Sister Crayon joins Deftones on tour – and the Warner Bros. label

People tell Terra Lopez all the time that she’s the female version of Chino Moreno.

The Sacramento singer is never offended.

The Deftones have been one of her favorite bands since high school, in part because of Moreno’s ability to float between guttural screams and those beautiful melodies.

“His voice is gorgeous,” says Lopez, who performs with beatmaker Dani Fernandez in the electronic duo Sister Crayon. The group is on tour with Deftones, starting Tuesday, Aug. 23, when the band plays Fresno’s Rotary Amphitheater.

Singer comparisons aside, the two groups have other things in common. Both grew out of the music scene in Sacramento: the Deftones during the alternative-rock explosion of mid-1990s; Sister Crayon over the past eight years of playing countless sidewalk and house shows around the city.

As of May, both are signed to Warner Bros. Records.

The Deftones’ latest album, “Gore,” was released in April and is being called its best work in almost two decades.

Sister Crayon will release its debut album Friday, Sept. 30.

The album was originally done as a collaboration with Omar Rodriguez-Lopez of the alternative rock band the Mars Volta and put out in very limited release. For Warner Bros., the songs have been completely reworked and remastered by Tom Coyne. You may have heard his work on albums from Adele, Beyoncé and Taylor Swift.

“The album is brand new, essentially,” Lopez says.

It will mark a new beginning for the group, too. The pair is officially changing its name and will begin to perform and record under the moniker Rituals of Mine.

Most musicians wouldn’t dream of rebranding themselves after after eight years, but Lopez and Fernandez say they had long outgrown the name Sister Crayon. The record deal (and the national exposure it brings) was the perfect opportunity to cement the change, Lopez says.

It comes after an especially trying period in Lopez’s life. Within the past two years, she has dealt with the death of her father and one of her best friends. They both saw her perform as Sister Crayon, Lopez says.

“I kind of wanted to put that name to rest with them,” she says. “That really helped shift and solidify this change.”

And it has been a change. Because, until it happened, Lopez never thought a major record deal was in the cards for her or Fernandez. They would have been happy just to support themselves making music, even if it meant working part-time jobs and maybe sharing a single room – which they did. When the band relocated to Oakland for time, Lopez lived in a walk-in closet. There were months when they were barely able to pay the rent.

“We paid our dues for sure,” she says. “It took going to L.A. and Oakland to get the national spotlight.”

This story was originally published August 18, 2016 at 5:03 PM with the headline "Sister Crayon joins Deftones on tour – and the Warner Bros. label."