“Whats crackin? This is JJ Peters from the band Deez Nuts we’re here at Punk Rock Holiday in Slovenia.”

You guys have been in Europe for quite a while now, what are some of the highlights?

JJ: Its kinda blurry at this point, its been the better part of 3 months for me. I was in Europe with family and then we did a 5 week leg, had 3 weeks off and now we’re on the second leg. So it gets a bit blurred along the way. But I would say some of the stand outs were right at the start of the first leg – Greenfield and Nova Rock which we did with Amity was really awesome.

Greenfield is amazing…

JJ: Greenfield is cool, just the location alone is mind blowing. I mean when you rock up and there’s hills surrounding you and shit, its very cool, aesthetically speaking and the festival itself. There’s been a bunch of cool club shows. In this run we played Wacken Festival for the first time and that was just like ticking the box man. It claims to be the biggest metal festival in the world, I don’t know if that is factual or not but it’s definitely very, very big. So that was cool just to be invited in the first place and then playing was awesome.

Do you run into many Aussie bands overseas?

JJ: We did a short run as well as a few festivals with Amity and Thy Art which was awesome. I mean whenever you get to hang out with mates from back home at festivals its great. There was also a little pocket there in the middle: Sweden, Austria and Germany side shows with Amity as a package that was really cool. It was great to get away from the festivals and have a tight knit package, get into some sort of routine and hang out with familiar faces. We’ve bumped into a few other people but as I mentioned it starts to get a bit blurry.

This is my second time in Europe doing festivals and I’m amazed at just how high the Aussie bands are billing. Parkway are headlining Rockstadt and Amity are everywhere for example.

JJ: Yeah Parkway have been smashing it out here for as long as I can remember. But obviously it grows and grows for them. It never surprises me to see them headline the bigger festivals. Even more mainstream festivals they are very high up there. Which is cool for everyone from Australia cos it forges a path for us to get in the door.

And then you’ve got bands like Airbourne that aren’t really…

JJ: Doing much at home but they killing it out here. We did Greenfield with them a few years ago and hung out with them a few times since, they’re a really good group. It seems they have grappled (well I cant speak on their behalf) but it seems they have a grapple with the fact that their not getting much attention back home but killing it over here. But we’re kind of in the same boat. I mean Australia is not bad for us but its not like it is out here. Europe seems to be a more loyal and a more consistent fan base at least for us and a few other bands we’ve been on tour with. It seems if you put the work in over here, if you have a strong fan base from the early days it continues to grow and the same people will be there 9 years down the line whereas in other parts of the world it seems a little more like people are looking for the next thing. “I’ve seen them a bunch of times, fuck that.” Whereas in Europe they are like “I’ve seen them a bunch of times cant wait to see them next year.”

So what’s next for you guys?

The rest of this year is not super packed. We have the rest of this Europe run, straight after we have South East Asia and then at the end of the year we will be in New York for a month writing the new album. In December we will be recording in Boston with Andrew from Comeback Kid. So pretty much exactly the same formula as the last album.

Good luck JJ.

Thanks mate.