Album Review - Deftones - White Pony
Wed, 08 May 2024, 02:08:00 AM
Introduction
What can I realistically say about this album impartially? It’s grown to be a major fixture in my life, and I listen to it every month or so in full. When I was younger, I looked down on deftones as a whole for the kind of audience it attracted, but after giving it a chance (at around 14 or so?) I was pretty much immediately enamored with it. Chino Moreno has such a unique vocal range and brings incredible raw emotion into his tracks.
just a short review! i’m tired and wanted to get something out before i sleep.
Tracklist
Accessible at Musicbrainzpicard. I am not typing it out manually again!!!
This is the same exact CD that I’m listening on.
Review
feiticeira
This is an incredible starter song for white pony, and I wish more people would agree. It kicks off with an intense riff, followed by a simple drum beat, which chino sounds amazing over.
Feiticeira means sorceress in Portugese. The song is about a kidnap, and the listener is intentionally left in doubt regarding the outcome of this kidnap, as well as the events leading up for it.
I think the song tells a good story, but the highlight is definitely the melody. I do like how the story is left to the listeners interpretation, as to the outcome of the person kidnapped.
digital bath
This song is an excellent example of what chino can do with his voice. He truly streches his range to an unimaginable degree during the chorus.
The melody is an oxymoron to the lyrics. The song itself is about murdering someone during a bath by throwing in an electrical appliance, and watching them take their last breath before they dry them off. The chorus describes the exhilaration that the murderer felt during doing this.
I enjoy listening to the instrumental intensify during every chorus, almost like a slow delve into madness as the song continues and the story lays out in front of you.
One of the best on the album. Not to milk the topic, but Chino’s voice is so capable of expressing pain and strong emotion in a way other artists struggle with without devolving into just screaming or something more reserved like Alex G (still very talented) or other indie artists.
elite
This is one of my least favourite tracks on the album. I find the lyrics quite repetitive, and the vocal effects and instrumental are just okay.
I do like the meaning of the song.
“You’re into depression
‘Cause it matches your eyes”
I think this lyric, and the song itself tackle the appropriation of depression amongst people who see to use it for attention or clout amongst others. Chino’s performance is great too, but I sadly find it quite grating, and despite the good message I don’t see myself relistening so often.
rx queen
This song is about a relationship where both parties continue to hurt each other. Some interpret this as about prescription drug abuse, but some people take Genius way too seriously. They don’t know everything!
This song is quite slow, and much less intense than the rest of the album. I like the motif across the album of interpersonal relationships, I think it makes the album pretty relatable for a lot of people.
“I see a red light in June
And I hear crying
You turn newborn baby blue
Now we’re all the virus”
These are my favourite lyrics on the song, touching on the harm being caused by both people in the relationship.
street carp
One of my favourite on the album. It sounds really unique, and I don’t think any other nu metal band on the scene could create something like this.
Stephen Carpenter plays this throbbing riff throughout, which gives the entire song a great structure.
I have to agree with the >reddit music kino people on this one. the song is about a relationship (yet again!!) where chino has lost interest, but his partner has not. She continues to ask for his address as to reenter his life, and chino just keeps lying.
Chino alludes to her as being aggressive and promiscuous.
I simply love how it sounds and feels. Sometimes I really struggle to understand the lyrics while listening and this took me a few times.
teenager
A major tonal shift in the album. Kind of a ballad, talking about a past love which was not reciprocated in the end.
Very emotional and raw, but not a fan of the instrumental. I think it is far too sudden of a change in mood, and feels kind of abrupt.
I love the guest vocalist. she harmonises with chino really well.
really sad!
knife party
dont tell me i spelled the title wrong…. its spelled this way on my cd!!!!
Not that the last guest vocalist was bad at all but this is possibly one of the best features on any deftones song.
it makes me wonder if chino can make a song that’s not about a relationship!!
this song alludes to chino finding vulnerability being itself masochistic, and that opening up to someone can be damaging.
“In here, we’re all anemic
In here, anemic and sweet, so…”
The process of opening up makes Chino feel weak. The screams of the guest vocalist are so penetrating, but not at all disharmonious. how the fuck chino cooked this up continues to mystify me, but i honestly think this is the best song on the album because of how this guy managed to make this a great song.
“Go get your knife, go get your knife
And kiss me”
I like this lyric. It symbolises the duality of love and pain and how they usually come together.
amazing song. please listen if you haven’t heard it.
korea
Starts off with a powerful riff. The song is about vice,
“Of white skin on red leather
Check the claws we got”
strippers!
“Night time, cavity, come in”
sex!
“Downtown, pony, work your pitch”
coke!
this could be percieved as chino’s own battles with indulgence, or as an expression for his love of it. there doesn’t seem to be any remorse, so i like to think of it as chino’s unwillingness to change in the face of all the previous themes, being faked depression, love and pain, because why should he?
passenger
there are plenty of interpretations of this song. people think it’s about an overdose, ignoring problems and also just getting a blowjob.
I personally lean towards it being about chino running from his issues.
“Chrome buttons, buckles and leather surfaces
These and other lucky witnesses
Now to calm me
This time won’t you please
Drive faster”
Chino is unfazed by all of these superficial things, and just wants to keep driving further away.
“Who cares who sees what tonight?
Roll these misty windows
Down to catch my breath and then
Go and go and go just”
or maybe it’s just about sex. shit, analyse it yourself, i dont know!!!!
sex could be considered as running from your problems, like temporary relief from real issues at hand. driving far away, indulging and going back home over and over again.
pretty good song! worth a listen but definitely one of my lesser played on the album.
change (in the house of flies)
Impossible to dislike. complete with a hypnotising riff, wonderful ambient synths overlaid on top and an excellent meaning about, yes, relationships again. to be fair he was like 27 when the album came out
“I watched a change in you
It’s like you never had wings
Now, you feel so alive
I’ve watched you change”
chino talks about a transformation of a partner into a fly. she is changing and chino doesn’t like it, she is less than human to him.
“I pulled off your wings
Then I laughed”
chino delights in hurting her now that she doesn’t comply to his standards.
“I look at the cross
Then I look away
Give you the gun
Blow me away”
Chino feels guilty about this. looking towards a cross symbolises his own moral code that he may have felt that he violated for superficial reasons, and this makes him remorseful to the point of wanting her to kill him.
an incredible display of lyricism, as well as one of the best riffs of the 2000s. i do not care that this is untrue.
a must listen for anyone with an even cursory enjoyment in metal.
pink maggit
one of the best ways the album could end, as well as another personal favourite of mine. vaguely melancholic, yet again showing themes of masochism, and also relationships again. i hadn’t really realised this theme until i listened to the album properly.
The intro is probably my least favourite part of the song. it starts off very slowly, but by the time the guitars come in, everything falls into place.
“I’ll take your oxygen away
I’ll set you on fire
‘Cause I’m on fire
And always you alone
So when to
This whore
I’m free
And they lose her
So forget about me
‘Cause I’ll stick you”
i think chino has had a bad time with relationships
i find it hard to know what to write about pink maggit. it is honestly an amazing song. i just hope you listen to this one too!
Conclusion
white pony is about hurt, loss and depression, and i think it’s the best album that deftones ever put out. few albums are as consistent.
i am lucky to have listened to white pony, and i hope listening to it changes how you think or feel or at least changes how you think about how music should be.