This side of Peters’ personality may come as a surprise to some, but not to those who’ve paid close attention to the four-piece in recent years. Since their formation in 2007, Deez Nuts have garnered a reputation for breaking the rules and challenging people’s expectations. “The life I live can be seen as polar opposites at times,” says Peters. “I love where I am right now, but I can’t wait to get in the thick of it.”
It’s times like these that Peters refers to as “the calm before the storm”. But the calm never lasts long. Shortly after our conversation, Deez Nuts proceeded to do what they do best – playing to heaving, sold-out venues all across Europe, loaded with fans singing the band’s lyrics back at them. “That’s always what we want when we’re writing a song,” says Peters. “It doesn’t get much better than hearing the lyrics you’ve poured your soul into sang back to you at fever pitch.”
Peters credits Sheffield metalcore band Bring Me The Horizon with giving Deez Nuts the exposure needed to be successful in the UK and Europe. “Our first-ever European tour with the Bring Me The Horizon boys gave us the strength to come back and tour and tour and tour,” he says. “Seven years on, and Europe is our strongest market. If it weren’t for our friends doing stuff like that for us back then, we wouldn’t be where we are today, so we always try to return that same courtesy to our friends. In fact, it worked out so well that we can bring Antagonist A.D with us for the Australian dates. They’ve just released an album too. We love those guys.”
Also joining Deez Nuts at their hometown shows this weekend are Sydney quintet Relentless and Melbourne up-and-comers Earth Caller. “Earth Caller are relatively new on the scene and they’ve just released their debut album called Degenerate,” Peters says. “They’ve come a long way. We picked the supports ourselves. We spend 80 per cent of the year on tour, so we want to be with people whose company we enjoy and music we love. That’s always first and foremost for us. We’re just lucky to have very talented friends. It always helps when you’re trying to put together a tour.
“Although, I don’t know if it’s always worked in our favour,” he considers. “I think sometimes it’s worked to our detriment – choosing friends rather than bands that, in some people’s minds, are going to position us for better things in the future. This industry is geared heavily on ‘you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours’. We’ve been pushed to consider bands that are atrocious to our eyes and ears simply because it may benefit us getting on another tour in the future. We don’t play that game.”
With Deez Nuts, what you see is what you get; “We don’t fuck around,” states Peters. This sentiment is reflected on the band’s new album Word Is Bond.“You could say that phrase is a mission statement for the band,” he says, “and I think this album is our most honest yet.
“In between our last album [2013’s Bout It] and Word Is Bond,I’d gone through a lot of changes in my life and some pretty dark times as well. Reflecting on that while writing these songs was extremely therapeutic. I had a lot of cathartic moments in the studio and leading up to the recording – I felt a huge weight lift off my shoulders. Exorcising those demons with a pen and paper was huge for me – I don’t think I’d be as stable a person if I didn’t have that in my life. I’d been living a pretty ridiculous life up till then – a non-stop party for ten years. I’m in a different place now.”
With a new outlook on life came the desire to boost the impact of Deez Nuts’ live shows. “These shows will be bigger and better than ever before,” says Peters. “We also wanted to make the tracks on Word Is Bond easier to recreate at these gigs, so we made the conscious decision to limit the number of features on this album. Bout It was littered with guest spots – it was more like a rap album. And honestly, when we began recording this album we all felt and agreed that it was so strong it was able to stand on its own two feet. It would be to the album’s detriment if we were to clutter it up with too many guests. This album is us.”
BY NATALIE ROGERS
