Rockers on a roll - Accessing System's spiritual side

Aug 26, 2005
The Philadelphia Inquirer
By Dan Deluca
Inquirer Music Critic

Daron Malakian, the guitarist and principal songwriter for the dazzlingly versatile Armenian American heavy rock band System of a Down, is not a religious man.

But when Malakian[...] talks about the creative outpouring that led to SOAD's two 2005 albums, Mezmerize (out now) and Hypnotize (due in November), he speaks in spiritual terms.

"The best way I can explain it is that I'm like a religious person who prays a lot," says Malakian, 30, who was born to parents who emigrated from Iraq to System's home base of Los Angeles. (The other band members were born in Armenia and Lebanon, but they all attended the same Armenian private school in L.A.)

"You pray a lot to get closer to God. For me, my religion is what I do with music. I'm very into it. I'm very serious about it," he says. "And I'm always ready for my higher power to channel the music through me. That's what I wait for."
[...]
With such an ambitious musical agenda and lyrics that often take a confrontational political stance - and frequently mention the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians at the hands of the Turkish government between 1915 and 1923, which Malakian calls a "genocide" - it's one of the wonders of modern popular music that System of a Down is a multi-million-selling band.
[...]

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