After fifteen years, new music from System of a Down appears via the single Protect The Land.

To get an idea of the motivation behind the release of these songs, here is an excerpt from the band’s press release.

We as System Of A Down have just released new music for the first time in 15 years. The time to do this is now, as together, the four of us have something extremely important to say as a unified voice. These two songs, “Protect The Land” and “Genocidal Humanoidz” both speak of a dire and serious war being perpetrated upon our cultural homelands of Artsakh and Armenia.

We’re proud to share these songs with you and hope you enjoy listening to them. Further, we encourage you to read on to learn more about their origins and once you do, hope you are inspired to speak out about the horrific injustices and human rights violations occurring there now. Most importantly and urgently, we humbly implore you to donate, in sums small or large to help those adversely affected with what are ever growing accounts of crimes against humanity.

There is a lot more to it, and you can read about at on the band’s Bandcamp page, Facebook, etc. Links below.

The two new songs are well in line with the signature sound of System of a Down. “Protect The Land” starts with a heavy guitar riff to establish the tone. The lyrics follow the message noted in the press release and the vocals are melodic and insistent. “Genocidal Humanoidz” has a much more frantic tempo demonstrating the hysteria the title portrays. The songs are very different to each other, showing separate musical sides of the band.

The single is out now. Give it a listen for the music and donate to the cause if you want to. I saw System of a Down a couple years ago at Aftershock in Sacramento and even without new music for such a long time, the show was just amazing. It is nice to have these two new songs, and I hope there will be more on the way in the coming months. But even if they never released another note, I would still go see them whenever I could. Recommended.

Links.

Bandcamp, https://systemofadown.bandcamp.com/

Website, https://systemofadown.com/#home

YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqmknZNg1yw&feature=youtu.be

Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/systemofadown