Serj TankianBesprekingen

I'm rating this book at three stars based on the artwork of Roger Kupelian, which is gorgeously vibrant; a collection of atmospherically surreal montages. On its own, Kupelian's work comes in at a solid 4/5 stars. Tankian's poetry, however, strikes me as something that Rik, the People's Poet, might have come up with after dropping out of university. It's not that I disagree with Tankian's position on the issues raised in his largely political poems, but he's as subtle as a brick through a window, overly-earnest and seemingly desperate to show his radical colours. A few neat lines aside, there's a lot of tortuously overwrought imagery, doggerel rhymes and a lurking leavening of lumpen alliteration. I do feel I'm getting a little carried away with my criticism; a lot of work has obviously gone into Tankian's work ... though, perhaps that's the problem.

Anyway, the book has generally good ratings on this and other book reviews sites, perhaps from fans of Tankian's band, System of a Down, or perhaps he's just not my cup of tea and there's a quality to his work I'm missing. Bought on a whim, a roll of the dice that was partially successful, partially a disappointment.

The artwork in this book is cool, and its a good-looking publication. Sadly the poetry is pretty bad. Might've been better with a metal
riff or two.

This reminds me a lot of my journals and songs from about age 15-23. That's in no way saying that Serj is an angsty teen-ager, just that it was probably very satisfying to write it and I'm sure it makes sense to him but not to many others. There's a brilliant comprehensible line here and there but much of it almost seems like automatic writing with a little bit of word play added in. The closest thing I can compare it to is Burroughs. If you enjoy digging through the non-sense to get to the gems of thought check this out. It makes good bathroom reading. OR if you're into psychedelic drugs it may also make much more sense, until you're down again that is.

Long live System of a Down! Keep fighting the "good" fight Serj.