At a time when nu-metal was definitely more than just a temporary fad thanks to Korn, Incubus, Deftones, System of a Down etc, Slipknot comes along with this monster of an album. The Slipknot album that scores the #1 position on my list is none other than their eponymous 1999 debut album. It’s about Slayer, which automatically means it’s worth reading, but for now, the band in question for today is Slipknot, arguably the single most popular band in contemporary metal of the 21 st century.

If you haven’t seen my first one, make sure you go and check it out. There’s no quantifying how much the other band members may have channeled their anger and sadness into the songs that would end up comprising Diamond Eyes, but it’s not possible Chi’s state didn’t play a factor.It’s now time for my second ‘best to worst’ list (or best to least best, if you’re not pessimistic), of the year. One more thing to consider: Diamond Eyes was the first Deftones album without bassist Chi Cheng, who remained in a coma following a devastating 2008 car accident. The back half of the record is loaded with more introspective numbers, too, if that’s what you were after, and they’re all predictably great. It’s not until “Beauty School” that we get a bit of a respite, and even here the band harks back to the melodic yet still somehow weighty dynamic of early fan-favorites like “Digital Bath” and “Rx Queen.” “Prince” is powerful in its dissonant catchiness, “Rocket Skates” offers as classic a hard-hitting Deftones riff as has ever existed (it’s a live set staple to this day) along with the shout-along refrain “Guns! Razors! Knives! Fuck with me!” and so on and so forth Diamond Eyes brings the riffs, and the riffs are what Deftones fans in 2010 craved most. Then came Diamond Eyes, with the buzzsaw opening riff of the title track an uppercut to the chin from the very start, and a volley of forceful jabs direct to the dome on the following three songs. Chino has always and will always bring that influence to the band - just listen to his work with Crosses and Team Sleep - but on those two albums that effect was all too palpable for many, even if those discs had their share of heavy tracks, too. The band’s 2003 self-titled effort saw the band experiment with more electronic elements, atmospherics and slower tempos, and its followup, Saturday Night Wrist, leaned hard into that direction.

Thankfully, I think it’s pretty clear why Diamond Eyes resonated so deeply with Deftones fans: it was a comeback album, of sorts. In a way it was close, but in another it wasn’t: Koi No Yokan received only one less vote than Diamond Eyes overall, but got smoked in the points department due to the volume of #1 votes (and top 5 nods) it received.

As we have with several bands on this list, when learning that Deftones’ 2010 entry, Diamond Eyes, outpaced their other efforts during the decade, we are forced to surmise why our intrepid list of voters, nearly 200 Folks Who Purportedly Know Lots of Stuff About Metal, picked this particular one.

Deftones albums worst to best