Two decades of music is a long legacy to live up to, but when Kula Shaker realised their debut album was about to celebrate it’s twentieth anniversary, they knew they had to mark the moment with something new. “It came as a bit of a surprise,” frontman Crispian Mills states, matter of factly. “We hadn’t noticed it. But once we’d got our chairs off the floor – having fallen off our chairs – we made a plan.”

That plan culminates in the arrival of ‘K 2.0’, a new record commemorating and continuing the band’s impressive history. “I hadn’t played a gig in five years,” the frontman admits. “The only gigs I’d been playing were in a front room, on my acoustic guitar, for my kids. ‘Infinite Sun’ is something I’ve been mucking around with for years, and the boys started singing it in the car, so I thought if they like it…”

Travelling from different countries, the process of getting the band back together wasn’t as simple as it might sound. “As long as you’re all in the room playing music, everything’s fine, but getting everyone in the room starts to become more complicated.” As for what difficulties they faced finding time together, “Alonza lives in the middle of a forest in Belgium. He’s always out chopping wood and things like that,” Crispian chuckles. “The channel tunnel helps.”

Recorded over six months in 2015, the new album sees Kula Shaker take the formula with which they first achieved success, and reinvent it in a brand new era. “I think there’s a sense of it being something you already know, but better,” Crispian ponders of the thought process naming the record. “We always thought about having an album called ‘K2’, but I think ‘K 2.0’ was more relevant. The idea that Kula Shaker is obsolete, and the built in obsolescence, reboot and update, it’s all in there. We were all having fun with it.”

With the recording studio split across two countries, the band certainly had their fair share of enjoyment. “There’s a great analogue studio in London called State Of The Art, we did a lot of work there. We also worked in Alonza’s old barn in the Belgian forest. There was a lot of mice, and bats, and hedgehogs in this place, but it’s cheap, and you don’t have the time pressure, so we got a lot done there too.”

Working on their first album in five years, the band put in some of everything they know. “A little bit of prep for that was everybody digging around in the bottom drawer for old songs. It’s about life, death, love, emancipation… The usual,” Crispian laughs. “Kula Shaker have always been about the journey. I think the spiritual journey gives the worldly journey meaning. It’s always been an integral part of what we do and why we do it. And it’s always been fun. The only times it’s ever stopped being fun, we split up.”

Ever-conscious of their motivations, there was no doubt that getting back together was the right thing to do. “It’s a proper band, so it’s more like a family. You just slip back into it.” Indeed, they might have gone their separate ways in the past, but Kula Shaker have a bond that time can’t dissolve. “This band has stayed together because we go back so long, and we all appreciate each other. It’s very lonely being a solo artist,” Crispian continues. “I’ve been a solo artist, and it’s not as much fun, to be honest. The sum is greater than the individual parts. It’s not about one person, a band is about something that unifies you. That’s something that’s carried on since we were kids.”

Once Kula Shaker were playing together once more, the creativity that followed seemed only natural. “We had a very definite deadline to deliver the album by,” the band recall. “Sometimes a deadline like that can really frighten everybody, but it created a lot of focus and energy. We managed to get it together, and it turned out great.”

Indeed, the first single from the record, ‘Infinite Sun’, does seem to signal a return to form. “It’s full circle!” Crispain exclaims. “I think it’s back where we started, but with a whole new cycle of influences and experiences. I tend to think of time as being circular, rather than linear. I do think that everybody goes through cycles, in their day, and bigger cycles through their life. This is definitely one such circle for us, where we return to the beginning again with all of that experience.”

A lot can happen in twenty years, but Kula Shaker still retain the same values they always have. “The world hasn’t changed that much. The ideas that are out there, and what’s important to people, and what it means to be human – nothing has changed. The same things worry us, and the same things inspire us. But I think the world has broadened out, and is more open to ideas. The internet has opened up information.”

“There’s a certain psychosis that’s going on as well, that has become a bit more acute,” Crispian expands. “It’s the sense that whilst we’re all connected, we’re also overloaded. Everybody’s conscious of that, and I think we have to stay conscious of that, and not become overwhelmed and disconnected, ironically.” For Kula Shaker, music is a crucial aspect of their human connection. “Music, and playing live, has become, strangely, even more relevant, even thought the music industry has kind of collapsed,” they say. “People want to come together, people need to come together, and music is still one of those things that keeps us going.”

The connection the band and fans feel with their music is as important for Kula Shaker as it is for their audience. “I’m not very good at being objective about our band,” the frontman starts, “but I know how it feels at gigs. I get that feedback from the audience. I think the bottom line is it’s a real band. It’s a real band that can play and are channelling, I guess what you could call ‘the good side of the force’. That’s what we’re in to, and I think that people get off on that.”

“We tend to have a lot of really weird, strange fans as well,” the band laugh, “which we’ve always liked. It’s our badge of honour. We don’t know what’s going to happen every gig. We don’t play the same set and we don’t play every song the same every night, so it always feels fresh. We get to actually connect with the audience as well, it’s great.”

Playing a different set every night doesn’t seem so surprising when you take into account the vast layers of instrumentation that Kula Shaker incorporate into their songs. “To get the band sounding great live, and to record those live performances, is not an easy thing,” Crispian debates. “You talk to any band who go into the studio, there’s a certain challenge. It’s not always as simple as just sticking a mic on a band. To create the live sound and the live energy is a trick, and requires all kind of things from mic placement to psychology. But I think we really have learned the way that sounds best for this band, and I think the band sounds really exciting in a lot of places on the album.”

The album might not have been recorded as live, but it does take a lot of inspiration from the performance setting. “I think rock and roll does tend to sound better going through a desk,” Crispian expresses. “ProTools, Logic… All that software is incredibly convenient, and you can fake it, but when you hear a band mic’ed up with good mics, it has a warmth. You can’t beat it.”

Recreating those songs live on stage continues to prove a challenge. “There’s a lot of ingenuity and creative decisions. I’ve seen some good bands play gigs, but they’re just playing the album really loud. I much prefer it when it’s a different presentation, completely different to the record and just as good. I did have a conversation this morning with Alonza – one of those ‘how the fuck are we going to do that?’ type conversations. And I left it with him. Don’t worry, he’ll think of something.”

With tour dates planned through the remained of the year, Kula Shaker seem to be erring on the side of permanence once again. As for where the band think they stand? “I’ve no idea, really,” the frontman shrugs. “We might write a whole album on the road. We may be desperate to get into the studio by August.” Their future might be uncertain, but there’s no doubt the band are happy where they find themselves right now. “The first part of our mission was to make sure this album sounded great. Now we’ve done that, we feel like whatever happens next is going to be good, and whatever happens naturally will be just the way it should be. We won’t try and force it.”

‘K 2.0’ is released on 12th February.