Features

The Dead Krazukies, the melodic punks from the South of France, are back with their highly anticipated new album, 'From The Underworld,' out now on SBÄM Records. It sees the band building and expanding on the sound they had established with 'Icarus,' adding even more metallic crunch this time around while staying true to their 90's Epi/Fat worship. We caught up with the band for a talk about the new album, being from a small town in the South of France and their take on the 80s classic 'Maniac'.

PRT: Congrats on the album. It sounds great!

Thanks so much, we are super happy too!

PRT: Your last album, ''Icarus'', was released during the pandemic without any chance to tour on it. What was that like for a band that is still trying to get their name out there?

It had a good and a bad side. The good one was that we had more time to finalize production, music videos etc. And also, we had a lot of streams and reviews cause everybody was stuck at home. The bad side of course was not touring...that was a really strange period!

PRT: Did you start working on what would become ''From The Underworld" right away?

Absolutely not! Every release is pretty exhausting, so I take a break for some time. I think The Fallen & the Ferryman was the first song written in the post-’Icarus’ era and that was almost 1 year after the release.

PRT: The new album is once again a solid mix of 90s Epitaph/ Fat Wreck punk rock and some more metal influences. I'm hearing some Anti-Flag, Rise Against and Sum 41. Are those the bands that you grew up on?

You are hearing well! Those bands are major influences on our sound. We wanted to create a more metal-punk sound. We already explored that in ‘Icarus’ with ‘#Allaboutme’ and ‘Short Song For Old People’ and we wanted to go in that direction even more. That's why you can hear a bit more metal in the new album, even if it is still really punk rock. As Christian Carvin (our mixing wizard) said, you can add all the metal you want, you are still fucking 90's punks. I guess he is right.

PRT: Elsewhere on the album you smuggle in a little bit of ska on ''Make Babylon Great Again''. Where did that one come from?

That's really an inside joke that started with ‘Icarus’. In our town, we have 3 famous beaches where there is a lot of surfing. We have "Les Estagnots" where a lot of hipsters go. So we wrote ‘El Diablo’ for Icarus, which comes with a cowboy/Ennio Morricone theme. And "Les Bourdaines" has more of a roots/hippy vibe, hence ‘Make Babylon Great Again’ and the reggae/ska. The next album will probably have "Le Penon" with something around dancehall or eurodance. I don't know yet. Yes, this is stupid.

PRT: One of the songs on the album is a cover of Michael Sembello's 80s hit ''Maniac''. Is there a story behind why you chose to cover that particular song ? Or is it just a fun one to play ?

I've always been convinced that it would make a great cover every time I listen to it. It has the 80's feeling with weird chord progressions, the main melody is a killer riff, and who can resist to dance to the chorus? So we gave it a try. It worked great on the demo, so we decided to add it on the album. And yes, it is also super fun to play! We also pushed the thing very far, even having ‘Maniac’ as our first single and making a music video for it with Fafo dancing. Pretty stoked with how it came out.

PRT: I read somewhere that you started out as a cover band. When and why did you decide to start writing original material ?

Yes, we formed the band at our workplace, Rip Curl (surfing company) and we were supposed to play corporate events (that means heavy parties). We were all punk fans, so we started covering some NOFX, Dropkick Murphys, Rancid etc. The first original material arrived pretty fast and soon we were doing a mix of covers and original material. Then our first singer left and we added Maider and Fafo to the line up and I took up the writing part. Then we came with ‘The Northern Belle’...and you know the rest!

PRT: Being a French band, did you decide right away to sing in English rather than in French ? And is it easy for you or can it be a bit of a challenge to find the right words ?

We really are fans of all the Epitaph / Fat bands, so singing in English has never been questioned. There is a lot of good French punk bands singing in French, but that's not for us. For the record, it still is a pain to write lyrics in English. Finding the right words with the right ending, working on pronunciation ... I think I'm spending way more time on lyrics than music (laughs).

PRT: You are from a small city in the South of France called Hossegor, which according to Wikipedia has a population of 3823. How did you manage to meet the right people to start a punk rock band in a town of that size ?

Honestly, it's pure luck and I'm still grateful for that. Back in 2011, almost no one was even playing music in our area. There were very few bands around. I always considered our band lucky. We must have a good star somewhere.

PRT: What's up next for you now that ''From The Underworld'' is out ?

Retirement. No, of course we have some shows to play and we are beyond stoked to have big ones like Garorock and Xtremefest. We hope to play Hellfest someday, just for the dream, and Punk Rock Holiday too. We will focus on doing music videos now so you should have some news soon. Thanks for having us. Cheers!