
by Grimmy101
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Overview - Toxicity, System Of A Down’s second record, takes the heaviness, aggression, and attitude they had in their first record and combines it with some melody to produce an overall better balanced and more varied record. By no means does this mean that this record is light - it’s still an extremely heavy record and none of the songs are truly ballad-like from start to finish. To fit with the change in music, Tankian does less screaming and focuses more on aggressive singing, although he still does scream in quite a few places throughout the entire record, his vocals are actually extremely varied throughout the whole album, something their debut album seemed to lack. Overall, the songwriting is much better and the band doesn’t sacrifice energy, intensity, or lyrics to make it this way.
The Lyrics - I’ve personally always really liked Tankian’s lyrics just because of how broad and abstract they are, they don’t really get straight to the point and they force you to look for what he’s meaning to say - which can turn out to be many things just in one song. Lyrical topics range throughout the entire album from criticizing the prison system along with the drug policy to suicide to brutality. Just as the first record, Tankian writes some extremely angry lyrics here but they aren’t to the point of childish, even if they do seem that way at first - there will be more to them, I can guarantee that.
The Music - As said before, the music keeps its heavy feeling without sacrificing much of anything, but it also combines melodic elements into it - not only vocally but also musically. Malakian is still playing the heavy steady rhythms that were featured on their self titled debut record, but on this record he features clean guitars more often and also works on changing up times and feels within one song - he doesn’t seem to feel the need or even the desire to keep a song going fast and heavy the entire way through, showing how he’s developing as a songwriter on this record.
The Tracks -
1. Prison Song - Vocals and lyrics, or even more like statistics, take the center stage of this song as Tankian and Malakian criticize the failure of the prison system in relation to the drug policy. Malakian’s guitar doesn’t actually carry the verse too much during the verse - this would be done by Odajian’s bass, a nice change. This song is
one of those songs I talked about where the feeling and mood would change completely during a song - the verse is relatively light and laid back while the chorus is extremely heavy and aggressive which eventually gives way to an even lighter bridge. I think Tankian sounds great on this track but I’m not a fan of Malakian’s screams on this track at all, Tankian should’ve just done backing vocals. Good track overall though and great way to start the album.
2. Needles - I personally thought that the combination and transition from lighter to heavy in Prison Song was great, this transition is slightly less natural on Needles and just doesn’t work as well. The heavy part is good on its own, and the verse is average by itself, but the transition between the two isn’t great. This aside, I absolutely love the bridge where Malakian takes the spotlight on vocals and the entire mood is very grim and dark, excellent part. Besides the awkward transition this song is pretty good overall and aggressive throughout.
3. Deer Dance - Starts out with a similar type of rhythm that I’m used to hearing from System’s debut album but switches into a much less heavy riff to go along with a pretty laid back verse before it gives way to an extremely heavy and angry chorus. Once again, I think Tankian sounds great on this track, but I really don’t like Malakian’s backing screams very much - Tankian should’ve done them himself. Malakian sounds alright in most parts but not when he’s screaming. Excellent melodic bridge in this song, especially because of all the guitar layering Malakian does which goes great with Tankian’s vocals. Yet another song that changes feels a lot just throughout the song, yet another good song.
4. Jet Pilot - This track wastes absolutely no time in getting right into it and starts out with Malakian’s heavy rhythm with Tankian screaming straight over it. Unlike the first three starting tracks, I really don’t like this song all that much. I’m not a fan of the chorus at all and the melody during the verse just does absolutely nothing for me. I wouldn’t call the song terrible, but for me, the song is just boring. I’d say a big reason of this is because it basically keeps one feel throughout and doesn’t really change around like the other songs do.
5. X - First of all, excellent build up but slightly disappointing that the band
slowed it down after this - if it would’ve gone straight from intro to verse this could’ve been brilliant. Extremely straightforward lyrics and delivery by Tankian which basically matches Malakian’s riffs here. They do try to change it up during the bridge by slowing it down a bit but it isn’t anything very interesting. Aside from the great build up in the intro and the energy of the verse this song doesn’t have too much. I mean I know this song is only two minutes but I personally think it should even be shorter, this song could’ve been a lot better than what it was despite how simple it is.
6. Chop Suey - Excellent guitar intro by Malakian here and actually great riffs throughout the whole song. After the first five songs I started to take a bit more notice to Dolmayan’s drumming but I haven’t really said anything about it, but I’ll say right now that he’s doing a great job on this record. Yet again this song goes from a lot of different moods throughout, the verse is heavy while the chorus is light and the transitions are heavy. I’m not a huge fan of the melody during the verse, it sounds slightly close to rapping but not completely, but excellent lyrics and the chorus is simply brilliant. The bridge is also basically split up into a heavy part and a melodic part - the melodic part is simply brilliant and actualy uses a piano during it, fitting and adding to the mood. Great song, one of my favorites on the record.
7. Bounce - Another track which wastes no time getting into it, but fortunately I like this song a lot more than Jet Pilot. Tankian does all the main screaming parts, or at least he’s the highest in the mix, which is how I feel the rest of the record should’ve been. I’m extremely glad Malakian didn’t do backing screams on this song just because his screaming on this record has been extremely disappointing so far. The lyrics are going to be a bit strange along with the delivery but the energy of this track is great, and probably what was needed after coming out of Chop Suey.
8. Forest - The verse of this song has a great vibe and rhythm to it, it’s hard to describe but it’s very “bouncy”. Tankian builds up the verse great with his vocal delivery and the chorus doesn’t let down at all. Unlike some of ...
re : Bounce - Another track which wastes no time getting into it, but fortunately I like this song a lot more than Jet Pilot
It’s a heavy metal band. the song only feel for heavy metal lovers only.music is about feeling.not just listening.
re : Bounce - Another track which wastes no time getting into it, but fortunately I like this song a lot more than Jet Pilot
It is not.its a very punch song.