Serj Tankian , vocalist of System of a Down , released a new EP titled Elasticity . To celebrate the release, the musician made the music video for the track "Electric Yerevan" available.
This work comes four months after the release of “Protect The Land” and “Genocidal Humanidz” , the first new System Of A Down songs in 15 years, and is the musician's first solo release since Orca , from 2013. The songs that make up Elasticity , according to Tankian, were written years ago for a possible new album by the group.
“When I wrote them, the original concept for me was: ‘What rock songs can come out of me now that I can possibly work with System?’ So, the intention was actually to sit down and play them for the guys. And we even kind of messed around with some of them. And, obviously, we couldn’t see eye to eye on continuing future System recordings, except, obviously, those two songs for the cause that we did, and that was before – obviously, a few years before. So those songs, I decided to finish them myself and release them. And they are really interesting and beautiful songs,” explains the musician.
Speaking about the song “Electric Yerevan,” named after the capital of Armenia, the country of origin of Serj and his SOAD colleagues, he said: “The song was inspired by the protests in Yerevan, Armenia, in the summer of 2015, where people protested against proposed increases in public utility prices. My writing from that time is inscribed word for word in the song.”
The music video for the track was directed by Garin Hovannisian and shows a visual timeline of the events leading up to the 2015 protests and the subsequent 2018 Velvet Revolution, while also showcasing the power of peaceful demonstrations around the world.
System of a Down's political views have always been present in their songs, from the beginning, and now, in the documentary Truth to Power a little of what lies behind all their activism. Read our review of the documentary here.
Listen to Elasticity in its entirety below and watch the music video for “Electric Yerevan”. Click here to purchase your physical copy of the album.
