SOUND BITES

SERJ TANKIAN Harakiri From: Harakiri Released: July 10 Seven years removed from his last album with them, Serj Tankian is still known by most as “the guy from System of a Down”. Over these last seven years, he's tried to distance himself somewhat from SOAD and prove that he's a formidable songwriter and performer outside the manic metal attack of the band that made him famous. Results have been mixed until this year's Harakiri . On it, the songs that sound most like System are also perhaps the weakest; lead single Figure It Out was obviously penned with SOAD fans in mind, but its profanity-laden Ministry-esque delivery, while potent on its own, detracts from the rest of the album. The real highlight on Harakiri is its title track, a soaring gem that doesn't let its riffs get in the way of a well-written song. 

Stream Serj Tankian's new album Harakiri before its July 10th release here (courtesy Exclaim!) After a pair of underachieving solo albums and the memory of System Of A Down starting to fade from public perception, it's somewhat understandable that Serj Tankian would use his third solo affair to reintroduce himself as the same oddball aggressor who tore a strip off of mainstream culture with System Of A Down over the course of four unflinching, daring and brutally heavy rock albums.  And, though it does rock hard by times, Harakiri gets most of its kicks in solid songwriting and soaring choruses rather than eardrum pummeling and guitar shredding.