I've never fully embraced all of the different sides to the Deftones and "Saturday Night Wrist" finds me in the same situation again. Like many others I was drawn to the band by "Back To School"back in 1999/2000 but was somewhat disappointed to find that the rest of "White Pony" didn't really follow its nu-metal blueprint("Back To School" was a reworking of "White Pony" track "Pink Maggit")

Of course after I looked into the bands background this became immediately apparent, Deftones are a band who have intentionally taken a contrary path and Chino Moreno has since dismissed "Back To School" as an example of how easy it is to write a hit (the implication being of course that the Deftones would rather put the effort into making worthwhile music).

So onto the new album then, well it takes what is a familiar path for previous releases in that it mixes harder edged tracks ("Rapture" or "Rats!" for example) with some more ethereal, almost ambient metal("Beware" is very trip-hop influenced and "u, u, d, d, l ,r, l, r,a, b, Select, Start" is almost like trance drum and bass) whilst I don't have a problem with this in a real sense (it doesn't cause any violent outbursts for example) I just find it incredibly difficult to find anything in the more trippy moments to recommend as theres a certain amount of truth in the fact that it all sounds the same.

  Theres no real dynamic in the more subdued tracks that distinguishes one from another and whilst it lends the more aggressive tracks an extra edge by virtue of the fact that they jump out of the background more it also means that almost half of this album leaves absolutely no lasting impression whatsoever, with that in mind theres little to enjoy in this album either and it leaves this reviewer cold.

Let us know your views on 'Saturday Night Wrist'

Track List

Hole In The Earth
Rapture
Beware
Cherry Waves
Mein
u, u, d, d, l ,r, l, r, a, b, Select, Start
Xerces
Rats! Rats! Rats!
Pink Cellphone
Combat
The Earth
Riviere

Line Up

Chino Moreno - Vocals
Abe Cunningham - Drums
Chi Cheng - Bass
Frank Delgado - Turntables/Keyboards
Stephen Carpenter - Guitar