Absence makes the heart grow fonder. That’s certainly true of Dublin rock duo Kid Karate. It’s nearly a year since the talented twosome last performed on these shores and while the lack of Irish gigs pains us a little, we certainly can’t hold it against them considering they’re kicking ass all over America right now (oh, and they play a long-awaited home-town gig in a few weeks time at the Forbidden Fruit festival too, but more on that later). When we catch up with drummer Steven Gannon, he tells us that he’s relishing life on the road.

“Things are going great,” enthuses the sticksman. “We arrived in Chicago an hour ago. We’ve covered two-thirds of America at this stage and have driven from L.A. to San Francisco, then Portland, Seattle and Minneapolis. We’ve a couple more shows and then we’re back to LA for some meetings to finalise a few label things.”
With Irish fans all too aware that Kid Karate hold a black-belt in being awesome, we wonder what the reaction has been like to their thunderous live shows Stateside?
“Some cities are a law unto themselves. The music scenes can vary. All types of music are greatly appreciated over here though. It’s just amazing to be able to play in front of people you’ve never met and probably don’t have anything in common with bar music and you can connect with them on that level without even speaking the same language. It’s great to travel the world, play songs and see the sights.”
Speaking of sights, the band recently posted a pic of singer/guitarist Kevin Breen straddling a statue of Jimi Hendrix in Seattle on their Facebook page. What did Jimi do to deserve that?
“We were just paying homage to the man himself,” he laughs. “Kev is a big Hendrix fan so he thought it was only right to see the statue. Kurt Cobain is obviously a genius and a hero to many. Hendrix doesn’t seem to get much props when you’re actually in Seattle, even though he’s from there too [technically Cobain was from Aberdeen, 100 miles from Seattle). I think people forget about him. Kev wanted to go and give Jimi a little pat on the head and say thanks for inspiring him.
“We’ve gotten to do a few cool things on the tour,” he continues. “Our manager’s dad hooked us up with tickets for see the LA Lakers a few weeks ago. We were sitting in front of Chad Smith from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and I was so tempted to turn around and mock him over his seats because we were courtside and he was a bit behind us. I didn’t have the neck to do it though.”
Out on the road in support of their superb Lights Out EP, Steven tells us that he’s met a few other Irish bands on his current travels and there’s a real feeling of camaraderie among them all.
“It’s great seeing bands from back home. We were hanging out with the Wounds guys and Hozier at South By Southwest and caught up with the Le Galaxie lads in LA. It was great to see them. There's a really nice community vibe when you go over to play things like SXSW and CMJ. All the Irish bands
stick together and help each other out. It’s great to be a part of that.”
At the end of the month, Kid Karate come home for what’s sure to be an incendiary show at Forbidden Fruit and Steven tells us he’s counting down the hours, especially since the event popped the band’s festival cherry a few years back.
“It’s a year almost to the day since we played an Irish gig and I love that our first show since then is at this festival. A lot of our good friends have performed at Forbidden Fruit and there’s always a really great atmosphere. We played the first one three years ago when we were just starting out. They took a chance on us and it was fucking amazing. It was our first proper festival experience on a proper stage and we haven’t really looked back since.
“At the minute the Forbidden Fruit date is our only Irish show of the year,” he says finally. “It’s because we’re very lazy [laughs]. No, we’re not of course. We want to wait until we have a release date sorted for our album before we play a big show in Ireland. We’re thinking September-time but we’re
just hammering out the details right now. Hopefully we’ll have news for
you soon...”

Kid Karate play Forbidden Fruit on the Saturday