Gore

by 
AlbumApr 08 / 201611 songs, 48m 13s
Alternative Metal Alternative Rock
Popular Highly Rated

Eight albums and 20 years deep, a determination to stretch metal’s boundaries remains sacrosanct for the Californians. Another key Deftones tenet—bonding aggression with vulnerability—rages throughout an album that captures a band invigorated and reflective. “There’s a new strange, godless demon awake inside me” sings Chino Moreno on cacophonous opener “Prayers / Triangles” and it sets the rapturous tone. The juddering “Doomed User” amps up the drama while “Geometric Headdress”, “(L)mirl” and “Phantom Bride” are piercing examples of the band’s propensity for melody.

7.8 / 10

Gore is easily Deftones’ most engaging record since White Pony, filled with carefully crafted hooks disguised as bridges and transition. As with all of their best music, it sounds like the brutal, beautiful result of the band being passionate enough to rip each other’s heads off.

4 / 10

8 / 10

Deftones push familiar touchstones to unexplored new territories on their eighth album. The result is a career-defining collection to rival their magnum opus White Pony.

4 / 5

“There’s a new strange godless demon awake inside of me,” Deftones vocalist Chino Moreno sings at the start of the band’s eighth album.

Balancing their sound on a knife edge, this is an album that sees their own heaviness redefined.

As the title Gore suggests, the contents within are bloody and visceral.

The Sacramento survivors continue to evolve and compel in their 28th year.

8 / 10

Anyone who's written off Deftones as a '90s nostalgia act within the past decade is doing themselves a disservice.

5.0 / 10

Deftones have milked the tension between vocalist Chino Moreno's tendency towards poppy fey melody and guitarist Stephen Carpenter's tendency towards the heaviest metal imaginable for a long, successful career.

8 / 10

Will "Eros" ever surface? Throwing fans a tease last year from the mythic album-in-waiting, the DEFTONES continue to leave a question mark hovering over its uncertain release. Instead, they pick up where they left off with 2012's evolved "Koi No Yokan" by firing a bullet strike at number two on the...

8 / 10

Regarding the legacy of the band, I view Deftones as divided into two entities, segmented by the passing of Chi. Adrenaline through Saturday Night Wrist represents their mastering of nü angst to alt-metal experimentation as the two releases in the past six years would act as the next matured stage i

Long since distanced from their early nu-metal roots, Deftones are these days a far more intriguing proposition: a metal band more than happy to dip their toes into the ambient and experimental genres.

Album Reviews: Deftones - Gore

4.0 / 5

Deftones - Gore review: Finding balance

GoreArtist: DeftonesGenre: RockLabel: WarnerChino Moreno described his band’s latest album as “not a happy record”, but what the Deftones’ frontman failed to mention was that it’s not a particularly cohesive one, either.

7 / 10