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To many people, White Pony demonstrates a change in style for the band. The music is a bit more complex, moody. Chino sat down to discuss this, as well as his thoughts on the current state of rock 'n' roll, with NY Rock freelancer Gabriella. | ||||
NYROCK: |
There has been much talk about your change in style.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
Everybody is telling us that we changed our style and all that, but anybody who listens closely to our other two albums [Adrenaline (1995), Around the Fur (1997)] knows that it is simply another chapter in our evolution. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
You let a lot of time pass before you got the new album out.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
We were under a lot of pressure – people tried to put some pressure on us – but we just decided to get out of it, to retreat and find ourselves again. We all changed, as people change. That's normal, but we had to get used to each other again. Once we had that out of the way and everything was quiet again, we started writing songs again, not a minute before. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
Where did the pressure come from? | ||||
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CHINO: |
Part of the pressure they tried to put on us came from the fact that a lot of the bands who were influenced by us were all of a sudden hip and got a lot of airplay. We didn't want any part of that. We didn't want to compete with music that sounds like a weaker version of our own songs. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
In a way, you seem to hold back. A lot of singers love the spotlight, but you don't seem to strive for it.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
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NYROCK: |
Is that the reason your lyrics are often cryptic? | ||||
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CHINO: |
I want to express my feelings. I want to express what I feel without actually having to spell it out, without actually having to sing the words. I don't want to use the words to express myself. I think the music should express it all. I've always been a huge Cure fan, especially when Robert Smith was really abstract and cryptic, like in Pornography, where the lyrics were really cryptic but definitely intense and everybody understood and felt what he was trying to say. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
Sometimes it seems that you are a step ahead of your time and it always takes some time for the public to catch on to what you do.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
If you take Around the Fur, I really thought that we created something futuristic, something completely new, but it took a while for the fans to like it, to get used to it. A lot of people just discovered and like that album and it's three years old and I see the same thing happening with White Pony. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
But White Pony seems to be a big success already? | ||||
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CHINO: |
A lot of people might not understand it straight away because it's not an obvious thing. There's no obvious reason to love the album straight away. You have to get into it. There isn't an image. If you take Slipknot, for example, you get all the pictures, the images, all the visions. I don't mean to dis them. It's just that we're different and our way of working and our sound is different. We don't like the image thing. We think our music stands for itself. We don't want our sound getting swallowed and getting lost in a lot of images. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
The Deftones and Korn are often considered to be in the same genre and are labeled as the new Californian Metal Explosion. Do you agree? | ||||
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CHINO: |
I think our lyrics are rather introverted and sometimes really complex. A lot of people describe Jonathan Davis's lyrics this way but I don't think our lyrics can be compared. The lyrics of Korn are quite different. For example, if you hear Jon singing about something, you know what he means. He's not talking around something. He's getting straight to the point, while I'd rather give you a feeling of what I'm trying to say. I prefer using metaphors and just giving you the general feeling about what I'm trying to say. It isn't necessarily something that has anything to do with my real life. It isn't necessarily autobiographical. It's the music that demands certain lyrics. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
One can read almost anything into your lyrics.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
I like the way my lyrics are. Okay, they're a bit different but maybe that's the reason why I like them. It's okay if people don't like the lyrics. Everybody should have their own opinion about them. Our albums have a lot of different scenarios. You might just feel really relaxed and then the mood changes and shakes you up. It might be a bit uncomfortable sometimes but at the same time there is a certain warm feeling around and it doesn't let you down and hugs you. I think it's something really rare and certainly nothing you find all that often. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
I heard that there was a bit of gossip about Frank. People criticized you for having a DJ.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
A lot of people keep on asking which role Frank plays in the band and why he's in the Deftones. They seem not to be able to understand that you don't need to hear the DJ straight away. We all work together and everybody in the band is important but we don't need to please our egos with solos. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
Egos and commerce are certainly not something the Deftones place a lot of value in. You even refused the headlining spot at the prestigious Family Values tour. Something other bands would kill for. | ||||
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CHINO: |
We really wouldn't have fit in and it wouldn't have been our thing. We thought about it but then decided not to do it. It just seems to be such a big circus and so many different bands, bands we wouldn't go on tour with so why tour with them for the Family Values? I think there are too many things involved, too much politics and too much money. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
But in Europe you played many festivals and supported many other bands, for example, Limp Bizkit.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
We don't mind supporting bands like Limp Bizkit and Blink 182 at European festivals. It's cool and so far we liked it and had a lot of fun and it's a good way for us to be. This way if anything goes wrong or we're making the wrong career decisions, we're the only ones who can be blamed for it. It's a good way to be and I don't have sleepless nights thinking about what I might have done wrong. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
You used to be a Korn fan, but lately there seems to be a certain animosity between Korn and the Deftones.... | ||||
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CHINO: |
I don't grudge them their success at all. I'm really happy that things worked out all right for Korn. But at the same time I know that if there's something going wrong at one point in their future and they're going to fall flat on their noses, then the reason can be found in the faults and mistakes they made. It's kind of hard to talk about it and for a long time I didn't talk about it at all because I didn't want to be misunderstood. I know the guys from Korn and I've known them for ages. I listened to them long before they were successful. I know how intensive they can be and that they've really got it. For me the first album was the perfect example of what they're capable of and how good they really are, but it got less with every new album. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
So are you still a fan? | ||||
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CHINO: |
I see myself as a Korn fan, but a Korn fan who's in danger of not being a fan anymore at some point in the future. Don't get me wrong. It has nothing to do with the fact that they're successful. As I said, I'm happy for their success, but just because the music doesn't touch me as much as it used to touch me. | ||||
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NYROCK: |
Do you think they know? | ||||
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CHINO: |
I said that to Jonathan myself, when he called me before they recorded Issues and told me that they were heading for the recording studio again. I told him to take some time out and let things happen naturally. I think good music is something that happens, nothing you can force to happen. It has to happen naturally. September 2000 | ||||
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Nov. 6, 2000 – Deftones Send Cash to Fired Editor Nov. 1, 2000 – Editor Fired Over Deftones Photo |