Four musicians, one ancestry. System of a Down is that rare famous act where the answer is not “well, one member, partially.” Every single member of the band is ethnically Armenian, and the band has treated that inheritance as a mission statement for thirty years.
Who are the members and where are they from?
The band came together in 1994 in the Los Angeles area, which is home to the largest Armenian community outside Armenia itself. The four members arrived there by four different diaspora routes:
Serj Tankian, vocals, was born in Beirut, Lebanon, on August 21, 1967, to Armenian parents and moved to LA at age seven. His grandfather survived the death marches of 1915 as a child. Daron Malakian, guitar, was born in Los Angeles in 1975 to Armenian parents who emigrated from Iraq. Shavo Odadjian, bass, was born in Yerevan, Armenia, in 1974 and came to California as a kid. John Dolmayan, drums, was born in Beirut in 1973, another child of Lebanese-Armenian families who left during the civil war.
Beirut, Baghdad, Yerevan, Los Angeles. That spread is the Armenian diaspora in miniature, and it’s exactly what a century of displacement after the genocide looks like on a map.
How Armenian is the music?
More than a surface detail. The scales, the folk melodies buried inside metal riffs, the wailing vocal runs Serj drops between screams, much of that traces back to Armenian folk and liturgical music. Malakian has pointed to Armenian melodies as a core ingredient of his songwriting. The band’s sound got labeled unclassifiable by rock critics partly because its reference points came from somewhere metal usually didn’t look.
Commercially, it worked at the highest level: the 2001 album “Toxicity” hit number one on the Billboard 200 and has sold in the multi-millions, which made System of a Down the most commercially successful Armenian act in music history.
What has the band done for genocide recognition?
Made it a career-long campaign. The debut album’s closer “P.L.U.C.K.” (Politically Lying, Unholy, Cowardly Killers) is entirely about the Armenian Genocide, and the theme returns in “Holy Mountains” and across Serj Tankian’s solo work and activism.
In April 2015, for the genocide’s 100th anniversary, the band ran the Wake Up the Souls tour, built to push recognition in country after country. It ended with a free concert in Yerevan’s Republic Square on April 23, the night before Remembrance Day, in front of tens of thousands in the pouring rain. Members have also spoken publicly during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, when the band released its first new songs in 15 years, “Protect the Land” and “Genocidal Humanoidz,” with proceeds going to Armenian relief.
Do they speak Armenian?
To varying degrees, yes, particularly the members raised in Armenian-speaking households and communities. The lyrics stay in English, but Armenian shows up in side projects, interviews and stage banter. Serj has recorded with Armenian folk musicians, and Shavo’s projects have drawn on Armenian material as well.
If you’re building a list of famous Armenians, this band sits at the top alongside Cher and the Kardashians. The difference is that System of a Down never let anyone forget it for a second.