Phil caught up with Rich from Karma to burn at their recent Birmingham show last week for a quick chat, covering everything from swarms of bees to the Lawnmower Man.

Thanks for taking the time to talk to us, brilliant show by the way too. Really enjoyed it. I was quite a late bloomer with you guys because the first time i saw you was at download last year.
Right right, when the bees attacked
Yes! What was all that about?
"Well they told us that because our base frequency was so low, that it woke up a swarm that was under ground and caused them to come out early."
I remember looking up at the sky and thinking 'is that a bunch of flies or.... oh no, it's bees!"
"they thought they needed a new home!"
It's such a cool thing to happen, just with the bands style of music, and there's a swarm of bees! Yeah i know, it's, well its crazy.

I asked a friend to sum up your music for me, and he described it that it rocks so hard, it's like a pair of dump trucks fucking..<
(laughs) well i can see the resemblance.... it sounds like a Bjork video.
It is kinda strange.

So hows it been with playing with Year Long Disaster? Obviously you've been doubling up on bass duties for this tour.
Yeah its easy. Year long only plays for half an hour, and it's a different kind of music, so it's not, its just different. When you're a bass player in a throw back rock band like that, it's just a little bit easier.

I'm with you. And with the new album. We're still not quite out yet are we?
No April 30th I guess...
What happened with that because it's had a few delays now hasn't it?
well, i dunno, it was supposed to be out for this tour so, we're disappointed naturally. I mean when that occurs we're touring with no new record out so..
Totally understandable. So you've got some people on this one too, John Garcia (Kyuss)
John Garcia is on there. Daniel Davies too (Year Long Disaster) who sang a song with us on-stage tonight. That song's on there. That's the single actually and there's a really killer video that just got finished for it too.
Cool. What's it like?
It's just evil. It's like lawnmower man. You remember that movie?
Totally! With the computers and the VR.. sort of like a Tron vibe too!
Yes! it's like Tron and Lawnmower Man and we beat them to it because ours is much better. Much better than what Hollywood could do with it.
Sweet buddy, I look forward to seeing that.

So how was it working with John (Garcia) as well?
Well, that material is the stuff we've put on from 1994. That was before Kyuss broke up. He was living with us for a couple of weeks in West Virginia, and we just did some songs together.
Excellent, i didn't realise it was this stuff, i thought it was new material.
yeah it's cool.

I just wanted to ask you as well, I've heard you talk about it in other interviews etc. About Myspace and the social networking music scene. But I wanted to ask you about Rock Band/ Guitar Hero. Have you ever been approached by that sort of thing?Not at all. We haven't. We'd love it but, but it's never really come about.
I mean, every time I play that game I'm just thinking about how this game needs 'twenty' on there. How awesome that would be...
I think they need Twenty on that game too. But that game will be passée by the time they decide to put us on it so...
Well i hope not. So lets keep hoping that something pans out.
Yeah, cool.

So what's next for the band too? US Tour next after this?
Yeah, then after that we're going to go on tour with The Sword in the US, then come back to the Europe with Monster Magnet.
Sweet, so that's one to look forward to.
Totally, we're actually also trying to organise with The Sword to come back and do a tour with them here, which I think would be bad ass.
Couldn't agree more. So any festival plans too?
Yeah we got a couple to do in August. We've got Year Long Disaster playing Download this year. But Year Long will actually be Karma To Burn.
How's that work?
Well, it'll be us three with Daniel singing. It'll be cool. we're writing a whole new set. <
that's really cool! Should be something with a little spin on it.
Yeah it'll be cool. I mean, we all live together; and we're looking forward to it.
Excellent. Well thanks for taking the time to talk to us Rich, and I wish you the best of luck with the rest of the tour. Look forward to seeing you again soon.

Interview by Phil Davies