DARON MALAKIAN Says 'It's Not Likely' SYSTEM OF A DOWN Will Make New Album 'Anytime Soon'

SYSTEM OF A DOWN guitarist Daron Malakian says that it's unlikely the band will make new music anytime soon.

Last summer, Malakian publicly accused singer Sej Tankian of not wanting to record, with Tankian responding that creative and financial issues with Malakian led to the stalemate. In a message on Facebook, Tankian wrote that Malakian wanted to control SYSTEM's creative process, take more of the publishing money and be the only band member to speak to the press.

Daron, who reactivated SCARS ON BROADWAY last year, told KROQ in a brand new interview that he decided to bring back his side project because he has "a lot of material, a lot of music, and I'm a little bit more clear on where I'm at with my life right now when it comes to releasing my songs. It took a while to figure out what's going on with SYSTEM and if we're gonna make a record or not, so I just kind of held on to a lot of music to see what was going on with that," he said. "We just couldn't see eye to eye with certain things on that stuff, so it was just time for me to start putting out my music."

Asked if new music that that he has already written is suitable for SYSTEM OF A DOWN or if it will be used for future SCARS ON BROADWAY albums, Daron said: "I think my material usually works for both bands, so if SYSTEM decides to make a record at some point, I think I'll have material for that. But the thing is I'm just not waiting anymore to see what's going on."

Pressed about whether his frustration lies in the fact that various members of SYSTEM are not on the same page when it comes to the band's musical direction, or if some of them don't want to leave their families and do the whole cycle again, Daron responded: "It might be a mix of both. People change. As time goes on, tastes change. And people wanna take the band into different directions, and you have other members of the band that maybe don't wanna go into those directions. So we just haven't come to an agreement on how we would wanna do it, if we did make a record. I never say never, but at this point, it's not likely that it's gonna happen anytime soon."

Serj recently told Rolling Stone that the public airing of his dispute with Daron didn't open up any more conversations about SYSTEM's future. "I think it released a lot of tension and negativity," he said. "Everything became more public and open, and that was that. There were no further discussions."

SYSTEM OF A DOWN bassist Shavo Odadjian confirmed in a recent interview with Consequence Of Sound that disagreements between Malakian and Tankian over the band's songwriting process have been brewing for a decade, explaining: "That stuff happened a long time ago. So, it's like, 10 years later, something new came up, but it wasn't really new. It was something that was really old, and they were just hashing it out."

SYSTEM drummer John Dolmayan revealed in a 2016 interview that the group had written music for more than a dozen new songs. Odadjian concurred, remarking: "Between you and me and this world, and to the people who read this interview, we have material that tops everything we've done. And that's me telling you, honestly. I can't wait to record that and drop it."

SYSTEM OF A DOWN has several live shows on tap for 2019, including headlining slots at Columbus, Ohio's Sonic Temple festival and Chicago Open Air, both in May.