I used to hate Chino Moreno...

How my own musical evolution transformed my connection with metal's legacy vocalist

I’ve never hated Chino as a person — in fact, I didn’t even know who he was when Deftones’ "Change" first hit my adolescent ears.
As Marilyn Manson’s grotesque sensuality had captured my middle school heart just a few years before, the sound, sentiment, and even the music video for "Change" were all very intriguing. I just couldn’t get over one thing… Chino couldn’t sing.

If you know me IRL, you know I’ve been a pro singer in the industry for more than 20 years. I was a ‘90s baby and trained pop star, trying to sing like Christina, dance like Britney, and slap like Demi Lovato. These influences, coupled with consistent exposure to a cappella (school), metal (my brothers), and the harmonically rich pop-folk music of the 60s (my parents), gave me a well-rounded, if not contradictory musical upbringing. But regardless of the decade in which they peaked, the singers I admired most had one thing in common - their technique was flawless. And “singers” like Chino were just not a part of that world.

As a singer myself, I didn’t just want to be decent… I wanted to be the BEST. I aimed high with technique, performance, and musicianship. At the time, I preferred the death growls of Strapping Young Lad and Behemoth over clean vocals from frontmen like Chino and Trent Reznor (and their extremely liberal translation of pitch).

So I kept "Change" in my back pocket. The song was sexy, but not in a bombastic way, like Manson. It was much more subtle… inviting you into a dark room with promises of romantic, candle-lit conversation… sitting you down before a shadowy mirror, and quietly guarding the exits as you crumble before your own reflection.

This invitation to take an axe to your own chest cavity and subsequently root around is part of Deftones’ charm; and it’s Chino’s genius that he successfully makes an otherwise cringey experience, strangely elegant.

A decade later, I had the chance to see Deftones live — a dual headliner with Gojira, my favorite metal band of all time. I recall firing off a comment without thinking as we approached the venue, “I just want the record to show that I’m here for Gojira — I don’t give a fuck about Deftones.”

Remembering the moment now is the very definition of embarrassment, as Chino’s stadium performance that night was shockingly technical. His vocals were gorgeous, stable, and well-supported — they sounded better than the records.

As a voice coach, I know this is because he had to change his vocal habits to have a longevous music career. He also wields his instrument differently for many other projects, so vocal flexibility would ultimately be more valuable to him.

Crosses is one of those projects, in which his vocals are straight and true, even delicate at times. This work, in conjunction with the live performance I witnessed, brought me back to Deftones that many years later, and I listened with fresh ears.

It took witnessing Chino’s restraint for me to feel some strange permission to enjoy his vocal expression as it is — perfect in its imperfection.

It also helps that in present day, I’m an industry professional writing heavy music and constantly working with instrumentalists. I appreciate so much more in Deftones’ music today than I did even two years ago.

I no longer fixate on a flat note somewhere, but rather willingly get chills over the heftiness of Deftones’ guitar tones. I marvel at the band's production and consistent ability to make something so busy, sound so streamlined.

Deftones - and Chino specifically - are masters of creating emptiness in a claustrophobic room. They deftly carve out space for melancholy in an arrangement that, in the hands of any other group, would fill your ear canal with mud. They shout mating calls to their fellow freaks, but would never insist on an ice-breaker once we’re all in the same room.

I’ve been sitting in the corner of that room since I was seven years old, clutching the boombox that first seized my guts with Robert Plant’s vocal violence. I sang those albums straight through without missing a single phrase (including the guitar solos)… absolutely consumed with yearning.

Being a metal vocalist has always been my final frontier, and as years passed, it remained so. My voice was always professionally committed to anything but, and I felt powerless to alter this pattern.

To younger me, the celebration of frontmen like Chino was just another reason the metal world would never embrace me or my vocal expression.

But the truth is that being a metal vocalist requires a flexible, well-rounded relationship with your voice. It requires release where you would imagine compression, patience where you would assume force, and — as all singing does — willingness to understand your humanity, in your pursuit of the superhuman.

Being a metal vocalist requires — as all singing does — willingness to understand your humanity, in your pursuit of the superhuman.

Chino's vocals create varied experiences throughout Deftones’ discography, but ultimately, he delivers one message… if your heart speaks contradictions, you are not alone.