Kula Shaker are well and truly back with a new album, Natural Magick, set for release on 26 January 2024. Natural Magick will be the first album with the original lineup since 1999’s Peasants, Pigs & Astronauts. “We all agreed to make this album a Kula Shaker fan’s dream,” Crispian Mills told MetalTalk.
“These new songs came about in a very similar way to how we recorded our debut album K,” Crispian Mills told MetalTalk, “back when we were often the support act and only had half an hour to blow people away. If you can take the listener on a fantastical ride in under three minutes, there’s a thrill and excitement in that.”
The revitalized Kula Shaker welcomes back the Hammond organ and keyboard virtuoso, Jay Darlington, who spent a decade working with Oasis and the Gallagher brothers. This promises to be a triumphant return of the band’s iconic lineup, with Darlington, Crispian Mills on guitar and vocals, Alonza Bevan on bass and vocals, and Paul Winter-Hart on drums.
Following the release of the single Waves, there will be new music in the form of a new single, Indian Record Player, set for release on 13 October 2023. It is an exciting track and an immediately exciting slice of earworm that sits in style somewhere between K and Peasants, Pigs & Astronauts. The song, full of ’60s psych-rock inspiration, featured in the setlist for the band’s show at The 100 Club on 4 September 2023.
Indian Record Player will be accompanied by a Bollywood-inspired video directed by Mills, which features British bhangra artist Johnny Kalsi of the Dhol Foundation.
“Bollywood loves its characters to break into song at the drop of a hat,” Mills told us, “so we did that in an English curry house. We shot the video in Johnny’s friend’s restaurant, Mumbai Junction in Harrow. We had to stop at 6 pm as customers were coming in.”
Indian Record Player follows on the back of the first single, Waves, released in July 2023, a song which gained inspiration on a journey from Liverpool to Tokyo.
Mills says the return of Jay Darlington has led to the complete team back together from when they produced the multi-platinum-selling debut album K and began the journey that would provide the soundtrack to many people’s lives.
“It was one of those fortuitous moments of synchronicity,” Crispian says. “When we first reformed in 2007, Jay was still in Oasis, but at the end of last year, the intertwining paths of fate brought us back together. Also, around the same time, our original management team of Kev Nixon, who also co-produced the album with Crispian and Alonza, and Sarah Clayman took over again.
“So we’ve got the whole crew back together from when we made K. There’s an excitement and momentum you feed off in these situations. Two days after Jay did his first official gig back with us at Shepherd’s Bush Empire last December, we were in the studio recording new songs.”
Released on Strange Folk Records with distribution by Absolute, you can pre-order Natural Magick from here. Kula Shaker have European and Japan dates announced for 2024. More shows will be added soon.
Kula Shaker – Confirmed Tour Dates
28/09/2023 IT Teatro Cominale, Ferrara
22/10/2023 DE Berlin – Columbria Theater
23/10/2023 DE Hamburg – Uebel & Gefahrlich
25/10/2023 DE Cologne – Burgerhaus Stollwerck
26/10/2023 BE St Niklaas -De Casino
27/10/2023 FR Paris – Point Ephemere
13/02/2024 JP Big Cat, Osaka
14/02/2024 JP Diamond Hall, Nagoya
15/02/2024 JP EX Theatre, Tokyo
