Waiting for Bill Wyman, I’m running through all the things he might tell me about: tales of excess from his 30 years as bassist in the biggest rock‘n’roll band in the world; performing with some of the greatest names in the music business; his sideline in photography; the restaurants he’s opened; or his solo career and his time with his band the Rhythm Kings.

What I didn’t expect we’d end up talking animatedly about at length was metal detecting. But Bill loves it and can often be seen around his village, Gedding near Bury St Edmunds, looking for artefacts as research for the history of his country house, Gedding Hall.

“I’m writing a book on it,“ says the 76-year-old, who is performing next week at the Barbican. “It’s a 15th Century manor house with a moat, it used to have a drawbridge, and I started to use a metal detector to find out stuff in the grounds and in the local area, and I’ve built up the history of the place.

“I do it more as a history thing than to find treasure to make me rich!“ Bill has uncovered about 400 Roman coins and found a Roman site in the middle of the village, and has also found a lot of “Saxon stuff“. He has even designed a patented Bill Wyman signature metal detector.

“I’ve been working on the book for 20 years,“ he laughs. “Every time I think it’s finished, we discover something else amazing which has to go in. For instance, we discovered a brick kiln where they made the bricks that built my house, so that became a big project. And then someone sent me a smock that the cow hands used to use, all decorated with embroidery, and it turned out to belong to someone in my house. People send me stuff all the time, so the book keeps getting longer.

“I’m editing it now and it’ll be out next year. Maybe.“ We’re speaking just after Bill has been presented with a Blues Legend award from the Great British R&B Festival in Colne and just as he is about to receive a BASCA Golden Badge Award from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors in recognition of his outstanding contribution to music.

Bill is reluctant to be drawn away from talk of his beloved archaeology, but soon warms to speaking of his other love, music.

“It’s very nice to receive awards, but I just think of myself as a bloke, a dad, as someone who goes out and works. When you get these things it really surprises you but it’s also an honour, but it always slightly embarrasses me, I get a bit shy about it.“ Bill’s lifelong contribution to music began when he joined The Rolling Stones in 1962. He started solo projects in the 1970s before leaving the Stones in 1993 and forming Bill Wyman’s Rhythm Kings in 1997.

“I only formed the band to make records, I didn’t even think about touring,“ Bill admits. “I wanted to do a variety of records of all kinds of music from the past, the ‘20s or ‘70s or ‘50s, it didn’t matter who did it or what style it was, if it was a good song we’d do it.

“I cut about 60 or 70 songs that year with a whole variety of musicians and when I got a record deal they said ‘We’d like you to tour’, and that was it. We’ve been going on tour every year ever since.“ The Rhythm Kings feature Bill’s life-long musical partner Terry Taylor and musicians such as Georgie Fame, Eddie Floyd, Albert Lee and Martin Taylor as touring members, and has featured such names as Paul Carrack, Eric Clapton, Peter Frampton, George Harrison and Mark Knopfler in the studio.

Having dutifully answered all my questions about his music, Bill now has a further 12 journalists to speak to before he’s finished for the day. While he’s an old pro at this interviewing business, I can’t help but feel that we’re all getting in the way of him getting back out there in the fields with his metal detector.

  • Bill Wyman’s Rhythm Kings are at Barbican, Silk Street, EC2, on November 25 at 7.30pm. Details: 020 7638 4141 barbican.org.uk