While the first eight tracks of Hypnotize lack the kind of manic creativity that “BYOB” exuded, the band takes a more focused and sober approach which works especially well. The band’s proud Armenian heritage, and the song’s elegiac melodies and moments of blind rage ( “Liar! Murderer! Sodomizer!”) makes for a devastating combination. The title track returns to the ballad style of previous singles such as “Aerials” and “Question?”, and features some of the strongest lyrics on the record (“Why don’t you ask the kids at Tiananmen Square?/Was fashion the reason why they were there?”), while the impassioned “Tentative” is bolstered by a beautiful breakdown, with layered vocal harmonies, synths, and the mantralike line, “Where do you expect us to go when the bombs fall?” “Holy Mountains”, meanwhile, is the best song on the CD, a highly emotional account of the slaughter of one and a half million Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Turks during and after World War One. “Kill Rock ‘n’ Roll” is a good example of how the band is able to incorporate such disparate influences as metal and ska and blend the two with enough subtlety to make the shift in style less jarring. The crunching “Dreaming” sustains the momentum, highlighted by Tankian’s soaring lead vocals, while the more hardcore punk-fueled “Stealing Society” contains some of Malakian’s most effective vocal work, as he channels the nervous delivery of Jello Biafra during the breakdown. Although strong sales might be a lock whether or not the band would be able to successfully follow up the very impressive Mezmerize remained up in the air.Īs one would expect from Side Three of a double album, the beginning of Hypnotize sounds like the band is in mid-stride, as “Attack” returns to the kind of no-frills ferocity System of a Down can do so well, with sharp, staccato riffs by guitarist Daron Malakian, the tempo shifting from mid-paced chugging, to double-time thrash, to frenzied beats by drummer John Dolmayan that border on grindcore, with the baritone/tenor lead vocal combination of Serj Tankian and Malakian working especially well. Not only that, but music fans, especially those who like the heavy music, are a staunchly devoted bunch, and releasing two CDs in one year all but assures gigantic initial sales Mezmerize topped the charts this past May and has since been certified platinum, and the same will likely happen for Hypnotize, as well. To split a double album in half and release the discs six months apart smacks of a cynical cash grab (this, ironically, coming from a band who likes to criticize consumer culture), but in the end, it turns out to be a wise move, as focusing on one disc at a time allows listeners to take their time with the music (hearing 23 new System of a Down Songs at once would be almost too overwhelming). With the band claiming this past summer that the second disc, Hypnotize, would be even better, fans of the band couldn’t be blamed for getting just a touch excited at the prospect.
Their most accomplished outing to date, Mezmerize lived up to all the heightened expectations, delivering a hair-raising blast of modern metal, fused with punk and Eastern European musical influences, and held together by a maniacal creative spirit, offering the kind of musical variety that highlighted 2001’s Toxicity, but sounding much more cohesive.
When we last heard from System of a Down six months ago, they were concluding Disc One of their intended double album on a bitter note, singing of the jaded, phony life in Hollywood, lambasting all those maggots smoking fags out there on Sunset Boulevard.
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