ride material?

Well I had a lot of time away from it, straight after '96. And then I've been touring America and that blew me away. I didn't realise that Ride and all those bands were really big out there. It was great and 'cos Ihad time away I can now look back and embrace it and feel proud of it.

Straight after Ride I got involved with Paul Oakenfold and people in London and made some tracks, and we were going to put a band together but that didn't come through, then I made an album in Oxford and put together a band called The Animal House but that all fell through. So after that I was disenchanted and went to India and France, and became a hermit and got back into just playing the guitar and writing again.

How much new material do you have

I've got enough for an album but I want to write more so I can throw some away. It's just a matter of getting it all together now.

What are you listening to at the moment?

Well Eminem's playing in the background. There's Supergrass I love their new album, Coldplay obviously. Then there's Cinematic Orchestra. and odd country stuff that i've always been into, and the old classics, you never go a month without putting a Beatles record on.