Deftones – Koi No Yokan

Storming out of the gate with Swerve City – a brutally sexy sledgehammer of a song, and hands-down their best opener since White Pony's Feiticeira – Deftones sound like a band brimming over with piss and vinegar on album number seven. Koi No Yokan may be a defiantly unprogressive collection, but that doesn't render its emotional effect any less explosive.

Romantic Dreams finds the band employing a beautiful time-sig change to underscore the super-sensual detonation of its euphoric chorus – and makes a convincing case for consideration as the band's most breathtaking late-period song in the process.

The album also serves as a vehicle for some of the most compelling lyrical missives of Chino Moreno's career, with Tempest in particular feeling like a perfect realisation of his penchant for moody, hyper-vivid abstracts. Truth-be-told, Koi No Yokan is all the more remarkable for feeling like a vibrant recombination of the Sacramento veterans' defining elements rather than a retread of past glories.