When System of a Down broke out amid the glut of nu-metal in the late-1990s, the group fought hard to separate itself from the pack of slogging growlers who dominated radio at the time.
But System couldn’t stand out – not then – because radio was being radio and rewarding the expected and not the unusual. More of the same was the mantra, so System of a Down gave them the least interesting song on the record, “Sugar,” to serve as its flag-waving introduction to the kids of nu-metal.
And it worked.
This bit of back story is needed to recognize why some of us are late arrivals on the System of a Down train, which pulls into the Pepsi Center tonight with The Mars Volta and Hella.
As a 21-year-old college student in the late ’90s, I was a prime candidate for System’s burgeoning army of fans. But “Sugar” rubbed me and others wrong with its gimmicky hook, inane guitar walls and outright pathetic mimicry of the populist subgenre. Looking back, there were hints in that song of a unique voice and original mind, but they were buried in the expected. It wasn’t until a few years later that System actually nailed it, creating something artistic – and its own – and sent it out. I caught it.
With “Toxicity” and its singles “Chop Suey,” the title track and “Aerials” – which collectively helped place the CD at the No. 1 spot on the charts the week of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks – the band was opening up and spreading out. Finally, System had put distance between itself and the surrounding clan of predatory artists, the Deftones and Korn included, trying to keep the flame lit.
System was different. System was more complex. System was better.
Since “Toxicity,” it’s been a tear of a ride with the band. System has flourished and matured with immeasurable assistance from Rick Rubin, who has produced multiple efforts for the band, including its 1998 eponymous debut, the recent disc “Mezmerize” and its counterpart, “Hypnotize,” due Nov. 22.
The material that makes up the two new records was recorded simultaneously last year at Rubin’s Laurel Canyon studios in Los Angeles. It was released separately and months apart for keener digestion, says the band, and it provides the ideal opportunity to take a step back and look at a thriving member of the pop-music culture that is actually evolving – an entity that is almost an endangered species in the industry’s current sad climate.
System of a Down is a quartet of friends, all of Armenian descent, who share a vision that is equal parts music and politics. Singer Serj Tankian and singer/
guitarist Daron Malakian are behind the group’s defining harmonies. They teamed up with drummer John Dolmayan and bassist Shavo Odadjian in Southern California in the mid-’90s with the intent of making potent, politically minded music.
Now more than a decade into the game, the band is at a place of comfort – and unease. It’s impossible to not feel unsettled when listening to the haunting combination-opening of “Mezmerize,” the calming strains of “The Soldier Side” intro and the expert pop-thrash of “B.Y.O.B.” juxtaposed against each other like fraternal twins who share DNA and little else.
“The Soldier Side” is a quick excursion into relaxed, neo-
gothic harmonies designed to make the skin crawl. It reminds you – though any true System fan doesn’t need reminding – that Malakian and Tankian have crystalline voices that can venture from the angelic to the demonic. And “B.Y.O.B.,” an anti-Bush single that stands for Bring Your Own Bombs, takes their music into a hypnotic area that is unique to System – and to “Mezmerize.” Think of it as post-operatic prog-metal.
“B.Y.O.B.” is the kind of track that will bring System throngs of new fans. People who previously thought the band too aggressive will revel in the song’s sweet yet pointed harmonies in the chorus: “Everybody’s going to the party, have a real good time; Dancing in the desert, blowing up the sunshine.” One minute the hamonies are sweet and lulling, the next they’re inducing fear and panic: “Why don’t presidents fight the war/Why do they always send the poor?”
The hardcore is still there, and the impossibly fast drums are yanked right out of death metal. But then System slows it down to half-time, never losing the original beat, and incorporates about a half-dozen genres along the way – with an amazingly subtle extraction of the pop music that ultimately acts as the song’s backbone and makes it so ridiculously rocked-out and appealing.
It could be System’s legacy, this unique crossover of pop music and metal that can be described as black and thrash and death and prog. It’s political and at times silly, but this music outweighs anything the lyrics actually say. Given that they’re combined in the same ferocious product – poignant lyrics and take-no-prisoners music – it makes System of a Down one of today’s most important music-making entities.
Pop music critic Ricardo Baca can be reached at 303-820-1394 or rbaca@denverpost.com.
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System of a Down|
NU-METAL|Pepsi Center; 7 tonight with The Mars Volta and Hella|$32.50-$45|through Ticketmaster, 303-830-8497 or ticketmaster.com.
