LONDON (AP) – Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke says he turned down the chance to discuss climate change with Tony Blair because the British prime minister has “no environmental credentials.”

The charity Friends of the Earth, for which the singer is an ambassador, asked him to meet Blair.

But Yorke said Blair had no record of championing the environment and added that dealing with the governing Labour Party’s “spin doctors” made him feel ill.

“I got so stressed out and so freaked out about it. Initially when it came up I tried to be pragmatic,” Yorke told New Music Express magazine in an issue out Tuesday. “But Blair has no environmental credentials as far as I’m concerned.”

“It was like talking to Blair’s spin doctors. It was all getting weird. It was just obvious there was no point in meeting him anyway, and I didn’t want to,” he said.

Yorke says the experience has soured him on political activism.

“I came out of that whole period just thinking, I don’t want to get involved directly, it’s poison. I’ll just shout my mouth off from the sidelines.”

Yorke is backing Friends of the Earth’s Big Ask campaign, which is calling for international cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.

Radiohead will play a benefit concert for the campaign at London’s Koko Club on May 1. The band recently announced a club tour in England.

They have been working on new material for the follow up to their politically-themed 2003 disc, “Hail to the Thief.”

GRETNA, La. (AP) – The rapper who once went by the stage name of C-Murder has been put in a house arrest program to await a retrial on a second-degree murder charge.

Corey Miller was freed from jail Monday after posting $500,000 bond on the charge and meeting a $500,000 bond set by a judge in Baton Rouge on two unrelated charges of attempted murder.

Miller was put into a home incarceration program, said Col. John Fortunato, a spokesman for the Jefferson Parish sheriff. During house arrest, Miller will wear a monitor so that authorities can track his whereabouts. He is restricted to his home and can only leave for court-approved appointments with his attorneys.

Miller, 35, is charged with the fatal shooting of Steve Thomas, 16, on Jan. 12, 2002, during a fight at a now-closed nightclub in Harvey.

A jury convicted Miller, who faced a mandatory life prison sentence without parole, but a judge tossed the conviction after ruling that prosecutors hid the criminal backgrounds of some state witnesses from the defense.

Authorities in Baton Rouge allege that Miller tried to shoot a nightclub owner and a security guard on Aug. 14, 2001, after he was told he would have to be searched before entering the club.

Since his legal problems began, Miller has changed his stage name to C-Miller.

SOUTH RUSSELL, Ohio (AP) – A ceramic bowl painted by Richard Pryor raised $7,099 in an online auction benefiting an Ohio animal rights group.

The bowl, in which Pryor painted a self-portrait before he died, was sold to GoldenPalace.com, an Internet-based casino company known for buying items online for charity and publicity.

Pryor sent the bowl to the Geauga Humane Society weeks before his death on Dec. 10. The actor-comedian, who was 65, died of a heart attack. He had been ill for years with multiple sclerosis.

The portrait was surrounded by the painted words, “Little Black Man in Big White World.” The side of the bowl has Pryor’s signature and drawings of a martini glass, lips and a cigarette.

“Richard and I were both there in spirit and I know he did everything he could to help the auction along,” Pryor’s widow, Jennifer, said in a statement. “I couldn’t be more delighted that he’s still helping animals.”