Product Description

System of a Down sees itself as being an integral part of anew musical revolution of heavy music. On the surface, the band's manifesto seems tangential to Rage Against the Machine's; but musically SOAD is a groove-metal machine, with a sound that incorporates a punk ethic, Panteraesque riffs, and a schizophrenic vocal approach reminiscent of Mike Patton.
Like a dose of chicken soup for a disconnected moshing youth, SYSTEM OF A DOWN is unrelenting. "Sugar" segues from neo-jazz verses into pounding thrash-core choruses. "Spiders" shows more depth, dynamics, and even poetic, melodic vocals. The production of the album is raw and very close to that ofa live album, surely a deliberate stroke by producer Rick Rubin (who has put many metal bands on the map under his guidance). On "Soil", vocalist Serj Tankian questions the ideology of democracy. With possibly more conspiracy theories thanan episode of THE X-FILES, System of a Down explores the concept of mass influence through technology in "War?" The essence of SYSTEM OF A DOWN can be found in "P.L.U.C.K"; the song's title says it all, an acronym for "politically lying, unholy, cowardly killers".

Track Listing

1. Suite Pee
2. Know
3. Sugar
4. Suggestions
5. Spiders
6. Ddevil
7. Soil
8. War
9. Mind
10. Peephole
11. CUBErt
12. Darts
13. PLUCK

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2753 in Music
• Released on: 2001-08-13
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Explicit Lyrics

Amazon.co.uk Review
Waaaargh! East-European death-metal in the area! System Of A Down, a collection of Los Angeles-based ex-pat Armenians with a serious fetish for beefing up the black-humoured urgency of the Dead Kennedys into a breed of music so heavy that it attracts small planets as satellites, rather elude the grace of a subtle introduction. Fortunate, then, that an introduction to them is all that you need; System Of A Down is a near-perfect example of late-1990s metal at its most ridiculous, and of course, heavy metal has always thrived on being the most absurd of all art-forms. "Suggestions", for example, encapsulates many great metal moments; bowel-emptying, mountain-sized riffage twinned with lyrics that crossbreed J.R.R. Tolkein with Karl Marx, sung in a mixture of graveyard-friendly goth baritone and genitals-in-a-vice falsetto. Elsewhere, "Suite-Pee" and "War?" (answer in the affirmative, of course) provide some ass-kicking highlights. Truly, this is a killer album. --Louis Pattison

Customer Reviews

Finally!
When everyone (including myself) got caught up in the sheer excellence of S.O.A.D's album Toxicity.. I saw this in a shop and bought it. I immediately decided that this was superior to Toxicity, but nobody else seemed to have given it a listen and/or thought that Toxicity was there first album!
But now everyone seems to have discovered this genius album and to this day i still see this as their best!

Raw
...system of a down, at their rawest and most unpredictable state (i.e. before all the calming down and melodic stuff - hypnotize/mezmerize). There is NO way you can pigeonhole system of a down into a chategory. they are metal/nu-metal/alt-metal/thrash metal...whatever. its funny and good music; none of that ultra serious political messages here; sure there are political messages; but all handled in an offhand joking style. Standout songs are Suite Pee, Know, War? and Sugar. For people new to system of a down (and for people who dont like raw-ish not-so-melodious-yet-melodious sounds), you probably shouldnt go for this. Buy Toxicity or Mezmerize; then as you get into system of a down, buy the rest.

A absolutely breathtaking debut album for system, Full of angsty goodness
Well im usually weary of metal bands as they usually put me off with their totally illegible and untelligent lyrics, but after listening to system i have completely changed my mind, its quite hard to say what kind of music system can be catogerised by as their musical style never remains the same which is quite impressive for any band i must say.

This is certainly one of their strongest albums, probably their second best behind the sequel toxicity with stronger variety of tunes. If u like metal and rage, system of a down is the perfect companion for you. Recommended.