Best Deftones Album Ranked In Order of Greatness (Tier 1 to Tier 3)

What’s The Best Deftones Album?

I don’t believe in many things but one thing I do believe in is that any new album needs time to steep. I’m writing this just days after the release of Private Music, so I haven’t included it in this list. It wouldn’t be fair; I haven’t given it enough time to stew in my subconscious.

Although right now, it does feel kinda like a Tier 2 album. Good, just not exceptional across the board. There’s a few tracks on the album I really don’t like (and that’s Tier 2 country through and through, sadly).

But the band’s other albums? I’ve probably listened to each of them hundreds of times, some maybe even thousands. Out of all the music I listen to, I think it’s pretty much a toss up between Tool and Deftones for the most logged minutes of listening.

This article is my attempt to organize the Deftones’ albums into an order, from the ones I love the most to the ones I like the least. It is subjective which means it is my opinion, not actual fact and there’s no empirical science at play here. Just a fan, attempting to structure the band’s output into some kind of order of greatness.

Deftones Album Ranked In Order of Greatness

Tier 1

Around The Fur

My favorite album, maybe of all time, and also Chino’s personal favorite Deftones album as well. Around The Fur is what put Deftones on the map, and it still sounds as good today as it did back when it first launched back in 1997.

Steph’s guitar work is phenomenal on this album; he had an instantly recognizable style (octave chords for days) and guitar tone that was stolen by numerous bands during the 2000s. The album had swagger, it was heavy AF, both in terms of riffs and breakdowns but also emotionally too, and this is from a group of guys that were only just inside their very early twenties.

The production, overseen by Terry Date, is fantastic and there isn’t a weak moment across the entire album. Stand out tracks include My Own Summer, Be Quiet And Drive, Lhabia, Mascara, Around The Fur, and Rickets for me, although I never skip tracks on this album.

Abe’s always brilliant but he did what most drummers never manage to do on this record: he wrote a drum beat (Around The Fur intro) that was so good, so catchy that drummers will still be playing it in 2179.

As albums go, Around The Fur is about as close to perfection as it gets. I have a pal that works in a record shop in Seattle and he told me they sell around 15 copies of Around The Fur a week. Usually to teenagers and people under 20. Not bad for an album that’s now almost three decades old.

White Pony

Around The Fur is heavy, pretty much across its entire 41 minute runtime. It does let up in parts, there’s plenty of melody but it is a heavy album with plenty of aggression. The type of aggression most dudes only have in their twenties.

What came next, White Pony, showed anyone who was paying attention at the time what most OG fans already knew: there was more to the Deftones than phat riffs, screaming vocals, and awesome drumming. They had nuance and a host of eclectic influences that were simmering under the surface, ready to burst through.

I think White Pony is the band’s most accomplished album; the one people will look back at in another 30 years and say, yeah, that’s the one that really captures the band’s entire essence perfectly. I think of White Pony as the Deftones’ Dark Side of The Moon.

Most bands, including the Deftones seemingly, only have one of these albums in them. Tool’s would be Lateralus. Opeth’s Blackwater Park. Mastodon with Leviathan. And that’s perfectly okay because most bands never do anything that is truly seminal, that is strong enough to not only stand the test of time but also earn it new fans decades after its release.

This is why bands like Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Metallica are still relevant today. Anyone who gets into music in a serious way is compelled, at some point, to listen to these albums because, well… they’re just part of the process and to properly develop your palette.

And I think White Pony is at this level.

Diamond Eyes

Diamond Eyes was the first major change to the Deftones sound. Steph got into 8 string guitars and this had a massive effect on the tonal quality of the band moving forwards. As a long-time listener, it was a little overwhelming at first, and initially, I really didn’t enjoy it; it was too bass-heavy and Deftones had always had this nasty mid-range quality that I really liked.

But over the months and years that followed, Diamond Eyes has gone on to become one of my favorite Deftones albums. It has a lot of killer tracks and also one of the coolest riffs Steph has ever pulled down from the ether: You’ve Seen The Butcher. Frank is also way more prominent on this record too, adding layers of sound and tone that simply were not present on earlier records.

The album was heavy too with a brilliant first single in the form of Rocket Skates. It was the band’s first collaboration with producer Nick Raskulinecz and their first non-Terry Date-produced album. Me? I prefer Terry Date’s style to Raskulinecz’s. Date brings more noise, more of an organic-feel. It’s less polished, less clinical and that’s what makes White Pony and Around The Fur sound so good, the imperfections.

The rest of Diamond Eyes, while largely different to the lead single, was confident, well paced, and beautifully engineered. Listening back now, fully accustomed to the new eight string aesthetic, I honestly don’t think there’s a bad track on this album, hence its inclusion inside Tier 1.

The only track I ever tend to skip is Beauty School.

Koi No Yokan

I have to admit, I kind of slept on this album. I never really paid any attention to it when it came out. At the time, I was living in London and working a lot. I’d also started listening to a lot of different bands and I still wasn’t really digging the whole Djentones thing with the eight string guitars.

Every year, though, without fail, I do a Deftones rinse, where I re-listen to everything. I usually start with Around The Fur, then White Pony, and then move onto the newer albums. It was 12 months after the release of Koi No Yokan that I gave it a proper listen and by the time the last track had ended, I was in love with it.

Stand out tracks, for me, include:

• Goon Squad
• Entombed
• Gauze
• Poltergeist
• What Happened to You?
• Tempest
• Leathers
• Rosemary

I think this album is the last time the Deftones really captured lightning in a bottle. There are huge choruses, massive riffs, incredible drumming, and more than 80% of the album’s tracks are absolute bangers. The pace of the record, how it just explodes on the opening track and then just keeps on going, reminds me of Around The Fur.

For me, this is the last, truly great Deftones album. It is a worthy entry inside its Tier 1 releases and, sadly, probably the last we’ll see from the band. The fact that it came out straight after Diamond Eyes makes this the band’s second killer two-album run after Around The Fur and White Pony. To pull this off so late in their career is testament to the band’s pedigree. When they’re on form, they don’t miss.

Tier 2

Deftones (Self-Titled)

Here’s a controversial take for you: I think Deftones’ self-titled album is one of its most under-rated. It came out after White Pony, so it had massive shoes to fill and the band, mentally, wasn’t in a great place when recording it; the drugs and booze were getting a little out of hand at this point.

Battle-Axe, Minerva, Hexagram, Bloody Cape are all standout tracks from the album; they’re heavy, melodic, and quintessentially Deftones. I think what I like most about this album, however, is that it represents the last time the Deftones truly sounded like the Deftones of Around The Fur / White Pony era. After this album, Steph started adding in more strings on his guitar and the tonal quality of all subsequent records shifted as a result.

The album was dubbed a disappointment by the label despite the fact it sold nearly 500,000 copies and debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200. Initially, I think expectations were too high. White Pony was a watershed moment for the band, following it (or even one-upping it) was never going to happen. Taken on its own, the album has some brilliant moments, killer tracks, and it showed a further maturation of the band’s sound and overall approach to song composition.

There are ideas and moments on this album that transcend both Around The Fur and White Pony, the production on Minerva, for instance, is utterly genius. Rick Beato has an awesome video that breaks down this song, from a technical perspective, and if you’re a fan of the Deftones it is well worth a watch. I’ve included it below, so you can check it out in full.

The Deftones’ Self-Titled album is heavy in parts, beautiful in others, and there’s rarely a dull moment in its 47 minute run-time. More than any of the band’s records, I think this one has aged and matured the best. Listening back to it now, it sounds like vintage Deftones from an era long gone. It’s like Around The Fur and White Pony had a baby, and in reality, this is pretty much what happened, as the Self-Titled album was born from the juices of both of these iconic records.

And while it is neither as good nor as accomplished as either, it is one of the band’s more interesting records because it represents their sound as it was during their first initial heyday, before the levee broke and they disappeared for a while, only to return stronger and bigger than ever after being rediscovered by legions of new fans on TikTok and other Gen Z-facing social media platforms.

Adrenaline

Adrenaline is heavy, dirty, grungy, and it was my first introduction to the band way back in 1997. Back then Chino had dreadlocks, Steph played six string guitars, mostly in Standard Tuning, and the band’s focus was tearing the roof off of small, sweat-soaked clubs. Basically, it was heavy, nasty, and frantic. And it was glorious.

Often thought of as the band’s weakest album, I don’t think this could be further from the truth. I’ll take Adrenaline over Gore, Ohms, and Saturday Night Wrist any day of the week and twice on a Sunday. Yes, the album is rough around the edges and Chino’s vocals aren’t at the level they are on Around The Fur and White Pony but the album captures the raw power of the band unlike any other of their records. As introductions go, this album set the stage for what was to come, hinting at the band’s latent potential which would come into its own on the follow up, Around The Fur.

Bored, 7 Words, Engine No. 9, Nosebleed, Root, and Fireal, One Weak, and Root are the standout tracks for me, and if you’re counting that’s basically most of the album, making it an easy inclusion inside Tier 2. Like the Self-Titled album, I think Adrenaline has aged well. It sounds like the 1990s with its grainy production and grungier, alt-metal tonal qualities that, at the time, no one else was really doing quite like the Deftones.

It was produced by Terry Date, fresh from working with Pantera, and it was recorded at a frantic pace over the period of a month. Date wanted to capture the band’s live ferocity, so he had the then very inexperienced Chino Moreno do all of his vocal parts live with the band, using a handheld SM57 microphone, which added to the live-feel of the record. Really, more than any other record by the band, this is the one where you can truly hear the band as they sounded live at the time.

I saw them play on their first trip over to the UK and, having heard Adrenaline, I remember being blown away by how close to the record they sounded live, especially the vocals. They were tight, incredibly heavy, and clearly destined for much bigger things. You could hear the influence of The Smiths, The Cure, stuff that wasn’t of metal origin and this added to the mystique around the band: they were different, arty, outliers in the burgeoning nu-metal rebellion of the late-1990s. As soon as you heard this record, compared to contemporary releases from Korn and Limp Bizkit, you knew the Deftones were different. You knew this band were going to do something special, and that they weren’t just another bit-part player in this burgeoning tracksuit nu metal scene.

Tier 3

Ohms

Ohms came out during the dark times. The lead single off the record, Ohms, was solid and sounded very much like a Deftones song of old, something from the Around The Fur / Self-Titled era. It was heavy, the pace was fast, and it featured one of the best riffs Steph had come up with in years. Instantly memorable, iconic, and catchy in equal parts.

Terry Date returned on producing duties and Ohms was the first record to feature Steph’s new custom 9 string ESP guitar which became one of the main focal points of the album’s tone and style.

I still prefer Deftones to Djentones, the more strings Steph adds, the further away from its core, traditional sound they move. When they get this right, as they did on Diamond Eyes, the band is unstoppable. It’s heavier than their initial era, more complex, and thanks to Steph’s general geekiness around tone and gear, always clear and defined.

But Ohms, at least for me, has a few too many forgettable tracks, a few too many missteps and missed opportunities. There are tracks like Urantia that start incredibly strong and then just wither away like a fart in the wind. It’s not a bad track by any stretch of the imagination but that opening riff deserves more.

And this, for me, is perhaps the biggest thematic element of the album: wasted opportunities. Tracks start off interesting or build up slowly, hinting at something bigger to come and then don’t really go anywhere, meandering off into dream-pop territory with little to no payoff. Urantia sums this up, perhaps, the best. It has the potential to be one of the best tracks on the album, but its middle section is just so weak, it becomes forgettable.

And that for me is Ohms in a nutshell, it’s not a bad album but it isn’t a particularly strong one either. There are moments of genius, Ohms, Radiant City, peppered throughout the album but these glimpses of the band firing on all cylinders, sadly, are outweighed by its weaker aspects which, in the end, form a larger part of the listening experience.

Gore

During the recording sessions for Gore, the band was not in a good place. Tensions between Chino and Steph were at their highest and this resulted in Steph not being happy with the songs they had. You cannot make a good Deftones album with Steph Carpenter’s full involvement and Gore is proof of that sentiment.

Described as being heavier than Koi No Yokan by Moreno ahead of its release, Gore turned out to be anything but; it was more dream-pop than alt-metal. And while there were some excellent moments on the album, Phantom Bride, Pittura Infamante, and Prayers / Triangles, much of the album fails to reach the highs of Koi No Yokan, Around The Fur, White Pony, and Diamond Eyes.

With the bands Tier 1 releases, I can literally name song after song, remember where I was when I first heard them, but with Gore I really struggle to remember anything about the album. I had to go and re-listen to it before sitting down to write this; with the other albums, I knew them off by heart.

I was pleasantly surprised when I did, finding a new appreciation for quite a lot of it. Tonally, it is a very different album from Golden Eyes and Koi. The band adopts a slower, more deliberate song composition on this record that is built around big, heroic choruses. When it clicks, it really works: the choruses on some of the tracks are some of the best the band has done, Phantom Bride being the best example of this.

Again, it’s not a bad album. Deftones doesn’t make bad albums; it’s just not as good as when they’re at their best. I had real trouble assigning albums to the Tier 3 category, Ohms was easy, but after re-listening to Gore, my mind has been changed about this album, proving that albums like habits and tastes can change with the passing of time.

For now, I’m keeping Gore in Tier 3 simply because it is the album I have listened to the least out of the bands entire back catalog. The good news is: it’s nowhere near as bad as I remember. Like Ohms, though, the really good bits are massively outweighed by the more mediocre, filler parts. You may disagree, and that’s fine, but for the criteria of this article, too much filler / forgettable tracks means a Tier 3 classification.

Saturday Night Wrist

This album was the first without Chi Cheng and it represents the start of the band’s second era (or eon). Losing a band member is always hard. Chi was an integral part of the band, a close, dear friend, and his untimely death left a hole in the band that still exists to this day. EROS was abandoned, never to see the light of day, save for the occasional leak online, and many feared this was the end for the Deftones.

Saturday Night Wrist was the album the band returned with. It wasn’t EROS, and Chi had no creative role in its creation. As an album, there are plenty of excellent moments on Saturday Night Wrist with some killer riffs, soaring choruses, and properly impressive songs. Mein, Hole In The Earth, Beware, Rats!Rats!Rats!, and Cherry Waves all sound like Deftones on top form.

This album had the potential to be Tier 2 stuff, the good tracks are some of the strongest the band has put out, but, again, they are out-numbered by weaker, filler tracks that pull down the overall quality of the album.

And an album isn’t just a few standout tracks, it has to be taken as a whole. When you take Saturday Night Wrist as a whole, it is certainly memorable in parts but the main takeaway, for me, was always that it had too many filler tracks, tracks that probably shouldn’t have been included or reworked into something better.

And that’s it, all the studio albums ranked in some kind of order. Got your own thoughts? Head on over to our subreddit r/electrikjam and add yours in as comments on this post; it’ll be pinned to the top!