I’ve been a bit of a Deftones fanatic since roughly halfway through high school. My tastes in metal have always leaned towards the more experimental, genre-bending side of things anyway, so I was primed to be into them anyway, but it’s amazing how these guys can switch between atmospheric and earth-shatteringly heavy on a dime, not to mention how consistently good they’ve been over the years. Their first and last albums are 21 years apart, and yet there’s not a single bad egg in their discography. So when I heard they were playing at the Greek Theater on campus the first week of my sophomore year at Cal, I knew I had to be there. The day tickets went on sale, I got mine--and I got a copy of Gore, their newest album, along with it, so that was nice.
According to the posters around Berkeley, the first opening act was a band called Sister Crayon. I had no idea who they were or what they sounded like, so I decided to preserve the surprise and avoided their music--not like that’s a difficult task, since they’re still pretty underground. I arrived at the show roughly halfway through their set, thanks to some poor planning and backpack shenanigans (hi Elena!), only to find out that they’d changed their name to Rituals of Mine. Still, regardless of their name, they made a solid warmup for what was to come, with an atmospheric, yet still in-your face sound and a drummer on each side of the stage backing up the powerful vocals. I don’t know that I’d go out and buy all their albums and merch right this second, but given the direction mainstream electronic music has been going since big room house fell out of favor, I won’t be surprised if they show up on pop radio sometime soon.
The other opening act, Alabama rapper Yelawolf, was someone I knew of, but wasn’t all that familiar with. I’d only heard him in posse cuts and cyphers like “Worldwide Choppers,” “1 Train,” and “Shady CXVPHER,” along with part of his song “Push ‘Em” in Need for Speed: No Limits, which worked in the context of a frenetic racing game, but didn’t quite grab me the way some of the other songs on there did. Combined with the fact that my only contact with live hip-hop performances consisted of Kanye’s Late Orchestration and brief YouTube clips, I really didn’t know what to expect.
What I got--much to my surprise--was an electric performance located somewhere in the sonic space between Black Label Society, Beastie Boys, and Hank 3. Backed by a DJ and guitarist, Yela was as deft an MC on stage as in the booth. He performed all his parts live, with no hype man or studio vocals to back him up, and kept the crowd engaged throughout. Whether he was spitting punchlines at rapid speed or singing bluesy hooks, he sounded perfectly in his element, and when he talked to the crowd between songs, you could tell he meant every word. If not for him shouting out Deftones multiple times during the set, you would think he was the main attraction.
And then, of course, there was Deftones. Their hour-and-half-long set covered the entire span of their career, from the punk-influenced nu metal of their debut Adrenaline all the way up to the spacey flourishes on Gore, with at least one track off every album. Of course, some albums got more representation than others, with material from Diamond Eyes, Around the Fur, and White Pony getting the most play, but no matter what era each song was from, the instrumentation was spot-on, and the sound mixing ensured every last riff felt and sounded as massive as the studio versions. Lead vocalist Chino Moreno didn’t scream quite as much as he does on record, but given how intense those screams are and the fact that his voice needed to stay sounding solid for the whole show, that’s understandable. Chino did, however, do something impressive during the band’s performance of “Knife Prty.” In its original form on White Pony, the song’s signature bridge features creepy, almost disturbing wailing from a woman named Rodleen Getsic. The band could have easily taken the studio track and played it over the PA or had their DJ/keyboardist Frank Delgado play it, but instead, Chino did it himself. I know he can go high when he wants to, but the fact that he pulled that off live blew me away.
Meanwhile, the stage setup added just the right amount of spectacle, with the Gore artwork as a backdrop and a set of lights that constantly changed color to suit the songs played. I think the fact that I was sitting just outside the standing area helped, since I was close enough to see the band well, but not so close that if I was standing in the wrong place, all I’d get was LED’s to the face. However, the most powerful visual image was one that I’m pretty sure happened by accident. Two or three times over the course of the night, Chino would play rhythm guitar while he sang, and when he stood in the exact right spot, his shadow, towering over everything, appeared on the wall to the right of the stage.
But for me, the story of that show didn’t end when “Engine No. 9” did and the Deftones walked off stage. My trip out of the Greek took me past the tour buses. I happened to look to my left, at the last one, and see Yelawolf and DJ Klever outside their bus, chatting with fans and taking pictures. Their set was long over by then, and they could have easily just gone inside and chilled out until it was time to drive to the next venue, but they came outside anyway. My conversations with each of the two weren’t that long, but they were both chill, friendly guys, and I’m glad I got the chance to hang out with them for a bit.
When I started my commute into Berkeley that day, I was a hardcore Deftones fan. But by the time I got back home, I was a Yelawolf fan, too. Remains of Mine set the stage well, but it wasn’t until Yela took the stage that things really got going, and Deftones were everything I’d hoped they’d be. Suffice to say, my copy of Around the Fur is staying in my nightly music rotation--and after what happened after the show, Love Story’s going in there too.
