While rock music has been languishing in a nu-metal ditch, with Fred Durst its clown prince and pre-teens its core audience, the Deftones have been busy staging a dark but spectacular coup. Having witnessed the public grow tired of the issue-based dirges peddled by the likes of Korn and lose faith in the crossover appeal of Limp Bizkit, the Deftones have quietly nurtured an adult audience. They are ready to steal the kids' glory and have some grown-up fun.
It has taken some time. The Deftones have been flirting with fads and subverting metal tradition since 1988, but it is only since the Grammy-winning success of 2000's White Pony that the band have transformed from identity-seeking wannabes to true contenders, on a mission to rock.
As singer and guitarist Chino Moreno stands atop a speaker at the front of the stage, legs apart and arms reaching towards the sky, he wears his hard-won glee with pride. "I've been dreaming about this shit since I was a little boy," he tells us. "I never thought it would turn out this way."
Only a child with an imagination vivid enough to match the fury of his repressed anger could have conjured up the Deftones' sound. If the story of their success sounds like an innocent fantasy, their music is the nightmarish reality: sweet melodies under a grinding symphony of heavy guitars and thundering drums. The stinging guitars of Hexagram, from their new, self-titled album, shriek above Moreno's screamed vocals, the rhythm speeding, the melody squirming before falling to a skeletal waltz, Moreno suddenly fragile and lost. Then, with a crippling kick, the frenzy resumes.
Even when the Deftones try a ballad, they can't escape aching self-awareness and frustration. Minerva is an anthem of sorts, its soft-rock underbelly torn to shreds by the jagged, chugging guitars. Songs skulk and sulk until they are almost unbearably claustrophobic.
Bassist Chi Cheng remains in a private world of pain, hidden behind his long, sweat-drenched hair and beard. But Moreno gets intimate with the crowd - squatting in front of them, eyeball to eyeball, and murmuring anxiously in Feiticeira, or yelping demonically to the jump-around spirit of Head Up.
Even the Deftones' fun is serious. Inviting a particularly enthusiastic fan up on stage for a respectful (if violent) rendition of System of a Down's Root, Moreno turns to him with an evil smile. "You seem eager," he says. "Don't fuck up."
· At the Apollo, Manchester, tonight. Box office: 0161- 242 2560.
