Ever since I first heard System of a Down over four years ago, I believed that the driving force behind the band was Serj Tankian. When the band went on hiatus in 2006 and various members released solo albums, my beliefs were only reinforced. Daron Malakian's album,
Scars On Broadway, was generic hard rock that didn't feature the interesting melodies and skillfully written lyrics that I became so used to. On the other hand, Serj Tankian's
Elect The Dead is, while not as good as his previous material, a very enjoyable album that contains almost all of the elements that made System of a Down so interesting.
Serj's vocal performance is as strong as ever. His voice is powerful throughout the majority of the album, and he relies mainly on grandiose, soaring singing, but Serj isn't afraid to sing soft, soothing passages from time to time. The guitar playing is unspectacular, and the music never becomes very technical, but the simple riffs fit the music well, so Serj's unfamiliarity with the instrument is not a glaring flaw. The bass playing is very rarely audible but is competent, if not mindbogglingly technical. Most of the baselines are not very memorable at all, but they provide a solid backbone to the music. System of a Down drummer, John Dolyman helps Serj out on this album, and his drumming is as skilled as on past albums, which adds greatly to music. The most unexpected component of the music is the addition of Serj's piano playing. He is a very skilled pianist, and the piano greatly contributes to the sound and adds to the mood. The title track, for example, feels mournful and desolate due to the slow chords played in the background, and songs such as
Lie Lie Lie and
Money rely greatly on keyboard accompaniment.
While the performance is generally strong, the music is often underwhelming. Serj does not rely on the experimentation that made System of a Down's work (particularly their first two albums) so strong and unique. Instead, most of the songs found on this album are rather by-the-numbers hard rock. While songs such as
Baby are well-written, they all feel disappointing at first listen, as Serj is capable of much more creative and experimental music. With that said, the album contains no weak songs, but much of the music found here is not as strong as on Serj's previous albums.
This album contains one experimental song,
Praise The Lord And Pass The Ammunition, which also happens to be the best song of Serj's career thus far. The strong starts with a Middle Eastern-esque riff, which is then joined by Serj's hypnotic vocals. The song shows some of Serj's less obvious influences as he switches from soft, high pitched rapping to jazzy, piano driven soft sections and back to the hard rock we are used to. This song also has the most interesting bass playing on the album, and is filled with catchy bass lines. Serj's vocals are also at his best, and he switches from being a human boom box to soothingly cooing and to his usual imposing, hypnotic singing. Also, one can hear Serj's best impersonation of a chicken at 0:40.
Elect The Dead is a very strong, but not groundbreaking, album that shows that Serj Tankian can write and perform above average music, even without help from other musicians. Recommended for any System of a Down fans.
