Deftones‘ fanbase has always been a strange beast. Here’s a band that has managed in 30 years since their debut album to release not a single bad album. Even after the tragic accident and eventual passing of key member and bassist Chi Cheng, the group have been able to retain their sound and even-handed writing style, all while establishing a sound that is instantly recognizable and evidently timeless. Yet the fanbase seems wholly divergent in their taste. You will find as many who claim Saturday Night Wrist is the band’s best as those who uphold it’s their worst. From the early genre work Around the Fur to the harsh Deftones with the iconic skull-and-roses cover, any of their albums can stand as somebody’s favourite album of the five piece.
The only nu-metal band that seems to have reached a critical consensus of wide appreciation (side note: there’s a lot of pretty good nu metal) are now on their 10th studio album, and to record it they reconnected with a producer who is widely credited with shepherding two of Deftones’ best albums. Nick Raskulinecz worked on 2010’s Diamond Eyes,a tour de force after Cheng’s presence was ripped from them, and the follow-up Koi No Yokan, an album that seems to have never received mainstream recognition, even with fans widely considering it their second best after the monolithic White Pony. What’s curious about these two albums the band did with Raskulinecz is how they seem to exist on two ends of the spectrum. Diamond Eyes has a dry, sludgy metal tone and returns to the palette of White Pony. Koi No Yokan, meanwhile, is almost tender in comparison, concentrating on emo, post-rock and shoegaze influences, often exploring cinematic atmospherics and complex structures – even when things get incredibly loud, they feel more narratively focused than the punchy alternative rockers of its predecessor. To uninitiated and non-fans, this might not immediately communicate itself, because – hey – both brandish the Deftones sound. So an important question should be to what degree private music sets itself apart.
Back to the fandom: it’s somewhat odd how muted the fans’ reception to the last two albums, Gore and Ohms, was. Yes, Gore featured a somewhat muddy sound, but that seemed very much intentional, setting it apart from the band’s clean dynamics – not to mention that the songs were absolutely fantastic. Ohms, meanwhile, garnered a lot of critical praise, introducing futuristic touches the band had not played with before, creating an almost psychedelic tapestry that wouldn’t seem out of place in a Blade Runner back-alley-bar – yet wide stretches of the fandom bemoaned it as predictable and “tired”. So I say the following with that crowd in mind: fear not! After the chromatic and acidic sonic walls of the underappreciated Gore and the radiant and forlorn cyberpunk touch of Ohms, Deftones have now released one of their most subtly nuanced and diverse albums of their career. While not as wholly experimental as the shimmering Saturday Night Wrist, private music explores a wide canvas of writing styles and emotional dynamics.
Take two of the deeper cuts on the album, which both have Chino Moreno rap the verses: “cut hands” and “metal dream”. The former is a heavy, grim nu metal tune, the kind of thing you’d trip over on MTV in 99 or 01, featuring a mean guitar riff, muffled vocals and a return to crystalline vocals over the chorus. The latter is more experimental, with a strangely funky guitar riff and jazzy drums, as Moreno’s echoing spoken-word delivery exude an likely cool and the refrain delivers pure romantic pathos.
Even in the opening moments of the album, with the Stoner-Rock of “my mind is a mountain” and the Black Sabbath adjacent “locked club”, there is a clear cut divergence in the band’s writing style and delivery. Abe Cunningham’s drumming especially shines on those two songs, propelling the songs constantly forward with a lot of style and tempo.
When the group sticks to their guns, fashioning atmospheric and strangely tender nu-metal anthems with memorable riffs and guitar licks, they allow Moreno to take centre stage: “souvenir” is a fantastic showcase that their vocalist still sounds as good as during the band’s peak 25 years ago, with Moreno delivering a passionate and emotive performance, before segueing into an atmospheric quasi-ambient outro. “infinite source” is equally impressive, professionally conducting the signature dynamic between tenderness and heavy metal to a point where the bridge almost dips into the territory of a The Smiths song (“I Know It’s Over” and “Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others” come to mind).
There still are shades of Ohms‘ modernist approach, such as on the razor sharp “ecdysis” with its rolling bass-line and vaguely futuristic machine-sound, but the clearest link comes with what is possibly the best song on the album: the deeply ominous “departing the body”, whose strange, unfamiliar aura feels unique in the band’s canon, thanks to the sinister tone Moreno’s spoken word passages retain (he barely sounds like himself) and the strange guitar experimentation that continues from the stuttering intro to the shoegaze layers that underscore the verses. The lyrics are cryptic and verge on being disturbing. There is hints of space-horror a la 2001 here (“There’s a room / We hang in space / It’s clear, cold”), but also digital disconnect (“A dome light, all that remains / It splits these days apart / And our low-res bodies sway / We watch these grains dissolve”) and bleak, minimalist existentialism (“In a room / We end in / It’s clean”). The sonics suggest a wide open space, the guitars ape the electrical currents of machines, but the lyrics imagine a crypt-like morgue, constantly swaying between liberating ascension and claustrophobic decay. It’s an impressive, often frightening song that yearns for the beauty found in early Siouxsie and the Banshees, such as “Switch”.
The second best song here is possibly the ballad: “i think about you all the time” follows a gorgeous McCartney-esque lead melody, before exploding into a post-rock climax midway through. It’s sentimental, yes, but easily one of the best compositions the band have to offer. But the early single “milk of the madonna” might still top it: an alt-rock banger in the style of Smashing Pumpkins’ “Bodies”, its an incredibly vital, infectious song and – like “Bodies” – it hides brilliant songwriting behind monumental guitars.
None of these songs sound ill-fitting – even when Deftones take a full left turn, it never interrupts the homogenous flow that private music aims for. The band have always been influenced by a vast array of musicians and styles, and it might seem jarring to imagine a record that aims to retain so many aesthetics, but Deftones’ key talent is to mold those unique sensibilities to fit a heavy sound. At times there is an almost analytical approach to how they include a specific element, which completely changes the focus and presence of a track. This is evidently nothing new, as this writing style harkens back all the way to the band’s beginnings. But it can be argued that private music is more nuanced and even-handed than most Deftones albums. And most of all, at only 42 minutes, its greatest quality comes in the desire to put the album on constant repeat. private music can be the soundtrack to a whole day, without ever dragging or becoming too repetitive. It practically beckons to be put back on, which not every Deftones album manages. Even the very crispy Ohms or emotive Diamond Eyes do not feel as instantly replayable and viral as private music. It sits firmly in the upper echelon of the band’s catalogue as one of their best.
