I don't know if you're deeply familiar with the Deftones, but you should really listen to "Saturday Night Wrist" at least once; an album that differs again from its predecessor, yet remains highly inspired.

This time, the spotlight is on Delgado, the keyboardist, who manages to create dreamlike atmospheres where Chino's voice sings like a long lament, sometimes melancholic, other times angry. You move from tracks like "Hole in the Earth," where harmony and melody meld perfectly, creating a piece that at times echoes typically English sounds, to "Rats!Rats!Rats!" where the Sacramento quintet borrows the grindcore schizophrenia of Dillinger Escape Plan (naturally seasoned with the typically melodic Deftones openings). At the center, we find gems like "Cherry Waves" (worth the album purchase alone) or "Xcerces," which harks back to trip hop tendencies, with Delgado and Chino chasing each other in a melody halfway between a ballad and a post-rock piece.

The Deftones have managed to transform their style into an even more mature form (helped by the stimuli from the side projects Team Sleep and Phallucy) and after winning a Grammy in 2000, they have chosen not to formalize their music, but to make it a gem accessible to the few. What can I say, another hit for the Deftones, many will say that it can't be compared to "White Pony," but I feel like saying it's better this way, S.N.W. lives with its own soul and in its thousand facets cannot undergo sorts of comparisons....

Last treat: the album is produced by Bob Ezrin (Nine Inch Nails, Jane's Addiction, Pink Floyd) and even in this the Deftones hit the mark, "softening" sounds that in previous albums gave excessive coldness to the piece.

If you haven't bought it yet, run to the stores, if you don't know the Deftones well... too bad for you!!!

Tracklist Lyrics and Videos

01   Hole in the Earth (04:53)

Can you explain to me how
You're so evil (how?)
It's too late for me now
There's a hole in the earth (a hole in earth)
There's a hole in the earth (a hole in the earth)
I'm out...

Can you explain to me now
If you're still able well...
I think you know the truth
There's a hole in the earth (a hole in the earth)
I'm out
I hate all of my friends
They all lack taste sometimes
There's a hole in the earth
I'm out...
There's a hole in the earth
Please take a bow...
This is the end (somewhere)
This is the end
Somewhere...
There's a hole in the earth
There's a hole in the earth
I hate all of my friends
I'm out...
There's a hole in the earth
Hey...
Somewhere

02   Combat (04:34)

This time the finger's pointed right at you!
Whose side are you on?!
Whose side are you on?!
I ask you what side since you pointed it out
Whose side are you on?!
Whose side are you on?!

A waste of time if you don't believe
Can't decide till you've hit the ground
Make your mind because you're holding me down
(And I want to get down)

This time the finger's pointed right at you!
Whose side are you on?!
Whose side are you on?!
I asked you what side since you pointed it out
Whose side are you on?!
Whose side are you on?!

A waste of time if you don't believe
Can't decide till you've hit the ground
Make your mind because 'cause you're holding me down
(And I want to get down)

Don't think that I don't know 'cause I do
Nice try
Guess that's what you're really like. Like
Let something out, say something else
Decide whose side you're on

Whose side are you on?! Decide. Go on.

03   [untitled] (06:12)

04   Cherry Waves (04:54)

A sea of waves
We hug the same plank
Just as I rehearsed over in my brain

The waves...
Suck...
You in
And you drown

If like you
Should sink down beneath
I'll swim down
With you...you....

You hang the anchors over my neck
I liked it at first
but the more you laughed
The crazier I came...

The waves...
Suck....you in
Then you drown...

If, like, you
Should sink down beneath
I'll swim down with you....
Is that what you want?...
You....
Is that what you want?...

Waves...
Waves...
it's like...

If like you
Should sink down beneath
I'll swim down with you!
Is that you want?
With you...
Is that what you want?

You?
You...

Escape...below...

05   [untitled] (05:32)

06   Mein (04:31)

I've looked outside
But I, never wandered out
I'd like to pull you into me
Intercept you in between
But I, never wandered out
Outside

That way I'll always stay away from you

I've looked inside
But I, never wandered in
I'd like to pull it into me
Intercept you in between
But I, never wandered in
Inside

That way I'll always stay away from you

The universe, breaking us down

That way I'll always stay away from you

07   [untitled] (03:05)

08   Finger of Death (05:14)

09   [untitled] (05:11)

10   [untitled] (03:11)

11   Pink Cellphone (01:51)

12   [untitled] (04:23)

13   [untitled] (04:04)

14   [untitled] (02:30)

15   [untitled] (05:27)

16   Xerces (04:03)

Universe
Surrounds you
When you're ready it waits
For us to leave this earth
Come on, they're calling your name out

I don't know
I could stay or leave
Either way
Cause the comet can take us
All the way through

Goodbye
Safe, heaven, new
I'll be waving
Goodbye

Return
To see
Everything looks the same
I don't know if the change it made was grave
Cause the craving remained the same

Goodbye
Safe, heaven, new
I'll be waving
Goodbye

I'll be waving, goodbye

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Other reviews

By Ginky

 One of the best tracks on the album.

 Surely this atrocity is the worst thing ever conceived by Chino and company.


By sephiroth

 I could compare the latest effort from Deftones to a pill that induces emotions that seem entirely genuine or utterly fake.

 The band has partially abandoned the elements of the predecessor and drawn heavily from the experiments of White Pony.


By maz74

 MASTERPIECE!

 music to travel through the metropolitan night without a destination...


By thetrooper

 This time the change of direction is somewhat more pronounced than in the previous self-titled album.

 A work that is not very fast and driven but calmer, more thoughtful, and quite engaging, a must-buy for lovers of experimental rock and nu sounds.