System Of A Down frontman Serj Tankian has revealed he’s working on some new “rock songs” for an upcoming release.
Over the last few months, it’s been an endless back-and-forth between members of System Of A Down in regards to the status of a new album.
While guitarist Daron Malakian and drummer John Dolmayan have explained that there’s “one member” holding them back, it was soon revealed that the cause of this delay is their frontman Serj Tankian.
Back in July, Tankian revealed that he was the cause for the band’s hiatus, and didn’t even want to be involved in their last two albums.
“It is true that I and only I was responsible for the hiatus SOAD took in 2006,” Tankian revealed. “Everyone else wanted to continue at the same pace to tour and make records.”
“I’ve always felt continuing to do the same thing with the same people over time is artistically redundant even for a dynamic outfit like ours. By that time I felt that I needed a little time to do my own work.”
“I wanted to leave the band before Mezmerize/Hypnotize for these developing reasons. This is why I personally don’t feel as close to the music on those records. There were songs I wanted to bring in but was hampered by unkept promises coupled by my own passivity at the time.”
Now, it seems as though the iconic vocalist is working on new heavy tunes for an upcoming project.
Taking to Instagram on Monday, Serj Tankian shared an image of his laptop noting that it had been “a weekend of mixing” while working on “some rock songs for a future release.”
By the sounds of it though, these tracks could be the ones that Tankian had referred to back in June, when he spoke about a handful of tracks that he was resurrecting from his time in the studio with System Of A Down.
“I have five rock songs that I wanted I do with System Of A Down,” he explained. “But it doesn’t look like that’s gonna work out.”
“So I am finishing those up to release them as a solo EP or possibly as a soundtrack for my film cause they are interrelated.”
However, it’s not clear what exactly these new “rock songs” will sound like, considering that Serj Tankian revealed last year that he was “tired” of writing vocals and singing.
“During a conversation with a friend yesterday I came up with an idea,” Tankian began. “Before we started making music, I was mainly known as a poet and vocalist. I wrote poetry every day. It was what I did constantly, what made me release two poetry books. In fact, I came to music from words.”
“I wrote so many lyrics that it stopped to be interesting.”
“Not because there is nothing I want to talk or sing about,” he continued. “Sure there are topics I don’t want to write lyrics to but at least I can pull out some new emotions out of it. Poetry is always something that opens yourself up and supports self-determination. I just did it for too long.”
“Now I am more interested in writing instrumental pieces of music.”
Of course, if you’re worried about the status of System Of A Down, don’t fret, with the band insisting that they’re still best of friends despite the constant back-and-forth about new material.
As for when we might see the group back on Australian shores, well, that one’s still a mystery at the current time…
Check out System Of A Down’s ‘Toxicity’:
