Line #16 Music/Toxicity


1	[[quoteright:340:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/e828cae0816c7dc91149411c942efb53.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:340:''You, what do you own, the world? How do you own disorder, disorder?'']]
3
4	''Toxicity'' is the second studio album by AlternativeMetal band Music/SystemOfADown, released on September 4, 2001. While their previous [[SelfTitledAlbum eponymous album]] garnered them a substantial following, this record propelled the band into the mainstream due to its impressive GenreRoulette and stunning originality.
5
6	Expanding from their usual tirades about government oppression, ''Toxicity'' highlighted more specific issues in which the band was interested, such as the decriminalization of drugs, environmentalism, education, religion, war, and fame. One of the more hard-hitting political messages was "Chop Suey!", which was an all-out critique of "''self-righteous suicide''" (such as jihad) and religious fundamentalism. It became a hugely successful song, especially when [[UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror 9/11 occurred just a week after the album was released]].
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8	The band also dabbled with LighterAndSofter melodies while keeping their HardRock edge and Serj Tankian's characteristic [[MetalScream metal screams]], such as on the hit singles "Toxicity" and "Aerials" (the latter of which was nominated for a UsefulNotes/GrammyAward). The album has since sold 12 million copies and remains SOAD's most influential album to date, since it helped to further popularize the progressive metal genre.
9
10	!!Tracklist:
11
12	# "Prison Song" (3:21)
13	# "Needles" (3:13)
14	# "Deer Dance" (2:55)
15	# "Jet Pilot" (2:06)
16	# "X" (1:58)
17	# "Music/ChopSuey" (3:30)
18	# "Bounce" (1:54)
19	# "Forest" (4:00)
20	# "ATWA" (2:56)
21	# "Science" (2:43)
22	# "Shimmy" (1:51)
23	# "Toxicity" (3:38)
24	# "Psycho" (3:45)
25	# "Aerials" (6:11)[[note]]Contains the hidden track "Arto" during its last two minutes[[/note]]
26
27	----
28	!!Principal Members:
29
30	* Serj Tankian – vocals, keyboards, guitars
31	* Daron Malakian – guitars, vocals
32	* Shavo Odadjian – bass, backing vocals
33	* John Dolmayan – drums
34
35	----
36	!!'''''Trope Suey!'''''
37
38	* AcademyOfEvil: "Shimmy" is a playful assertion that we have all become puppets of the education system:
39	--> ''Education, fornication, in you are; go\
40	Education, subjugation, now you're out; go\
41	Education, fornication, in you are; go\
42	Don't be late for school again, boy!''
43	* AlbumFiller: WordOfGod confirms that "Bounce", "X" and "Shimmy" were mostly written for this purpose.
44	* AlliterativeTitle: "'''D'''eer '''D'''ance"
45	* AsTheGoodBookSays: "Chop Suey" quotes two verses from the Crucifixion of Jesus: "Father, into your hands, I commend my spirit" (Luke 23:46) and "Why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46).
46	* AttentionDeficitOohShiny: Daron said during a live performance that "Toxicity" was mainly about Attention Deficit Disorder, with the "seeds" in the song representing the pharmaceutical drugging of the youth.
47	* ConceptVideo: In addition to showing the band perform, the video for "Aerials" focuses mainly on a young CircusBrat with... ugly features, wishing that he were famous. He also has a naive view of the world; he assumes nobody would give a second thought toward his physical characteristics, he imagines a reporter as a young boy, and he imagines that rich people do nothing but blow money up in the air all the time. It ends with him kneeling face-down in disappointment on the same ground where the band had been performing a minute ago.
48	* DeadlyEuphemism: "Deer Dance" sarcastically invokes this:
49	--> ''Battalions of riot police with rubber bullet kisses\
50	Baton, courtesy, serviced with a smile''
51	* DisproportionateRetribution: "Deer Dance" features innocent, young protesters and the tired poor peacefully fighting against the system, which continually oppresses them.
52	* DoubleEntendre: "Bounce" bizarrely uses a pogo stick as a metaphor for a penis.
53	* DrugsAreBad: "Needles", which is a little ironic given that it's preceded by "Prison Song"[[note]]which isn't a song saying that drugs are good, per say, but is a song arguing that drug criminalization has gotten way out of hand[[/note]].
54	* EpicRocking: Comparatively, "Psycho" has a pretty long solo from the rest of the songs on the record. It also sounds really cool.
55	* FunWithAcronyms: "ATWA" is short for "Air, Trees, Water, and Animals", though none of those words appear in the song.
56	* GreenAesop: "ATWA" and "Forest" mainly serve as this, to show how complacency and an uncaring attitude can be destructive to the world surrounding us.
57	* GroupieBrigade: "Psycho" is a commentary about how groupies get entrenched in the culture of SexDrugsAndRockAndRoll in order to follow musicians they admire:
58	--> ''So you want the world to stop\
59	Rushing to watch your spirit fully drop\
60	From the time you were a PSYCHO! GROUPIE! COCAINE! CRAZY!\
61	So you want to see the show\
62	You really don't have to be a ho''
63	* HiddenTrack: The album version of "Aerials" fades out into a tribal-sounding instrumental the band calls "Arto". It's named after Arto Tunçboyacıyan, an Armenian singer-songwriter who contributed to the track; Serj has since collaborated with him on numerous occasions.
64	* LampreyMouth: "Needles" compares a heroin syringe to the mouth of a tapeworm. Lovely.
65	* LikeASonToMe: "Forest" is mostly about how we are all children of the nature, and we have all disavowed ourselves from protecting our progenitor:
66	--> ''Why can't you see that you are my child?\
67	Why don't you know that you are my mind?\
68	Tell everyone in the world, that I'm you\
69	Take this promise to the end of you''
70	* LimitedLyricsSong: "X" mostly repeats "''We don't need to multiply''" and "''No need to nullify''" a bunch of times.
71	* MagicVersusScience: "Science", contrary to lots of interpretations, is actually about how a more spiritual outlook toward our world can be more useful to humanity than a neutral, even devastating view toward ideas which govern our lives.
72	* MartyrdomCulture: "Chop Suey!" is a powerful, reflective critique of this. It mostly serves to show the absurdity of "self-righteous suicide" and pleading to a God before one's death.
73	* MediaWatchdog: The 2001 [[Creator/IHeartMedia Clear Channel]] memorandum, following the 9/11 attacks, actually banned (well, discouraged) [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_Clear_Channel_memorandum a bunch of songs]] from playing on the radio that were apparently insensitive to the public, including "Chop Suey!". Since "Chop Suey!" was the lead single, it had already been playing on radios a month before the album's release date, so it was already popular enough to not be that affected by the ban.
74	* MoodWhiplash: After the deep, powerful melodies of "Chop Suey!", the band immediately moves toward the particularly weird, fast "Bounce". Serj has said that this was intentional, to provide a light-hearted contrast between "Chop Suey!" and the rest of the album.
75	* NonAppearingTitle: "Chop Suey!" is justified mostly because it was a playful censorship of the song's original title, "Suicide". Although the music video, possibly as a joke, includes a single shot of the guys apathetically eating chop suey out of cardboard takeaway cartons.
76	* OlderThanTheyThink: "X" dates back to before the band's first album, and it was played regularly on its tour as well.
77	* OneLetterTitle: "X"
78	* OneWordTitle: "Needles", "Bounce", "Forest", "Science", "Shimmy", "Toxicity", "Psycho" and "Aerials".
79	* OrderVersusChaos: "Toxicity" makes this juxtaposition, showing the constant tension between the struggle to create order and the confusion which causes disorder.
80	* APartyAlsoKnownAsAnOrgy: Humorously invoked in "Bounce":
81	--> ''I went out on a date with my girl, a bit late\
82	She had so many friends (Gliding through many hands)\
83	I brought my pogo stick just to show her a trick\
84	She had so many friends (Gliding through many hands)''
85	* PoliceBrutality: In "Deer Dance":
86	--> ''Peaceful loving youth against the brutality of plastic existence\
87	Pushing little children with their fully automatics\
88	They like to push the weak around''
89	* PunBasedTitle: The original title for "Chop Suey!" was "Suicide" [[note]]the album version even confirms this, with one of the band members announcing "Rolling 'Suicide'"[[/note]]. To make it more palatable to a mainstream audience, however, the band renamed the song after a certain Chinese takeout food, with "Suey", of course, short for "Suicide". (The band has said that they weren't really under pressure from management to do this, however.)
90	* PunctuatedForEmphasis: "PSYCHO! GROUPIE! COCAINE! CRAZY!"
91	* ScienceIsBad: "Science". Rather than outright denying it, however, the band instead compares religious wars to the more recent wars amplified by advances in science that allow for further destruction.
92	-->''Fighting off the diseased programming\
93	Of centuries, centuries, centuries, centuries\
94	Science fails to recognise the single most\
95	Potent element of human existence''
96	* ShownTheirWork: "Prison Song" cites facts and figures (which were current at the time) to convince people that the system of incarceration within the United States desperately needs reform:
97	--> ''The percentage of Americans\
98	In the prison system, prison system\
99	Has doubled since 1985''
100	* TheSomethingSong: "Prison Song"
101	* SongStyleShift: It ''is'' a System of a Down album, after all.
102	* StepUpToTheMic: Daron Malakian sings some of the bridges in the album, most notably in "Needles", and provides more prominent backing vocals than in their self-titled debut.
103	* ToiletHumour: "Needles", which features the sarcastic, if odd, refrain, "''Pull the tapeworm out of your ass.''"
104	* UncommonTime: "Toxicity" is largely done in a 6/8 time signature.
105	* VillainProtagonist: "Chop Suey" is often interpreted to be about a religious terrorist's attempt to internally justify killing a large amount of people.
106	* WarForFunAndProfit: "Jet Pilot" mainly deals with this. This song was actually written ''before'' the war in Afghanistan, when this criticism became par for the course for every anti-war protester.
107	-->''Wired were the eyes of a horse on a jet pilot\
108	One that smiled when he flew over the bay\
109	My source is the source of all creation\
110	Her... discourse... is that we all don't survey''
111	* WeHaveBecomeComplacent: The subject of "Forest" and "ATWA", both about the environment.
112	* WordSaladLyrics: "Bounce". It's about hopping on a pogo stick in front of your date's friends... and having a huge orgy, maybe?

Context Music / Toxicity