Well, it’s been a long time since the last Dancing Mad, yeah sorry I’ve been busy. Basically doing these reviews were pushed back because I had started University courses and well, getting my homework done and not failing was higher on my priorities list. But, that’s not the only reason. I initially had planned to do a Dancing Mad about Music sooner or later, the problem is, I could not decide on what album I should review, and the last time I attempted a review on an album well… The less said about that atrocious blemish that completely made me look like an arrogant tool with poor critiquing skills and was nothing but ranty bullshit, the better. So, today I selected an album from my past, back when I was just 15 years old and still kind of developing my musical horizons, so to speak. I was already a listener of Classic Rock and the music of Alice In Chains and Radiohead and a little of Jeff Buckley. But after suggestions from people and liking what I heard initially, I decided to listen to System of a Down. My fandom of them got to the point where I had to buy their stuff and the first album I got of theirs was Mezmerize. I think it’s time for me to take a stroll down memory lane as I go Dancing Mad over System of a Down’s Mezmerize and find out if nostalgia prevails or if it was crap all along.
For those who don’t know, System of a Down is a hard rock (It kind of pains me to classify them as that) consisting of four Armenian-American musicians, who, individually are quite good at what they do. And quite honestly, up to Mezmerize, System of a Down actually knew who did what. Shavo and John did bass and drums respectively, Serj sang, did lyrics and I believe occasionally get on the keys, and Daron wrote most of the music, lyrics and guitar and had a MINIMAL role on vocals. Mezmerize is where his fucking ego broke critical mass and felt that he was the next John Lennon, more on this later, this is merely an observation but if you lead to the conclusions I lead too and the snarky shit I’m going to pull you will make the same connections I do. Yeah, this album doesn’t give me the feeling of nostalgia I once had about 5 years ago. So, lets start off with the lyrics of this album.
Looking through this album’s liner notes, there is only one song where Daron Malakian does not write the lyrics, Question! Where Serj Tankian is the only lyricist; every thing else it’s the fucking Daron Malakian show. And God, Allah, Buddha, and Vecna does it BLOW! And funnily enough, Question! Is easily the best song on this godforsaken album. The main problem with the lyrics is they are not constructed in a memorable way and are not sung in a way that defines the lyrics eloquently , take the Beatles for example, they wrote songs that were not only simple to understand, but they were memorable. That’s part of the reason the Beatles had as much of a staying power as they did. Or, take Radiohead on the other extreme. Radiohead had some of the most nonsense singles of all time, and that’s not a knock against Thom Yorke, but just look at Paranoid Andriod’s lyrics, they aren’t exactly easy to sing along to, but the way Thom sung that song gave the song merit, it presented a moody atmosphere which is what made Paranoid Android a memorable song. Save for Lost in Hollywood, which is the only song where the lyrics are coherent and consistently makes sense in context to the actual song, and by no means is Lost in Hollywood a well-sung or memorable song…. Mostly because Daron sings the whole damn song. Not to beat an already dead and castrated horse but Daron, can not and should not SING, he’s fine on the lyrics if Serj helps him, or if Serj just writes the lyrics. On Toxicity Serj and Daron shared the responsibilities of the writing and Daron, although did the most contribution to music composition had help from Serj and even Shavo. Then we come to Mezmerize and Daron decides he’s the star, comes up with the concept of the double-album ala the White Album. Because yes this shit continues into another System of a Down album that is less memorable that Mezmerize. But that’s another review. The main problem with Mezmerize’s lyrics, the main fucking problem it suffer from “Green Day Syndrome” or what is more commonly known as a “Soapbox Album”, because during the years of 2000 to about 2008, artists fell into a lull of creative abstinence, followed by a lot of creative masturbation over on topic and one topic only, the president. Now, I for one am not a fan of that particular leader and his vice president I can only refer to as either “He Who Shall Not Be Named” or “Vecna.” But, even with my political and philosophical stance, I will still say this: Daron Malakian you are a fucking tool, I don’t give a shit, You do not need to make 2 fucking albums about one subject, a subject that half a dozen artists got to before you ever did. Then again, this is a guy who freely cites Charles Manson as an inspiration and is a fan of the LA Kings hockey team. So, I am not surprised.
Alright, time for moment of clarity, I have to back-peddle and say something decent about this man before I just wind up hurling a flurry of insults and taking away from the music. I just happen to think a person’s direct actions can impact an album massively. Daron can write some good lyrics, he did, he has, they made sense. I fully recognize the guy as a talent, I just don’t want to have to listen to him sing. Are we cool? Great, because this will be all I will say about Daron himself, the rest of the band is at fault for not telling him to tone it down a notch and Serj clearly wasn’t on his a game either lyrically, because after listening to the lyrics Serj wrote, he’s at fault for some of the stupidest songs I’ve listened to. Moving on to the musical composition shall we?
The music is… rather bland throughout the entire record, and while I could stick to berating Daron Malakian, his guitar work is quite good, if a little fret-wanky at times. And what I mean by fret-wanky is the use and over use of solos and riffs. There’s nothing wrong with keeping a steady beat Daron, nothing wrong at all. But I digress, no the problem with Mezmerize lies with the band as a whole. Because, if you recall, I said it’s been years since I actively listened to this album and whenever I listen to an album I haven’t listened to in years, I will usually give the singles the nostalgia benefit because those songs are usually the songs that are not only the most memorable, but often are the best songs on the album. I only got 5 seconds into BYOB before I said “fuck, this song is garbage.” Serj sounded terrible here, the guitar work is passable, Daron was limited on vocals here which is a good thing… until the bridge where he screams like a belligerent idiot. But my nostalgia of the singles, especially of BYOB is non-existent, which begs the question: Why, did I enjoy this band at all? Well, that’s easy, because before Mezmerize, you could say that System of a Down wrote decent songs and musically they were very good. However, Mezmerize gave us songs with such lines as “My cock is much bigger than yours” and I guess the 15 year old me got a kick out of juvenile lines, but even then the music of System of a Down during Mezmerize was not their best. Hence why the band took a hiatus, and Serj went solo and Daron did that horrible Scars on Broadway shit. And after 5 years, they’ve decided to reform. I find myself not caring, because they really have to do something that can make up for the garbage that is Mezmerize.
Finally, the song structure on Mezmerize is completely laughable. Let’s compare and contrast here, lets take an album like oh, I don’t know Toxicity and lets see how it fairs. Now, for the record, I think the best album of theirs is their debut album, but, Toxicity is a lot easier to grasp the song structure of.
Toxicity is not a perfect album, like Mezmerize it has songs that contain dumb lyrics. Shimmy being a good example; however the lyrics and the music fit with each individual song and on Mezmerize there are songs where you could switch around the lyrics of one song and the music of another. Mezmerize is just chaotic all things considered, and it did not help that this was the first album of a double album. I am not against the idea of the double album, but if you’re going to do it, you have to connect the content of the first album to the next album and Mezmerize was a poor way to do this. There are songs that just do not belong on this album, specifically Old School Hollywood and Lost in Hollywood. I do not understand the reason for them being on this album, or any album really because they are godawful songs, but structurally, when you have songs that are very political, do not break the consistency of the album by talking about fucking Tony Danza and a bunch of posers in Los Angeles, you know the entire population of Los Angeles. It doesn’t work here, and Mezmerize’s song structure is chaotic and crap.
With all that said, I think I have reached my consensus on Mezmerize: It’s crap, it began the downfall of the band and it only served to be Daron Malakian’s disgraceful project before he did fucking Scars on Broadway. And what’s funny, I’d take Mezmerize over Scars on Broadway any fucking day. But, remember this is a double album, so you can expect that Hypnotize will be next in my sights… If my ears can take it.
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