System Of A Down‘s Shavo Odadjian on progress of “really great” new album tracks: “Why it isn’t happening is a big question”

"If it was up to me, we would have never stopped"

System Of A Down‘s Shavo Odadjian has said that the band have some “really great” ideas down for new material, though “creative differences” are still hindering progress on a potential full-length.

At the end of last year, the bassist revealed that the Serj Tankian-led outfit had been at work on “material that tops everything we’ve done”. The musician added that he was keen to “record that and drop” what would be the follow-up to 2005 albums ‘Hypnotize’ and ‘Mezmerize’. In April, guitarist and songwriter Daron Malakian followed up the comments by saying the project isn’t “happening anytime soon”, explaining he and his bandmates have “different ways of wanting to do things” in the studio.

In a new interview, Odadjian was asked if there are currently any ideas down for new songs. “Yeah, there are,” he told SiriusXM, before adding that there are “no recordings” of the music at this time. He later revealed that the band “would have never stopped” if it was up to him, and could be on their “ninth or tenth record” by now.

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System Of A Down’s Serj Tankian. Credit: Getty

“Two years ago, we got together, the three of us – minus Serj, because, at the time, he was doing a lot of solo stuff – and we were, like, ‘We don’t wanna wait around. Let’s just get in there and see what we can do’,” he said. “And we got in and wrote about 10 or 11 songs.

“It was really good. It came out really great. And I hope to one day go back to those and use some of Serj’s stuff. I know Serj’s got some stuff.”

Asked why System are unable to complete the long-awaited LP, the musician replied: “In my world, man, why it isn’t happening is a big question. I think we can get over anything, ’cause it’s not like someone’s done anything so horrible that we can’t get over it. It ain’t anything like that. It’s just creative differences that are lasting a little too long for me, for my taste.”

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Last summer, Daron Malakian offered a similar comment by saying that System aren’t “enemies”, despite their ongoing creative differences. “There’s nobody in the band saying, ‘I can’t be in the same room with that guy.’ It’s nothing like that,” he said.

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