Deftones released Adrenaline on October 3, 1995, through Maverick Records. Opening with “Bored,” the Sacramento band’s first studio album began their recording partnership with producer Terry Date. They had chosen someone whose records they admired, but they also arrived with firm ideas about how their own debut should sound.
Some of its songs had already helped the band reach beyond Sacramento. In a 2019 Kerrang! interview, Chino Moreno recalled a homemade demo containing “Engine No. 9” and “7 Words.” Producer Ross Robinson passed the tape to Korn, leading to an invitation to play together and an eventual show at the Dragonfly in Los Angeles. Those recordings came from a group still finding its direction. Moreno described writing through trial and error, with drummer Abe Cunningham and guitarist Stephen Carpenter providing the instrumental foundation as he and bassist Chi Cheng worked alongside them.
Date encountered that chemistry before entering the studio. He told Kerrang! in 2020 that he first watched Deftones rehearse in Sacramento roughly six months before the debut. The musicians arrived on bicycles and crowded into a small room, moving so energetically that he wondered how they avoided colliding. What persuaded him was their commitment to the music. The challenge was to capture a band whose performances were already physically intense.
Carpenter had suggested Date when Maverick asked whom they wanted as producer. As Moreno explained in a 2018 Tape Op interview, his appeal extended across records by Pantera, Soundgarden and Sir Mix-a-Lot. Deftones liked that those artists retained different identities. They nevertheless insisted that their own record avoid sounding like Pantera, and they resisted the newer recording technology Date had been exploring. “We wanted to sound raw,” Moreno said. They asked to record to two-inch tape and rejected the sample-heavy approach associated with his work on White Zombie’s Astro-Creep: 2000.
On “Bored,” that preference meant keeping the musicians together. Speaking to EQ for its December 1996 issue, Date described recording the band in one room, using floor monitors for everyone except Cunningham. He accepted some sound spilling between microphones because the shared setup helped the players perform naturally. The recording still involved deliberate studio work: he doubled the rhythm guitars and returned to the vocals, retaining selected feedback when it added something to the song.
Moreno’s microphone became part of that performance. He changed his tone by adjusting how he cupped the Shure SM58, while Date encouraged him to treat it as an instrument. The singer threw it around and spat into it, but Date kept the same microphone for the track and handed it to him afterward.
Releasing the album meant taking those songs to audiences who had little connection to the following Deftones had established at home. In a Metal Hammer interview published in 2026, Moreno recalled supporting Monster Magnet with Sugar Ray opening, sometimes facing tiny crowds and hostile reactions. An arena run opening for Kiss presented another test, with fans showing little patience for the unfamiliar support band. He described that period as repeatedly having to earn their place, even after signing a record deal.
By Around the Fur in 1997, their relationship with Date had changed. Moreno told Tape Op that the band trusted him enough to remove the restrictions imposed on the debut. He later preferred the sound of their second album, made with greater confidence and more freedom for the producer they had first recruited for Adrenaline.
