Deer Pilot is a no-frills alt-rock band from Los Angeles, CA. Founded in 2019 by Bobby Danzi, the transplant musician has been around the country, playing in bands and working as a recording engineer and producer in New York, Boston, and Nashville.
In early 2020 he moved to California and expanded the project, recording a full EP, and solidified Deer Pilot’s place in Southern California rock music.
The dark and somber sounds that hail from their latest single, “All Is Fair (In Love and Warfare),” provide us with a myriad of influences that can be heard on the spectrum of indie to heavy rock.
Commencing with a protruding sense of foreboding tenors as the edginess of this record seeps into your speakers, we get taken into the unraveling of powerhouse emotions that shape the entire quintessence of “All Is Fair (In Love and Warfare).”
Presenting us with a musical formula that strikes our very being with anticipation and curiosity, we love how the yearning vocalization mirrors the same appetite that comes from grunge-esque bands in the nostalgic eras of music.
Deer Pilot manages to add a modern flair to the slow tempo energy that reflects on familiar notes in the invitation that’s “All Is Fair (In Love and Warfare).” With lyrical motifs such as, ‘there’s an echo in my head. It’s ringing in the end of times,’ taking an abstract turn in the delivery, you can’t help but to be intrigued by what’s performed before you.
Making this track an easy addition to your favorite playlist, Deer Pilot knows what it takes to charm the ears off of their flourishing fan base.
We love the musical inspiration that allows “All Is Fair (In Love and Warfare),” to curlicue the way that it does. Could you please share what this song's meaning is to you as the creators?
Thank you! This song was written as a breakup letter, of sorts, to Nashville. I spent the end of 2018 and all of 2019 living in Nashville. During that time, there were a few things in my life that were crushing me a bit, really bringing me down. I vividly remember sitting at this coffee shop in Hillsboro Village and having the words just pour out of me. While the verses are a bit more personal, the broader concept of the song is that life has the tendency to knock you down. You’ve just got to pick yourself back up and keep going.
Do the themes addressed in this song reflect what listeners can normally hear in your music catalog? What does “All Is Fair (In Love and Warfare),” say about you as a band?
I think so. I tend to write a lot from a more personal point of view, so there are definitely times when other songs have been born out of similar emotions. I think that, aside from its lyrical content, this song is a great indicator of where the band is heading musically. I think that there is a “sound” beginning to form and that as a whole, the identity of the band is starting to shape and mature. I think this song will serve as a great stepping stone, sonically, from our first EP to our next set of releases.
Could you please share a glimpse into what the creative process looked like when bringing this song to life? Did anyone help to enhance your vision and make it come out the way you saw it destined?
This song started its life with that big hooky riff at the top of the song. I’ll oftentimes come up with something I find catchy on the guitar, and then build a song around that. In this particular case, I probably came up with some version of that riff around July of 2019. Like I mentioned earlier, those lyrics really just kind of fell out of me. I probably wrote about 90% of the lyrics in about 15 minutes, sans a few changes and revisions during the recording process.
The recording process for this song actually began with the recording of the first EP, back in late May of 2020. I tracked the entire song with Grant (drums) and Jake (bass), and began recording vocals , only to find that the key was way too high for me to sing! My girlfriend, Hope, who is an amazing engineer/producer, is actually the one who suggested I bring it down a few steps. So, striking everything but the drum tracks, I went and re-recorded everything else, including bass, all guitars, keys, and vocals. That newer version is the one that you hear today!
From 2019 to now, how have you grown as a band? What has been the proudest moment in your career thus far?
The growth has been amazing, really. This project really started as a solo endeavor under the guise of a band name. It’s still very much that way, but I’m grateful to have found the really stellar cast of collaborators that I’ve been working with for the last year and a half. This project really went from an idea to a reality over the course of 2020, which was a rough time for everyone. The inability to play any shows was definitely crazy, so releasing the first set of music as Deer Pilot, under those circumstances, was a bit of a leap of faith. Very gratefully, the first few songs have been well received, with the EP now pulling in over 127,000 streams. That was definitely a huge accomplishment, I’m really proud of that. I’m so thankful now for the ability to take these songs out and play them for people and see how people respond firsthand. It’s been really great, and I’m looking forward to doing that a whole lot more in the years to come.
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