System of a Down will honor the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide with their Wake Up the Souls Tour. The seven-show run will come to a close with the group's first Armenian performance when SOAD plays a free show in Yerevan's Republic Square, via Gigwise.
"For years we have commemorated it by doing a solo show, so we've decided to call this tour the Wake Up the Souls Tour," singer Serj Tankian said in a video preview — see below. "We're playing in Armenia for the first time, the day before the commemoration of 100th anniversary.
"The important thing is also justice. If someone killed my family, and burned my house down, and I'm running after them for 100 years for them to turn around and say, 'Sorry,' what does that mean? I think you have to have incrimination. I think you have to have justice."
Tankian is Armenian and explained his background to KCET a couple years ago.
"There is a good amount of Armenians in Lebanon who have left and come to the U.S. and other places," he said. "There is obviously a big Armenian population here [in Los Angeles]. So I grew up in the Armenian community in Los Angeles, went to an Armenian school until [the] end of high school and then went to Cal State Northridge and got a degree from there. I think growing up in the Armenian community and realizing the kind of hypocrisy of the denial of a well-known genocide within a well-known democracy kind of made me aware of other things, made me an activist in life."
Check out the tour dates — including the Armenian show — below:
4/10: London, UK @ Wembley Arena
4/13: Cologne, Germany @ Lanxess Arena
4/14: Lyon, France @ La Halle Tony Garnier
4/16: Brussels, Belgium @ Forest National
4/17: Amsterdam, Netherlands @ Ziggo Dome
4/20: Moscow, Russia @ Olympisky
4/23: Yerevan, Armenia @ Republic Square
