Corrosion of Conformity and Down member Pepper Keenan chatted with Loudwire recently about plans for new material with both bands. We also talked with Keenan about this year’s Motorboat Cruise and his busy schedule for the rest of 2015. This year also marks major anniversaries for Down’s NOLA album and Corrosion of Conformity’s last release In the Arms of God. Check out 5 Questions With Pepper Keenan below:

You’re no stranger to the Motorboat Cruise, what are you looking forward to most about this year?

To be honest with you I had so much damn fun last year I was so stoked Motorhead was doing another one. We get to play with Motorhead again and be on the boat with crazy Phil Campbell and hang out with those guys. I’ll take a boat in the sun any day and combine that with some heavy metal, I’m definitely in.

It’s been 10 years since the release of Corrosion of Conformity’s In the Arms of God. What do you remember most about creating that album?

Oh man, I remember when we were done with it and I was like “That’s as good as I can do it.” [Laughs]  It couldn’t get any better than that, for me. It was the pinnacle of songwriting and production; I think we nailed it on the head. I was really proud of it even though it was under such crazy pretenses. It ended up turning out great and I knew close to the end it was going to be something I was super proud of.

Another musical milestone, It’s been 20 years since Down’s NOLA album was released. What does feel like knowing that disc is 20 years old?

[Laughs] It’s hard to believe we’re all still here. God knows we pushed it pretty hard back in the day. It started out with a couple of us talking, just a band we would dig even if we weren’t in it. It ended up taking on a life of its own and the fans really kept it alive. It’s a wonderful thing and it’s still going strong these days, too. We were just youngsters and everybody was super busy and crazy and on the road boozin’ and partying, making records in different bands. It was just nuts how the whole thing was thrown together and actually worked. We were just a bunch of dudes from the wrong side of the tracks trying to write heavy metal s--t.

Have you been working on some new CoC stuff already?

Yeah we got some ideas, just playing again has put us back in the groove. What we’re doing live has kind of been freaking people out. It’s been awesome. My catalyst is going to be shooting from where we left off on In the Arms of God and that’s a huge, tall order. We don’t take it lightly and we know what we’re up against, we just have to go at it.

What does the rest of 2015 have in store for you with both Corrosion of Conformity and Down?

Oh man, I’m busier than s---. We start off with this Motorboat Cruise, Corrosion of Conformity starts a couple weeks later with festivals in the U.S. Down are doing some shows prior to that in August with some festivals and solo shows. Then we got to get ready to work on the next Down EP. I’m pretty much slammed all the way to Christmas at this point.

Our thanks to Pepper Keenan for speaking with us. For more information on Motorboat 2015, go here.

More From Loudwire