Serj Tankian

I'm not comfortable with just entertaining. Although I like entertaining, I also like bringing forward the truth of our times as minstrels used to in the old days.

If you allow for a purely capitalistic society, without any type of regulation at all, you will get one monopoly that will eat all of the smaller fish and own everything, and then you'll have zero capitalism, zero competition - it would just be one giant company.

As an artist, you never want to write the same song again, you always want to challenge yourself to writing in a different way.

I think music is a powerful medium because it co-inspires. It inspires the artist who then inspires the listener, and it's a back-and-forth process.

I think it's my interaction with journalists that has pegged me more as political than my actual records, although they have obviously political aspects to them as well.

People always ask me 'do you think there should be more bands doing political music?' and I say 'absolutely not.'

Sometimes it's better to have a benign dictator than a dumb democracy, to be honest.

Elect the Dead' is a rock record that takes you on a journey with different types of genres integrated, different lyrical themes digested, and many fun and colorful moments to enjoy.

I've always worked on all different types of music, some with specific project goals and deadlines and some not. Sometimes I would write a piece of music that is almost like a film score or weird electro pieces, wherever the muse took me, and I still do that.

I've always tried to listen to a lot of different music from around the world.

I think I might write a book. I like writing. People have asked me if I would get into politics, but I think I feel a lot more effective being a representative of truth through the arts.

Awareness in our society has flipped all types of injustice on its head.