It just worked out organically, and we have one of the baddest drummers ever just snapping.”
The snaps are our little attempt at a barbershop quartet. “Our buddy Zach Hill happened to be in LA when we were tracking everything, so we all walked up to meet him and had one beer, which led to three and four. “It’s one of those things that just happened out of nowhere,” Cunningham says. “The Spell of Mathematics” is an epic album highlight that combines doomy basslines, breathy vocals, and screams, before a midsection breakdown of finger snaps that you can easily imagine resonating across a festival field or concert hall. Guitars and bass pound out an enormous, droning chord as Chino Moreno screeches: “I reject both sides of what I’m being told/I’ve seen right through, now I watch how wild it gets/I finally achieve balance/Approaching a delayed rebirth.” “Ceremony” opens with staccatoed guitar and muffled vocals, followed by a feverish riff. And then, with a hint of reverb and Cunningham’s sticks counting it in, there’s an explosion. “Sequencing is definitely something that we put a lot of thought and energy into.” Opening track “Genesis” begins with an eerie synth, a slow, wavering riff. “We try to make albums,” Cunningham says. It reaches into every corner of Deftones’ influential sonic repertoire: chugging grooves, filthy rhythms, extreme vocals, soaring emotions, experimental soundscapes, and intentionally cryptic lyrics, open for each individual listener’s interpretation.
Ohms is a triumph that serves the stuck-at-home headphone listener every bit as much as it would, and eventually will, the festival-going headbanger. “There was talk of delaying the album,” he says, “but we were like, ‘Shit, if we can help somebody out, if we can get somebody through their doldrums and their day-to-day shit, let’s stick to the plan.” The band had spent nearly two years before that chipping away at their ninth album, Ohms, while also planning to celebrate the 20th anniversary of 2000’s White Pony with a remix album, Black Stallion-which is to say, they had more than a few reasons to take their show on the road. “We were eight hours away from flying to New Zealand and Australia,” he says, when they received the news that the festival that was to signal the start of their tour had been canceled.
The California band was set to embark on a two-year touring cycle when the pandemic hit. “My bags are still packed,” Deftones drummer Abe Cunningham tells Apple Music. “It’s beauty meets aggression.” Read an interview with Abe Cunningham about Deftones’ massive ninth album.
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