“Foundations” track listing:
01. A.F. Day
02. Justice Will Shine On
03. Appropriations
04. Cartoon Buyer
05. Life’s Revengeful Son

“Foundations” mines music and lyrics from previous decades and reframes them in a hard-hitting, intensely focused collection. Like all of Tankian‘s work, the five songs that comprise “Foundations” encompass a wide range of sounds and styles. It is music that traverses multiple eras and vast swaths of emotions. It is also very much a rock album — “music of rebellion,” says Tankian.

“Foundations” kicks off with “A.F. Day”, a raging, heavy-riffing track that sounds like classic Tankian. The origins of the song date back almost three decades, to his earliest days with SYSTEM OF A DOWN. Tankian never brought it to the band to record, and when he happened upon “A.F. Day” more recently he “felt it should finally be released.” In doing so, he retained much of the original music, including his vocals — a decision that was partly pragmatic: “My voice has naturally changed over time,” Tankian explains. As the lyrics demonstrate, his attitude has not. “Medieval educators locking horns at the playground at 5 / Real live police crime shows submission of the population at large,” he rails, expressing disgust with indoctrination and blind deference to authority at every turn.

“A.F. Day” is followed the album’s most anthemic track, and also its emotional centerpiece: “Justice Will Shine On”. Another song whose compositional roots date back to the early SOAD days, the impassioned hard rocker is nonetheless instilled with a message that is as hard-hitting and vital today. Over potent riffs and pummeling rhythms, Tankian grapples with the atrocities of the Armenian genocide experienced by his grandparents firsthand. He addresses their suffering in jarringly personal and direct terms, singing, “Can you tell me dear grandfather of your childhood so far away / You can see the death of laughter in his teared eyes disarray / Can you tell me dear grandmother of your childhood from hunger and pain / Of the orphans you called brothers in her teared eyes disarray.” As the song launches into its soaring chorus, Tankian declares that his grandparents’ torment, and the anguish experienced by all Armenian victims, will not be in vain. “We are the children of all the survivors / Justice will shine on!”

Elsewhere on “Foundations”, “Appropriations” (an older song I’ve ‘re-appropriated’ to modern times,” he says) juxtaposes a snake-y, arpeggiated verse with a crushing chorus in a clash of eastern and western modalities, as Tankian unspools lyrics that play off complementary sounds and contrasting sensibilities: “Resignation, provocation, segregation… imagination and creation,” he croons. And “Cartoon Buyer”, which dates to a period just prior to Tankian‘s first solo record, 2007’s “Elect The Dead”, begins in hushed, almost folk-y mode, and gradually builds — both in intensity and actual tempo — before exploding in sonic and spiritual catharsis. Throughout the track, Tankian scrutinizes the divides within humanity (“You see me without emotions / I see you across the oceans,” he intones) before ultimately declaring our oneness: “California to Argentina…Saudi Arabia to Tunisia…Armenia to Australia…Israel to Indonesia / They are us and we are them.”

Finally, “Life’s Revengeful Son”, originally recorded prior to Tankian‘s 2010 “Imperfect Harmonies” album, incorporates a variety of instrumentation, including acoustic and electric guitars and dramatic orchestration, into an epic closer with unmatched imagery: “The final revolution will occur when the arms of the clock fall,” Tankian sings. “Jesus seen in the streets, dragging a car axel instead of the cross.”

A true creative tour de force, Tankian recorded “Foundations” primarily at his own Serjical Strike Studios in L.A. He wrote, performed, orchestrated and produced all the material, as well as contributed the artwork — an original piece titled “Sunburst” — that adorns the album cover. Additional instrumentation on the record was provided by Dan Monti (guitars, bass and drum programming) and, on “Cartoon Buyer”, by bassist Mario Pagliarulo and SOAD drummer John Dolmayan.

“Foundations”, Tankian says, is “a retrospective of songs from different eras of my life, meant to complement the memoir,” and caps what has been an incredibly prolific year for Tankian, from the release of his memoir The New York Times bestseller “Down With The System”, to the massive, sold-out SYSTEM OF A DOWN headlining show at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco with over 50,000 fans. But even as he is now revealing his “foundations,” Tankian is already looking ahead. “The next record will likely be a record of covers, collaborations and collages,” he envisions.

Watch the previously released “Justice Will Shine On” and “A.F. Day” below.