Albums: Private Music

Deftones tenth studio album "Private Music" originally released on 22 August, 2025. was preceded by great singles "My Mind Is A Mountain", "Milk Of The Madonna, and "Infinte Source", under the production by Nick Raskulinecz who previously worked on the band's albums Diamond Eyes (2010) and Koi No Yokan (2012).

 

Private Music was met with widespread acclaim from music critics upon its release, praising as the Deftones best labum in their career so far. 

 

The released of the singles "My Mind Is A Mountain", "Milk Of The Madonna" and formidable "Infinite Source", the album seemed to intrigued a lot, starting with cover with a snake, back in the day the albums preceded by an animal on the cover White Pony’s stallion and Diamond Eyes’ barn owl became synonymous of good music, and with some of the band’s best material. Now using a white snake this time, and guess what...the suspicious were true.

 

The new album seems to be total changed developping some of the best material from the band in years, mastering their sounds where beauty meets brutality, the band are still faithful to their style of alt metal to near perfection,  but now they are creating a massive wall of sound layered by so many nuances that pushes Deftones to new heights. 

 

Working with Nick Raskulinecz, was a great choice, Nick helped to polish Deftones' sound to make the whole album feel crystal clean sound production, you can notice this on several tracks such "Infinite Source" where Stephen Carpenter's guitar dissonates all over, Frank Delgado's eerie synths at the end of "Souvenir" makes believe this album is definitely a total shift in the bands, proving the album is the sort of record that muste be played on a fantastic hi-fi stereo system on Cd or Vinyl in order to warpe completely the listener.

 

This time, the band also adds other sounds such a dream wave and shoegaze to create a certain ethereal effect in many tracks such as the expansive ballads "Souvenir", the meditative "Metal Dream", and the the chart breakers "cXz" and the brilliant "Milk Of The Madonna". 

 

One of the key factors for this change was the addition of Fred Sablan, his fantastic grooves on his bass guitar aided to increase the intensity on "Ecdysis", the intense flow on "My Mind Is A Mountain" which results in one of the best tracks on  the record, and of course Chino Moreno's voice seems to be more intense more amplified to expand this ethereal effect.  Nothing new, cause Chino’s vocals have always been a huge highlight in the past, but this time, his performances on "Private Music"proves to be the best he’s ever sounded, by leaning heavily into his signature tenor to provide an ample amount of beauty throughout the album. 

 

The lyrics are quite good, keeping the ambiguity that Deftones’ songwriting has shown in the past, with many of Chino's lines being left to interpretation as always. Check the track "Ecdysis", as a term for the shedding of a snake’s skin, the band uses imagery of flames and rain to symbolize the transformation of themselves.

 

Other subject are much more literal. "Infinite  Source" hints at what could be the band's potential retirement. A majority of the final tracks feel like these out of body experiences as the songwriting gets incredibly spacey, perfectly fitting the production of these last few songs. Particularly on the last two ones "Metal Dream" and  "Departing The Body". In the first one, Chino searches in the dreams of another party, yearning for the good days ahead. On the latter, Chino comes across as foreboding as he anticipates what’s going to happen next for the band.

 

Definitely an album that speaks on its own, their best material in years and yes why not, their best record of their whole catalogue, proving the band still can make timeless and deeper music. 

 

Private Music Track List: 

 

1. My Mind Is A Mountain

2. Locked CLub

3. Ecdysis

4. Infinite Source

5. Souvenir 

6. CXY

7. I Think About You All The Time

8. Milk Of The Madonna

9. Cut Hands

10. Metal Dream

11. Departing The Body