Review: Deftones Album ‘private music,’ And How New Generations Await It

It is perhaps foolish to assume that, in returning to the music game, the Deftones would only release just one song. It has all but always been established that they were -and still are – a band teeming with endless material; even if this recent hiatus between their most recent album and now was a considerable number in comparison to their former pattern.

To clarify, and if one were to actually go through the available records and list them accordingly, starting of course from their first album ‘(Like) Linus’ (1993), what would be identified is a two to three year silence before anything new would be released.

In this particular case, it was approaching five, stemming back to the beginning of the pandemic – a most poignant time for a needed release from within the confines of both a physical lockdown and a sort of shared existential pause felt by all.

No other balm would have been half as effective as new material from a band known for its universally loved sound, brought on by the appreciation of another generation’s nostalgia for their youth, which in turn, was adopted and just as eagerly consumed by another, much younger in years. 

And at that point, the band had been going strong for twenty-seven years.

Now, fast forward, and a veteran status of thirty-two does not display a slowing in pace or disintegration in familiarity, at all.

In fact, with just two introductory tracks, they announce with great fervor just how much they still got what makes them one of the alternative metal genre’s most formidable acts.

And it starts with ‘milk of madonna’.

milk of madonna

Barely even 8 seconds in, and their classic dissonance of guitar chords, accompanied by their dominance of percussion, break through a pull of disembodied voices that beckon your attention just enough, before hitting you with their true reintroduction.

After that, the assault of sudden and crashing instruments is not really all that much out of left field, but – if you would indulge the visual – an audible and colorful burst of fireworks in a dark, still sky.

Or, rather, if one were to be more fitting to their aura instead, a spectacular car crash, wherein you as the listener find yourself witness to it and can’t look away from its potential lethality, or are yourself surviving it, and crawling out from its damage scarily unharmed… And gloriously, deliriously, and dangerously alive from what flames that burn behind you. 

Chino Moreno, the band’s fearless leader and front man since their inception in 1988, comes in at 0:24 with his quintessential vocals, which to fans who eternally ache for his natural instillation of reverb, sounds almost exactly the same as in his prime.

Echoing, hazily and addictively muddled, and deliciously sounding so far off in the distance of his surrounding composition and yet not close enough – he is very much heard, but screaming to be understood in his totality. He has a beauteous call nonetheless, bordering on his usual ethereal eroticism. Such is the voice of the Deftones. 

And the lyrics, or what can be found of them so soon in its appreciative listening, can be described in no other way, but worshipful; calling out to a “Holy Ghost” and/or “Holy Spirit” that they are indeed “… On fire!” in their rejoicing.

Remaining and ever-present is this tone for what feels like throughout, up until suddenly there is a discombobulating instrumental break between 2:39 and 2:56, where the foundation of the song for these brief 17 seconds quells back down to the swirl of voices from before, only this time wrapped in a soft-edged fuzziness of a kind that brings with it the grounding trills of a guitar.

One truly familiar to religious worship would find this break familiar, in that it is the eye of a godly storm before returning to its awesome, savage nature of pulling from the earth and its flock the resurging need to move, dance, shout; to scream and call out to whom they deify that they thrive in this moment, not only glad to be alive, but they are themselves burning with life.

The testimony has been made of the Deftones return, and it is received as the prophesied announcement of a great journey.

And what comes next is the revelation that it leads to a great peek, in ‘my mind is a mountain’…

my mind is a mountain

No reprieve whatsoever in this one. In fact, upon arrival, we are hit with what could only be the sound of immediate crashing thunder, thus inspiring the image of, indeed, the looming mass of a mountain. Crown it with the illuminated branches of lightning and the cacophony that has since erupted, and you all too readily find yourself seated and utterly entranced with the establishment of this new rhythm, which harkens back to the rich, ripping chords of their 2010 album, ‘Diamond Eyes’. 

The lyrics are no doubt clearer, as can be heard by 0:20. Such could mean that, differentiating itself from the instrument-heavy trip that is taken with ‘milk of madonna’, the words are meant to be heard, and perhaps upon this first listen-through, completely understood. And they are themselves dripping with a sort of verse flow that seems equal parts hallucinating great visions, and feeling their effects on a high journeyman’s mind that recites more so an epic rather than just a song.

Then the demand to “Trip out!” summons the first of what could be audibly identified as a pre-chorus (0:04), declaring amidst a great underlying rumble that they – the Deftones – have been waiting patiently for the right moment to fill this void of absence without them, which their listeners perhaps did not fully absorb how palpable it was until this moment, amidst the welcoming noise. 

However, upon listening further – past a brief but roaring instrumental that sounded like the lead up to a chorus, and the quick passing of the second verse –  what sounds like the return of a pre-chorus comes back around at 1:32.

Only this time, new lyrics follow, and rather than speak of space to be filled, they call to restless minds to remain here, on this plane, and on this mission. It is a formless and yet purposefully built way of communicating; to keep your attention, more like, and to keep your eyes level with theirs, so that you don’t lose track, and that you spirit for seeking what is ahead in the chaos that resounds remains – set on that mountain of which you must climb. 

By 1:51 what is no doubt the chorus now reveals itself, slowly and with a melodiously eerie nature that could only belong to Moreno when he is in the thick of his own retelling. His innate reverb gives waves to what he sings that we sail through, proceeding on to a fate that has yet to begin, even though those who have since been following have travelled this far.

All of the latter was not even the start of what is to come of their return, and such is only just discovered when the track already begins to fade out, marking the end of this part entryway at only 2:50.

A cliffhanger of sorts. One could only find it fitting. 

8/22/25

The announcement of the new album itself, currently entitled ‘private music’ on all available listening platforms, is to this day thumbnailed and ready for all those who eagerly wait to jump on it as soon as its countdown clock dwindles down to the very last second. Such instant capturing and maintaining of all three of hearts, minds and ears can only be the result of how suddenly, one day and/or one moment in time that may not have been exactly pinned down, the Deftones blew up in relevancy on Tiktok. 

With an already burgeoning alternative scene making its way to becoming a permanent phenomenon on the app itself, the addition of this band that came from their curious plowing-throughs of artists that preceded their own time has since had them become the emblem for the resurgence of their genre.

Audio snippets of their songs, spanning from their first raw set of tracks from the late 90’s to their headier and better known kin of both the early 2000’s and 2010’s, are a constant checkpoint in the algorithm that you are approaching the alt side of TikTok. And those who claim to be loyalists of such a darkly clad and heavily loved movement cannot let you go further without at least one of their hit singles. 

Or better yet, why not listen to what is to come?

That way, both may wait with bated breath for what is to be the filling of negative space with an utmost overflow of the Deftones that is always sorely missed, just as it is always yearned for; no matter how long it’s been since we had last heard from them.

The album ‘private music’ is set to be released on August 22, 2025. Be sure to listen to the first two tracks.