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The living ideas of the dead are more powerful and effective than the dead ideas of the living.

Serj Tankian

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Serj Tankian
Age: 57
Born: 1967
Born: August 21
Bassist
Environmentalist
Essayist
Guitarist
Keyboardist
Lyricist
Peace Activist
Pianist
Poet
Record Producer
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
Ideas
Effective
Dead
Powerful
Living

More quotes by Serj Tankian

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I don't find most people to be as politically engaged as I am. I do find people that appreciate eye-opening events and words, and who want to learn more about what's going on. I do find people with a lot of opinions. And I get a lot of people who come up to me and give us props for what we do.
Serj Tankian
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People always ask me 'do you think there should be more bands doing political music?' and I say 'absolutely not.'
Serj Tankian
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I believe very firmly that indigenous populations had a really good, intuitive understanding of why we're here. And we're trying to gain that same understanding through psychology and intellect in modern civilization.
Serj Tankian
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I think as consumers Europeans are a lot more artist loyal irrespective of the genre of music or the type of project or the collaborative effort, and Americans are more media-loyal, because they need to be fed that media to know what's going on, because we're so inundated with promotion and marketing and everything that's going on - advertising.
Serj Tankian
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We're addicted to this concept of civilization - we can't imagine living outside of it because we've had it for 10,000 years, all of what we call history. But according to archaeologists, humanity has been on this planet for millions of years in indigenous form.
Serj Tankian
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Life is that perfect fine line between ironies.
Serj Tankian
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Sometimes it's better to have a benign dictator than a dumb democracy, to be honest.
Serj Tankian
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I don't want to spend all my time working as an activist. I don't get satisfaction out of it. I'd rather be doing something else. I'm a musician.
Serj Tankian
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I have a more direct avenue to expression as an artist than I ever would as a politician.
Serj Tankian
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'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.
Serj Tankian
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I've got my own studio, and I've got four- to five-hundred unreleased tracks. I've got stuff that's electronic, orchestral, jazz, I've got rock, I've got metal, you know, I don't have polka.
Serj Tankian
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Harout Pamboukjian is one of the biggest Armenian folk singers in the world. In the '70s, he was making these records that were really Zeppelin-influenced.
Serj Tankian
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What does civilization mean to you, and what would its ending bring to the world?
Serj Tankian
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Touring and putting out records is fun and cool, but I've been doing it for a long time.
Serj Tankian
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Sometimes a good love song can change the world and create positive energy more than any political song can.
Serj Tankian
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I like African music, and I'm a huge Ravi Shankar fan.
Serj Tankian
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We [americans] self-regulate ourselves, we self-censor ourselves a lot in this country instead of having someone else censor us so we can blame them. That's not good, either.
Serj Tankian
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The next song I wrote in Paris years ago in a dream. So I didn't really write it, the universe wrote it. And that's what I believe about music, I believe it belongs to the universe, it comes from there and it's this beautiful energy that we share that transcends normal flash existence and that we inspire each other through.
Serj Tankian
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If you're using live bass versus orchestral bass, you've got to make sure that you're not stepping on the toes of the other elements, so you've got to balance it out.
Serj Tankian
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In America, there's more of the question, should music be political or should it just be for entertainment purposes, whereas around the world that's not even an issue. I think people just assume that music should be everything.
Serj Tankian