System of a Down’s Shavo Odadjian Confirms the Band is “Still on a Musical Hiatus”

It’s been 18 years since alt-metal titans System of a Down put out a new studio record, but that hasn’t stopped fans from holding out hope that something — anything — would be coming in the future. Inter-personal friction and disinterest seem to be the hurdles within the band and it’s led some band members to hold others responsible for the lack of a new album.

During a recent interview with Sobre La Dosis, bassist Shavo Odadjian revealed that the band is still very much on a break from writing new music, despite having just recently performed at Sick New World in Las Vegas last month.

“Not in the near future. We’re still on a musical hiatus/creative hiatus, but we [played] at Sick New World in Las Vegas. And I’ve got a solo record coming out very soon. That’s heavy and it’s big. It’s not hip-hop, it’s just crazy. Usually, all my side projects have been kind of hip-hop-y or electro, but I went down and wanted to do something that felt right to me from day one. That’s my DNA, so look out for the solo record.”

That’s pretty much been the M.O. of System of a Down members in recent years: “we can’t get together to work on music, so we’re doing our own solo efforts.” All four members have put out their own projects in the 18 years since Hypnotize and Mezmerize came out back in 2005.

That being said, the band has since released new music, releasing singles “Protect the Land” and “Genocidal Humanoidz” in 2020 as part of a benefit effort to support the Armenia Fund. That being said, however, both of those songs were originally written by Daron Malakian for his solo project Scars on Broadway, so that kinda doesn’t count.

Whether there’s some internal strife or some members just don’t want to do it anymore, it’s going to be a looong time before we get a new System of a Down album. If we ever get one…