Juzzee Humphry - Flaming Wrekage ‘The Most Special Thing A Musician Can Feel Is Someone's Reaction’

Flaming Wrekage has the best guitarist in Sydney right now. 

Go on. Tell me I'm wrong.

In a Sydney metal scene packed to the brim with some of the worlds finest musicians, one name stands high on my list of sickest guitarists in the land, and that name is Justin “Juzzee” Humphry. It’s a sentiment shared by some of Australia’s finest musicians and is no mean feat considering he stands on stage next to another guitar wild man, his bandmate, guitarist/vocalist Dave “Luppo” Lupton.

The lads have come off the back of a huge 18 months that has seen them headline tours throughout Australia and Europe in support of their latest opus Terra Inferna, while landing support slots on home soil with the likes of Testament and Psycroptic. They’re wrapping up touring this year with only two more shows that are taking place over the next couple of weekends at the wonderful Wollongong and the always majestic Katoomba.

In the lead up to what will undoubtedly be a monumental set of shows, Wall of Sound had a yarn with the shred-legend Juzzee to find out what makes Sydney’s best guitarist tick.

‍Well, mate, the reason we're talking is that you're rounding up your year early. You've got two more shows and then that's it for 2025.‍

That's it, man. So we've got Wollongong, Dicey Riley’s- that's on Saturday, September 27th, and then the next one is the Baroque Room in Katoomba on Friday, October 3rd.

‍Two pretty good rooms! They should be a lot of fun. I've seen you guys play Baroque Room before.‍

Yeah, yeah. Katoomba is a sick place. That room is amazing for music. It's got such energy and a massive chandelier above us while we're playing, so hopefully we can bring it down this time.

And then Dicey Rileys is just a classic Irish pub. It's just as Irish as you get, just Guinness getting thrown around in the pit the entire time.

So yeah, it should be a fun two shows.

‍I've seen the supports, off the top of my head, you've got Naugrim, bloody Mountain Wizard Death Cult, and Rails from Newcastle supporting.‍

Yeah, it's always a pleasure to share the stage with the Wizzies. We don't get to do it as often as we want to, but yeah, every time we can see 'em at a venue and we play as well as they do, it's a fucking good time. So it should be fun.

‍They're next level, absolute killers, and I've seen Rails once before. I didn't know what to expect and they blew me away. So that's a stacked lineup. I'm hoping to get to that one for sure. What has been your favourite gig ever?‍

That's such a tough one. I want to list a couple because I've got a couple of pinch-me moments. First off, the opening for Testament was absolutely insane. That was definitely up there. That was recent, sold out at the Metro, so that was pretty sick. We've also done the show at, I think it was before it was Crowbar, when it was still The Stag, opening for Power Trip. Just before he [vocalist Riley Gale] passed, too. It was insane.

I feel like it was over capacity. I feel like they just kept pushing people into that room, and so they should, because everyone should have experienced that. I think Dave lost his shoe at that gig, too. It was hilarious.

But yeah, no, absolutely incredible to open for them and fuck, they have some good riffs. And then the other one that comes to mind would be, we did a gig when we toured Indonesia. It was Tobacco Blast Festival sponsored by a cigarette company. And that was the first time I think we'd ever played to over 700 people. And it was just a sea of Indonesian kids that were just frothing… absolute metal. There were kids getting up on the stage. It was a tiled stage as well, which was weird, but kids getting up on stage and doing backflips into the pit the entire time. It was unreal. So yeah, those are the top three for me. 

‍A tiled stage, it's like playing on a pub floor.‍

Yeah, exactly. Exactly like that. You get no grip, the sweat just makes you slide everywhere and it’s so hot over there. It's fucked.

‍Heavy metal in Indonesia, I understand it’s a massive part of their culture as well. It's a lot bigger. ‍

Yeah, it is. It's huge. Some of the gigs we were playing as well, these bands, they'd rock up on their little mopeds with three of them strapped to the back of it and their gear wrapped to them as well. And they'd just absolutely annihilate the stage. Necrophagist-level tech death, we sounded like The Wiggles compared to every band we played with in Indonesia. It was insane.

‍Awesome! So I've said it, and it's been backed up by a few other musicians in Sydney. I think you are one of, if not the best, guitarist in Sydney. So I'm going to ask you some guitar questions. I know that's hard to hear praise like that, but I've seen you play, I've seen a lot of bands in Sydney play, and you are definitely one of the standout musicians. What is your guitar choice at the moment? What is your favourite play?‍

My favourite guitar to play would probably be The Mirror Kelly. I think you commented on that last time you saw us. So it's a Jackson Kelly. I think it's a KEX mirror finish, so it's got a mirror top on it that's been smashed. It plays ridiculously well, and the sustain is incredible. And yeah, it's a super comfortable guitar, and it looks fucking sick. I don't think you can take a bad photo with that guitar, which helps. It looks great on the social media.

‍It's a good-looking guitar. And it sounds amazing, as you said. If you were to pick a dream guitar, what is the one that you've seen or maybe read about that you would love to own and play?‍

I'm probably going to go with Marty Friedman's Kelly from when he was in Megadeth. The single pickup, the Kayla Tram. It's funny, there's an app called Reva where people sell old music gear. And Friedman has a friend from Indonesia who manages him basically and his social media for him. He actually owns the first KE Marty Friedman model. And he was selling it because he experienced some troubles with Indo, I think during COVID. So he was trying to get rid of it, but he was selling it for like 70 grand. So definitely out of my price range. But one day I think I'll be able to finally touch that and play a ‘Tornado of Souls’ forever.

‍Fucking hell. Hell of a guitar to pick. I don't have 70 grand to spot you. Sorry, man. It's probably worth double that. Is Friedman your favourite guitarist? If not, who is‍

Friedman is number one. I'd say number two would be Alexi from Children of Bodom. And third, I would say would be Alex Skolnick. So that's my top three.

‍That's a firm three!‍

A very powerful three. And you notice what I love about those three players is every time they play, it's them. A Friedman Lick when you hear it, an Alexa fucking Floyd Rose dive lick when you hear it and a skull lick because he does those weird jazzy sweeps that are just the cleanest thing on Earth. That's ridiculous.

‍What is, in your opinion, the best all-time riff?‍

Ohhhhhh. That's a hard one. There's so many. I'm going to go with the one that I always line check and sound check with, which is the intro riff for ‘Blood and Thunder’ by Mastodon. It's such a good riff, and it just chugs and it's just, oh, it hits so hard. So yeah, I'm going to go with that.

‍I know you've mentioned the three bands, Bodom, Testament and Megadeth. Were they the bands that made you pick up the guitar or was there another band earlier that made you pick up the guitar in the first place?‍

So when I was younger, I used to be into just mainstream music, not really caring that much about music. And then one year for Christmas, my parents got me Guitar Hero 3, and that soundtrack is ridiculous. It starts with, I can't even remember some of the starting songs, but it goes from ‘Barracuda’ by Heart to ‘One’ by Metallica, and ‘Raining Blood’ by Slayer. It literally starts you off easy and then slowly just gets heavier and heavier as it goes through. So that sort of piqued my interest into music. But then they released Guitar Hero Aerosmith, and I became an Aerosmith fanatic. I fucking wanted to be Joe Perry so bad. And I think I still kind of do because just the coolest guy that exists ever. He's so cool.

‍Yeah, they were one of my early favourite bands for sure; that was one of my first big favourite bands. Joe Perry, he's the man. Obviously you guys are a lot heavier than Aerosmith. You got your death thrash stuff- really heavy, really fast, really technical, but groovy at the same time. What is, in your opinion, the best ever thrash album?‍

It's got to be Reign In Blood. It has to be, it has, as much as I love Rust in Peace and Master of Puppets, and even a lot of the Testament albums, like The Gathering is probably my most played thrash album ever. That's an insane album. It's got Dave Lombardo on drums. For some reason they swapped, Bostaph went to Slayer and Lombardo went to Testament, and they were both firing on all guns. But the definition of thrash, I think, has to be Slayer. It has to be, there's no argument about it. It has to be Slayer. What is it like a 40-minute album? It's insane.

‍I think at the time I remember reading about it, they said they wrote an hour's worth of music and then when they finished playing it, it went for 26 minutes.‍

Yeah, it's probably something like that because it's just so fast and Lombardo's drumming is so on the edge. It always sounds like he's not going to hit on time. He's just pushing it to the absolute limit. It's the best. It's the best. ‍

It’s like four guys saying who can play the fastest!‍

Yeah. Each time they played it, someone else was like, “No, we're doing it faster”! And they just started it faster every time. It's brilliant.

‍Well, that's the best ever thrash album, but what's, in your opinion, the best album ever? What's the one album that ticks every box for you?‍

I'd have to say puppets, Master of Puppets. I think it was my most played album throughout high school. Every time I'd get to the school gates at 8:00 AM, I'd start with ‘Battery’ and would be like, cool, this is the start of my day. And then just pump it all the way through the day and then go home and listen to it again.

There's not a skippable track on it. Every single song is a banger. Yeah, they were at their peak then.

‍Absolutely. Obviously I’m much older than you, but my first Metallica was Justice... and that was before the Black album came out, and then I sort of backtracked to that. And then when the Black album hit, Metallica became the biggest band on the planet. But you, you've been in Flaming Wrekage for quite a few years now. You've got your latest album, which was out, what, a year and a half ago, Terra inferna. You have been touring here and through Europe and all that sort of stuff. What is your favourite Flaming Wrekage riff?‍

I'd have to go ‘Skeletons of Giants’, that intro riff, just every time it kicks in, I look up, I normally play it and I'm looking straight down, but I peek up through the hair and you can just see everyone just sort of nudge each other and point like, "oi, oi, oi, fucking check this out”. It’s peak. It's so good.

‍Is that your favourite song to play as well, or have you got another whole song that's just you prefer to play? What's your favourite Flaming Wrekage song?‍

I think that one probably is my favourite to play. I think it's one of my favourite solos to play too. It's fun. It was inspired by Zakk Wylde and Randy Rhoads. So yeah, it's got tapping, it's got pentatonic riffs, it's got bluesy licks, it's got sweeping. It's got everything you fucking need in it. And yeah, it's so fun to play.

And just looking at people's reaction to that is the most special thing that a musician can actually feel is seeing someone's reaction to the music that you're making and seeing it actually affect someone is just incredible.

‍Unreal. When you're up there playing and I look around and people are pulling those get fucked faces.‍

Yeah. Yeah. That's what I live for. The 'Get Fucked'.

‍Especially the other guitarists in the room. I've stood next to Timmy from Astro Death a few times watching you, and as many times as he's seen you and a lot of us have seen you, it still blows us away. I've asked you this question before, I'm going to ask you again, and you might have a different answer, I don't know. But if the world's blown up and we've got to get in a spaceship and we are only allowed to grab one Black Sabbath album, which one is it and why?‍

Got to be Vol.4. That was my answer before, and it's my answer again. It's got to be Vol.4 It's the most cocaine fuelled album in the entire world. Nothing will ever compete with it. It's more of a blues rock album than a metal album, I feel. But fuck is it good. It's such a good album. So yeah, it's definitely Vol.4.

‍Vol.4! And one last bit out of Flaming Wrekage, it has been a year and a half since your last album. How's new music coming? Have you been working on new music? And if so, when do you reckon we'd be able to get a hold of it?‍

We are working on new stuff. We're trying to work out a different sort of plan to approach the releasing of music.

Obviously everyone works for the algorithms these days, so albums don't actually perform as well as they used to anymore. So we're thinking of maybe doing an EP, maybe just dropping a couple of singles here and there and seeing how that goes.

But yeah, we've been writing, I actually broke my foot this year, so I was off work for six weeks and I was sitting at home thinking, “Well, look, it's either I play guitar or I just fucking rot in front of a television”. So I just played a bunch of guitar and then I messaged Dave every day and was like, “Hey man, check out this riff”. And he was like, “Juzz, you've written an entire album”. We said we weren't going to do an album and you've written an entire fucking album.

So we're just trying to get some time to all get in a room and throw it all at each other, which is usually how it works. Me and Dave get the ideas and then we throw it at Lock and Matt, and they're both musically trained, so they'll look at us and go, “oh, this is a major flat third”. And I'm like, “what the fuck did you say about my mom, bro?” Just fucking play the gallops. Play the riff.

But yeah, we sort of butt heads a little bit because me and Dave dunno what the fuck we're talking about. But yeah, it's fucking music, bro. Just listen to it and play it.

‍Mate. I'm looking forward to it. But most of all, I'm looking forward to these two shows, the 27th and the 3rd in Wollongong and up at Katoomba, and that's it for the year. Hopefully the rest of the year you are making new music and might get something out of you, I don't know, early next year with any luck.‍

That's the plan. So we're trying to lock down on the writing and pre-production hopefully this year. And then looking to get into the studio hopefully around February, maybe at the latest. It's really hard, obviously during December, January because people have stuff to do and people are closed and all that sort of stuff. But yeah, we try to get into it as soon as possible. I love Friday music, so that's why we do it.

So this is it kids, your last chance to see Flaming Wrekage this year before they bury their existence in a recording studio somewhere. Plus with the likes of Mountain Wizard Death Cult, Naugrim and Rails in tow for their Katoomba show, this is an outing that absolutely no one should miss. See you there legends.

Interview by Duane James