Few English bands have cracked into the American jamband scene, but the Leeds-based quartet The New Mastersounds has found a home in the improvisation-heavy musical community. On Friday, May 1, The New Mastersounds will make their debut performance at Workplay. Currently, the band is on tour in support of its recently-released album Plug & Play (Vagrant Records). Recently, the Weekly’s Brent Thompson spoke to guitarist Eddie Roberts by phone.

BT: Eddie, thanks for your time today. If you will, talk about the evolution of Plug & Play.

ER: It was a pretty quick process – a studio-based process. Once a year, we go into the studio and develop things from there. You try not to spend too long to keep them fresh. I think that’s how you capture energy in music – when things are lying around for ages, you’re sick of it when you record it.

BT: Obviously, technology plays an important role in today’s music industry. Some artists feel the impact is positive and others feel that it’s difficult to separate yourself from the abundance of artists. How do you see the balance in technology?

ER: Having done it for 20 years, there was no access or distribution in the early years. When the Internet started taking off, you could actually compete with labels because you could get your stuff out there – people could find it rather than it being dictated by major labels. I definitely think it’s a positive thing – it’s definitely helped us. I can see why some people find that it’s a little too much, but if the quality’s there, it’ll rise to the top anyway.

BT: The jamband scene is a broad scene – styles from Bluegrass to Electronica seem to fall under its name. I assume the common undercurrent within the scene is improvisation. How do you feel about your band’s association with the scene?

ER: Before we came to the U.S. – which was about four years ago – we’d never heard of the jamband scene. I’d never heard of Phish and Widespread Panic. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was because the genres were so spread out. In Europe, it’s much more specialized. If you play funk, you only play in a funk club. We came here and there’s a rock or bluegrass band on before us (laughs). It was really quite an eye-opener for us. Basically, people just love live music in America. As long as it’s good, it doesn’t matter what specific genre it is.

DJ Logic & Moon Taxi will open the 9 p.m. show. Tickets to the all-ages show are $12 – $15 day of the show – and can be purchased at www.workplay.com or by calling 380-4082.