Tweet
A TAD RUSTY, BUT STILL TOPS: ROCKERS SYSTEM OF A DOWN ARE THE GENUINE ARTICLE
by MIKE ROSS
Edmonton Sun (Alberta)
May 11, 2011 Wednesday
FINAL EDITION
There are two reasons performers ban the media from their concerts
-as System of a Down did on Tuesday night:
1. They hate the media.
2. They haven't been out for a while, they don't have a new album and
they don't want the press to see how rusty they are -- so they come
to places like Edmonton, Canada, to iron out the show before the big
gigs in, say, Rock in Rio this fall.
Musicians call it "paid rehearsal." Beyonce did it a while back, too.
System doesn't hate the media. How can you hate someone who slobbers
all over you like a dog? Pity, maybe, not hate. And let's make it
clear that a "ban" just means they didn't give any free tickets to
reviewers or allow photos.
No matter! The media and more than 12,000 fans were happy to pay for
the privilege of seeing one of the best modern heavy metal bands in
the land, rusty or not, new music or not.
We're just relieved they didn't break up. It was just a little
"hiatus."
Were they rusty? Well, sure. The re were a few awkward wrinkles in a
stripped-down show -- a missed back-up line, a cracked note, a near
train wreck, some pitchy vocals, some ridiculously fast and intricate
riffs that weren't quite as in the pocket as they could've been.
But hey, this "gypsy-metal" stuff isn't easy to play, even if they
invented it. Imagine hard rock injected with plaintive minor key
melodies straight from Eastern Europe, topped with political substance
and savage social satire and led by a guy who can actually sing.
Imagine.
The roles haven't changed: Serj Tankian as the operatic foil to his
rather screamier partner, guitarist Daron Malakian -- though they
seemed to have switched hairstyles in the last six years -- backed
by Shavo Odadjian on bass and John Dolmayan on drums.
It's just the same four Armenian- American friends (more or less) who
threw a new twist into what had become an old sub-genre of metal --
speed metal, so named because it is both fast and hard.
There was no fakery here, no canned back-up tracks, and production
was sparse. The only special effect was the band itself. That's all
anybody really wanted.
Political songs dominated the evening, opening with Prison Song from
the 2001 album Toxicity, before what might be the band's big-g est
hit from what many consider its best album Mezmerize: BYOB -as in
"Bring Your Own Bombs."
It's an anti-war song that's particularly hard on both warmongers and
apathetic citizens who'd rather party than think about warmongers. It
was fun to hear Serj grin through his line "Everybody's going to the
party, have a real good time" -- and soak up the cheers of agreement
-only to turn it back on them: "Where the f---are you?!"
Getting tighter yet strangely more chaotic as the night raged on,
the band poked celebrities, the media, the religious right, American
so-called values and some other targets we're not quite sure about :
Like Cigaro, which seems to be about nothing but someone boasting
about having a big penis.
Metaphor for some important global issue? Probably. The mood ranged
from the tongue-twisting Chop Suey to the lamenting ballad Lonely
Day to even a love of hockey. Daron wore an Oilers jersey the whole
time and even inserted the line "let's go, Oilers!" into a song that
definitely wasn't about hockey.
Good to know someone's got his priorities straight.
There would be no encore. Opening act Gogol Bordello didn't just blur
the line between polkas and punk rock -- they destroyed it. You've
heard of "oi" as it applies to punk rock? This New York band is "oi
vey!" With violin, accordion and two back-up rappers who doubled on
percussion for a general gypsy- punk-polka-ska-samba-screaming sort
of sound, the band pounded through a set of circus calisthenics at
240 beats per minute and about God knows what.
You couldn't understand a word from singer Eugene Hutz, who sounds
like he's right off the boat from Transylvania, and his rappers
(toasters, hypemen, whatever) were no help at all.
The strongest thing that came through was a repeated call to "Break
the Spell," words that both opened and closed the set, suggesting
that this was all just one, long, ridiculous song.
by MIKE ROSS
Edmonton Sun (Alberta)
May 11, 2011 Wednesday
FINAL EDITION
There are two reasons performers ban the media from their concerts
-as System of a Down did on Tuesday night:
1. They hate the media.
2. They haven't been out for a while, they don't have a new album and
they don't want the press to see how rusty they are -- so they come
to places like Edmonton, Canada, to iron out the show before the big
gigs in, say, Rock in Rio this fall.
Musicians call it "paid rehearsal." Beyonce did it a while back, too.
System doesn't hate the media. How can you hate someone who slobbers
all over you like a dog? Pity, maybe, not hate. And let's make it
clear that a "ban" just means they didn't give any free tickets to
reviewers or allow photos.
No matter! The media and more than 12,000 fans were happy to pay for
the privilege of seeing one of the best modern heavy metal bands in
the land, rusty or not, new music or not.
We're just relieved they didn't break up. It was just a little
"hiatus."
Were they rusty? Well, sure. The re were a few awkward wrinkles in a
stripped-down show -- a missed back-up line, a cracked note, a near
train wreck, some pitchy vocals, some ridiculously fast and intricate
riffs that weren't quite as in the pocket as they could've been.
But hey, this "gypsy-metal" stuff isn't easy to play, even if they
invented it. Imagine hard rock injected with plaintive minor key
melodies straight from Eastern Europe, topped with political substance
and savage social satire and led by a guy who can actually sing.
Imagine.
The roles haven't changed: Serj Tankian as the operatic foil to his
rather screamier partner, guitarist Daron Malakian -- though they
seemed to have switched hairstyles in the last six years -- backed
by Shavo Odadjian on bass and John Dolmayan on drums.
It's just the same four Armenian- American friends (more or less) who
threw a new twist into what had become an old sub-genre of metal --
speed metal, so named because it is both fast and hard.
There was no fakery here, no canned back-up tracks, and production
was sparse. The only special effect was the band itself. That's all
anybody really wanted.
Political songs dominated the evening, opening with Prison Song from
the 2001 album Toxicity, before what might be the band's big-g est
hit from what many consider its best album Mezmerize: BYOB -as in
"Bring Your Own Bombs."
It's an anti-war song that's particularly hard on both warmongers and
apathetic citizens who'd rather party than think about warmongers. It
was fun to hear Serj grin through his line "Everybody's going to the
party, have a real good time" -- and soak up the cheers of agreement
-only to turn it back on them: "Where the f---are you?!"
Getting tighter yet strangely more chaotic as the night raged on,
the band poked celebrities, the media, the religious right, American
so-called values and some other targets we're not quite sure about :
Like Cigaro, which seems to be about nothing but someone boasting
about having a big penis.
Metaphor for some important global issue? Probably. The mood ranged
from the tongue-twisting Chop Suey to the lamenting ballad Lonely
Day to even a love of hockey. Daron wore an Oilers jersey the whole
time and even inserted the line "let's go, Oilers!" into a song that
definitely wasn't about hockey.
Good to know someone's got his priorities straight.
There would be no encore. Opening act Gogol Bordello didn't just blur
the line between polkas and punk rock -- they destroyed it. You've
heard of "oi" as it applies to punk rock? This New York band is "oi
vey!" With violin, accordion and two back-up rappers who doubled on
percussion for a general gypsy- punk-polka-ska-samba-screaming sort
of sound, the band pounded through a set of circus calisthenics at
240 beats per minute and about God knows what.
You couldn't understand a word from singer Eugene Hutz, who sounds
like he's right off the boat from Transylvania, and his rappers
(toasters, hypemen, whatever) were no help at all.
The strongest thing that came through was a repeated call to "Break
the Spell," words that both opened and closed the set, suggesting
that this was all just one, long, ridiculous song.