Serj Tankian – ‘Toxicity’ Launch Interval Was ‘F–king Traumatic’

For a lot of bands, the interval surrounding the discharge of their greatest albums is normally considered fondly. However that is not essentially the case for System of a Down, as Serj Tankian reveals in a brand new interview that the interval surrounding the discharge of Toxicity was “actually, actually dicey.”

Admittedly, there was quite a bit occurring surrounding the interval by which the album was launched that added to the stress of the scenario. Tankian tells Metallic Injection, “Simply being on tour the week after 9/11 for months at a time by itself, even when you weren’t a political band, could be difficult as a result of there’s these day by day form of threats proper, that had been on TV and the orange, the crimson threats, all these completely different calibers of terrorism threats and stuff. And but we had been additionally being threatened by many components due to our outspokenness. So it was a really, very tough time.”

Talking extra to their very own expertise, he additionally remembers, “The discharge of Toxicity itself was a riot in L.A. We unintentionally ended up having a riot in Hollywood due to our launch occasion that, principally, we had too many individuals. And the fireplace marshal closed it down and other people reacted and fights ensued. We misplaced our tools, our crew was punched, after which L.A. riots occurred and we needed to clarify what was occurring to the media, and it was a fucking mess.”

He goes on so as to add, “So once I consider Toxicity, everybody thinks, oh, it is your form of finest document or your finest promoting document, no matter you need to name it. And so they’re like, ‘How was it? How did it really feel?’ Like they anticipate some actually optimistic form of reminiscence or response. It was fucking irritating as fuck. That is what I keep in mind. I did not really feel like a musician. I did not really feel like I used to be doing music. It was fucking irritating as fuck. It was actually, actually dicey. That is what I keep in mind, that is the emotion that prevails.”

Toxicity did push the band to new heights, with the document hitting the highest of the Billboard 200 Album Chart and spawning the hit singles “Chop Suey!,” ‘Aerials” and the title observe.

That stated, Tankian can now look in reflection and see that there have been some issues discovered from the expertise. “I believe there’s something to success the place it is not simply monochromatic, no matter your inventive output is. And people different layers, these different prospects may be constructing into what we all know as this profitable time and this profitable document for this band per se. In order that’s actually attention-grabbing to me.”