INTERVIEW: Emo Nite
Emo Nite and 3OH!3 are currently on their WANT House Party Tour with Lil Aaron. They played Boston on Nov. 25 and are looking forward to the rest of their tour within the United States. WTBU journalist Grace Lauson chatted with Berklee grad and co-founder of Emo Nite TJ Petracca.
Grace Lauson: How has the tour been going?
TJ Petracca: It’s really fun. The show has been amazing so far. It’s not like a typical concert. We have been trying to figure out the right flow to the evenings, and I think we have figured it out at this point. It’s been pretty fun and very different for us to be on the road. We usually fly out, play an event, and then fly home, or just do events locally. So it’s a big change for us to be on the bus and doing shows every single night.
GL: Do you enjoy the process of constantly being busy and on the road or does it get overwhelming?
TJ: It definitely gets overwhelming. The three of us–myself, Morgan Freed, and Babs Szabo–run another business called “Ride or Cry.” So we are trying to run another business from the road as well as playing every day and than finding a place to shower, workout, and eat healthy. It definitely gets overwhelming, but the 3OH!3 guys have been super helpful. They have been touring for like 10 years. The best piece of advice that Sean [Foreman, of 3OH!3] gave me was to find one thing in each city that is comforting. Whether it’s going on a walk, meditating, or working out, find that one thing, because everything is so different every day. That definitely helps.
GL: Do you ever have time to explore the cities you visit?
TJ: It depends on what time we get in and what we have going on each day. We usually have a bit of time in each city. Then we will have off days to go out and do fun things. I just did Top Golf in Phoenix the other night!
GL: How did you meet the 3OH!3 guys?
TJ: Sean was at the first Emo Nite. He is mutual friends with one of my friends. He lives in Echo Park down the street from me. When we first started throwing Emo Nite, we were at a bar around the corner from his house and one of his friends was guest DJing so he came out for that. Then we got close to them last year during the Warped Tour. We really hit it off and became good friends with them on the cruise.
GL: Do you notice a distinct difference between playing festivals verses playing your own shows? Do you have a preference?
TJ: Every festival is so different. I don’t have a preference. The Warped Tour cruise was probably one of the most fun things I did in my whole life. We were on the cruise ship for four days and no one really had cell phone service. We were throwing Emo Nite every night and there was not too much else going on on the cruise ship, so everyone would come out on the cruise and have a good time. That was super fun. We also did some great festival sets. Last year, we played Lucca Festival and most of the other acts were EDM artists, so I was a bit scared and didn’t know what to expect. To our surprise, everyone there was very excited to be hearing emo and pop punk to change things up.
GL: I know you have been able to do some clothing collections with some big brands. Do you get to design clothes yourself and what’s the process like for this?
TJ: Yeah, we design pretty much all the clothing ourselves. Every collab with a brand is a bit different, but we will usually come to the table with and idea. For example, with the Chinatown Market Collab, we came with the phrase “Thank you for moshing” and the general idea to do it. Then they threw in their two-cents and had their designers work on it. Most of the collabs are genuinely collaborative. For our own clothing collection, we will design it ourselves or work with an artist we really admire and ask them to do stuff for us.
GL: If you weren’t making music and touring right now, what do you think you would be doing?
TJ: I always pretty much wanted to do music. I went to Berklee College of Music in Boston and I always grew up playing in bands. Recently, I got really into fitness. Last year, I got into going to SoulCycle and CrossFit, so that’s a new hobby for me.
GL: Who are your favorite artists currently?
TJ: I am actually super late to EDM. I never liked it before, but have recently been getting way more into EDM music, I think just because I’m around emo and pop punk every night. So, when I’m listening to music on my own, I want something completely different. I love Dillon Francis and Rufus Du Sol. Also, our friends, Captain Cuts. they have been doing EDM remixes and mashups of emo and pop punk songs. Their new mixtape is really good.
GL: Have you ever played Boston before?
TJ: Not with Emo Nite. It will be cool. I use to go to shows at the Middle East. I had several bands that I was in in college that would play to empty rooms at the Middle East. I still have lots of family and friends in Boston, so I’m excited to go back and play a sold-out show there.
GL: What’s next for you? What do we have to look forward to?
TJ: We’re trying to get through the rest of this tour, then the year is pretty much done for us. We’re going to take January off and start our regular Emo Nites back up in February and just keep cruising.