Billboard
March 29, 2008

THE BILLBOARD Q&A: SERJ TANKIAN

by CORTNEY HARDING

SERJ TANKIAN For This Veteran Rocker, Making An Environmental Impact
Is A Way Of Life by Cortney Harding

A few days before the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War, Serj Tankian
is sitting in an Austin hotel room and ruminating on the costs of the
endless battle. But Tankian isn’t talking about dead soldiers or
civilians; he’s talking about the cost to the Middle East’s
environment, an issue that few people have raised. "The topsoil there
has been destroyed," he says, "and who knows what kind of damage all
those bombs have caused to the ecosystems in the Middle East?"

Many bands these days are claiming the "green" label, but their
concern often starts at the merch table and ends at the recycling
bin. Not so for the System of a Down frontman-turned-solo artist, who
sees beyond silos and realizes that issues like electoral reform,
recognition of the Armenian genocide, poverty and the environment are
all related. As the four-day industry party that is South by
Southwest rages below him, Tankian is serious but not humorless; clad
in jeans and a T-shirt, he fiddles with his iPhone and shows off
pictures of his dog before settling in to ponder weightier issues.
Later that night, he brings the seething, schmoozing Stubb’s crowd to
a halt when he plays three haunting acoustic tracks at a show to
celebrate the release of the "Body of War" documentary.

For Tankian, preaching about taking action is not enough. Rather than
simply paying lip service to green issues, he founded a Web site,
skyisover.net, to connect his fans to environmental and social
justice organizations. He also fuses the message to his music and the
accompanying visuals; the video for "Sky Is Over" shows him literally
erasing the sky, a comment on the growing deterioration of the ozone
layer.

He also founded a nonprofit, Axis of Justice, with former Rage
Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello. "Serj and Tom are really
committed to getting music fans to get involved with local
organizations and be active on a grass-roots level," AOJ media
director Jake Sexton says. "Serj is extremely informed about how the
way we live our lives impacts others and the need to a change in
consciousness."

"The organization has grown and morphed, and we really see the
environment as being tied to social justice and human rights causes,"
Morello says. "We both realize that while people can do things on a
person-by-person basis to make the world more green, massive levers
need to be thrown to cause any real change."

Tankian is spreading his green message on the road and working with
environmental nonprofit Reverb to make sure that his current tour
leaves as small a carbon footprint as possible. With the
organization, he ensures all the food served backstage is organic and
locally grown, that recycling bins are available throughout the
venues and that fans can buy energy credits to offset their travel to
the show. Still, Tankian recognizes that it’s not enough. "This is
all great," he says, "but it’s not going to stop the destruction.
Right now the Earth has a fever, and based on the accelerated rate of
population growth, the way we live now is completely unsustainable."

Many artists are becoming more active in promoting green issues, but
you seem to be one of the few who actually go a step beyond and
connect environmental issues to issues of poverty and war. How do you
see the relationships between these causes?

For me, it all stems from the need to promote justice. I called my
organization Axis of Justice because I didn’t want to focus on only
one issue. The connections can be drawn because they are present in
so many places; for instance, poor urban neighborhoods have higher
asthma rates. When a city wants to build a dump or get rid of
radioactive waste, they don’t put it in the nice part of town. Even
materials that are supposed to be environmentally friendly can be
harmful to poor communities. Biodiesel, for example, uses up farmland
that could otherwise be used to grow food for starving people.

How did you first get involved in green issues?

I’ve been a supporter of Greenpeace and the Sierra Club for years. I
have a place in New Zealand, and I was really impressed with a
Greenpeace action that took place down there recently. Greenpeace
folks boarded a Japanese whaling ship to try to shut it down, and in
the midst of the conflict, both ships ran out of fuel. When a rescue
ship came, the Greenpeace people tried to disconnect the fuel lines
to the whaling ship, even though it meant they’d be stuck as well. It
was kind of crazy, but sometimes you have to be ballsy and put
yourself out.

Do you ever worry that you are just preaching to the choir and the
people who are driving around in Hummers and living in McMansions are
just ignoring the message?

I sat next to an oil executive on the flight to Austin, and he
started talking to me about how absurd it was that every day when he
drives to work, the highways are full but trams and buses are empty.
I think people are starting to hear what environmentalists are
saying. "An Inconvenient Truth" was a huge wake-up call for a lot of
people.

Have you ever been confronted with having to eat costs to be greener?
Have you paid extra upfront for organic merch or greener touring? If
so, how much?

Absolutely. Awareness always has a built-in economic cost, though in
some cases green materials have become more competitive as far as
pricing. We pay more for our merch items so that we can be sure that
they are made with equitable labor and ecological practices. As far
as investments [go], going green means that the return on your
investment is less than investing in the corporate world, at least
for now. This does not mean that you can’t be profitable and
conscious. It just means that there is a real-life cost to being more
aware; hybrid cars cost more than non-hybrid cars of the same make,
for example. It would be great to encourage large industries to
reverse this policy. For example, if car companies made hybrids the
same price as regular cars, more hybrids would be sold and that would
have a positive effect on pollution.

What is the dynamic of those business decisions? Do you see a payoff
further down the road or just eat the cost because being good to the
planet matters more?

The payoff for those decisions is not somewhere in the future, it’s
now. I feel better about the way I live now and that’s my payoff. I
do things because it’s the right thing to do now. I don’t know what
the future brings. In reality, the future never really exists. It’s a
design of the logical mind.

This is all great, but I’m wondering how you justify being part of an
industry that produces so much waste every years. You’ve sold more
than 10 million CDs, and many of those were in plastic containers
that had to be shipped to stores.

Basically, we’re all hypocrites unless we go out and live off the
land. That way of living is a model for me, because I think those
people are clued in about climate change and the way we’re going to
have to alter our lives. I spend a lot of the record talking about
the end of civilization, and I don’t mean an apocalypse. I think that
we are going to have to come to terms with the fact that the way we
live now will not exist in 50 years, period.

Along those same lines, you have been touring for this record, and
while you have carbon offset programs in place, you are still using a
lot of resources and putting a lot of goods out there. How do you
reconcile that with your belief system?

Again, I realize I am a hypocrite by going on the road and doing
this. I’ve had an idea for a long time, which might sound a little
crazy, but I really want to look into holographic touring. I think we
could reduce our need to travel if we could project ourselves into
meetings and concerts. We have the technology, and we’re not using it
right now.

For instance, I have a studio next to my house and a live performance
room in the studio. I could broadcast a show in real time and could
interact with the audience as if we were in the same room. After all,
it’s not like the audience can touch me, anyway [laughs]. It would
open up a whole new world for touring — shows wouldn’t have to be
limited to bars or clubs. There would be no travel costs, so bands
with very little money could play shows, and tickets would cost less.

Well, even though that is still in the future, at least bands right
now are starting to become more conscious. Do you worry, though, that
being green might just be another trend for musicians and will be
forgotten in a few years? After all, how many people do you hear
still talking about Tibet?

I’m not a big trend follower, so I don’t know if this is just another
blip. I think that with the ice caps melting and everything changing,
bands and everyone else on the planet won’t have much of a choice
about becoming green. I look at a place like New Zealand, which is
ecologically one of the most progressive places on earth. People down
there are unconsciously conscious — they don’t get
self-congratulatory when they recycle, they just do it as a way of
life. I think we need more education to get us to that place.

While bands are also becoming greener, they seem to be less
interested in other issues, like electoral politics. Would you agree
with that?

I think a lot of bands are coming out for this election, many more
than the previous few. Howard Dean had some good support and momentum
in 2004, but it collapsed quickly. I’m an Obama fan, but I have to
say I was disappointed when I found out he wanted to expand the
defense budget. Still, he has done a good job getting younger people
invested in the process and teaching them about the way party
politics work.

You just performed at a concert for the anti-war movie "Body of War"
and have a song on the soundtrack. What other musical plans do you
have for the near future?

I’m going to continue touring behind the new record, and I’m also
working on some music for film. I might be working on a score for a
theatrical production, too. My next record will be a jazz orchestral
record; I want it to have a whole different vibe than the last one. I
want to be able to play Carnegie Hall with the new one. I’m planning
on releasing it in 2009. I never studied music; I ran a software
company before I did any of this. I’ve been lucky that I’ve done so
well and been able to make the music I want to make.

You’ve used your position as a popular musician to spread the word
about a number of causes. Have you gotten any backlash or flack from
your fans?

I wrote an essay called "Understanding Oil" after 9-11 that led to me
being called a traitor and stations dropping our songs. The sad thing
is, now that the war has been on for five years, people are coming up
to me and telling me I was right.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress