Last week I ran part one of my epic, hour-long conversation with Incubus frontman Brandon Boyd and System Of A Down frontman Serj Tankian. I met the two rock titans and long time friends in a Los Angeles restaurant in advance of their October shows together in San Bernardino and Sacramento. (https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevebaltin/2018/08/01/incubus-brandon-boyd-and-system-of-a-downs-serj-tankian-open-up-on-fame-music-touring-and-more/)
In part two, the two discuss how music has changed since they started as bands in vans, some crazy bus drivers, memorable shows together like Spain in 2005, the ups and downs of fame and much more.
Here is part two of Brandon Boyd and Serj Tankian face to face.
Steve Baltin: Do you think about your legacy as you get older?
Brandon Boyd: When we’re young we’re flying by the seat of our pants without thinking too much about it. And, I think as we get older, depending on the circumstances that are accruing as we get older, we’re still flying by the seat of our pants, but we’re thinking about it now. There are more and more realizations like, “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Serj Tankian: You’re right, you start thinking about it. Art is intuitive obviously, and you start with that and you grow with that. And then at some point you start applying rationalization and all your cognitive thinking into the process. At some point, it might make it worse.
Boyd: How you get there is a real danger of making it worse and why you see kind of a precipitous decline in a lot of artists’ output as they get older. Not only is our time more and more precious as we realize we’re running out of it, but there’s pressure of really thinking about it now. And, god forbid, maybe you’ve been successful.
Tankian: Replicating that success or whatever, that kind of self-applied pressure.
Boyd: But I also believe therein lies a really interesting challenge. The potential for what you do to be truly transcendent also gets higher, if you’re able to transcend all of these barriers and actually arrive at something that can be emotionally evocative to you, and maybe other people as well, then it’s even more of a triumph.
Baltin: Does that need for something new also influence your multiple creative outlets?
Boyd: That’s how it feels. It feels if you or I were to limit ourselves to one creative outlet it would be like robbing you of really essential moments in your life. It’s like you just do make lots of things and it’s amazing. I personally think that it helps.
Tankian: It keeps it fresh so that when you’re actually focusing on your art, whether it’s a painting or a song or a shoot for a film you’re actually fresher because you’re not just doing it over and over again. And you absorb because you’re doing so many things you’re absorbing from different sources. So what you put out is a lot richer from all this other experience.
Baltin: Talk about the differences you had coming up when you did versus now.
Boyd: I do know that the way both System and Incubus came up was decidedly old school if you look at it from today’s perspective. I don’t know for certain, but you probably had a physical mailing list, right?
Tankian: Oh yeah.
Boyd: We had mailing list get together's at Mike [Einziger’s] house.
Tankian: That was very important.
Boyd: Jose [Pasillas] and I would draw up flyers, we would write people’s physical addresses on them. And we properly got in the van and did that whole thing. I honestly don’t know if bands are doing that anymore. I kind of hope they are cause it’s a difficult experience, but it’s highly enriching. If you survive it you’re a survivor.
Baltin: What were some of the most memorable experiences in those early days on the road?
Tankian: We’re on those little RV beds and somebody hit the brakes and we probably flew out. I don’t know, whatever it is. I had a few of those crazy bus drivers too over the years where I’m like, “I don’t know this guy, but my life is in his hands. Can someone explain that to me?”
Boyd: Oh my god, we had some crazy bus drivers, ones we’ve had to send home.
Tankian: We’ve done that once, twice.
Boyd: Three times for us. Once this guy got sent home because he bit one of our tech guys, like proper bite marks on the arm. He had to go home and get a shot. Human bites are really bad. Another guy called us up at one point, “Guys, come here,” while going 60 MPH on the highway. We go up there and he is standing on the seat, one foot on the seat, one foot on the steering wheel, “I’m surfing, bros.”
Tankian: He was high on something. That’s the one we let go because we would wake up and he would be talking really loud, yelling at other cars, “Get out of my way, I’m coming through.” And the bus broke down and he started kicking the bus. He was so jacked up he couldn’t help it.
Baltin: Do you think all those experiences playing and growing with your bands is what’s allowed you guys to play together for 20-something years?
Boyd: We had the opportunity for sure to play too much.
Tankian: Where did you guys tour this last year? All over?
Boyd:Yeah, last summer, which is technically the same tour, we did States. For the last few months we’ve been doing festivals in the States and everything. But we did get a chance to finally go play in India.
Tankian: Oh, how was that? Where did you play in India?
Boyd: We played in Pune. It was so much fun. South Africa, have you guys been there?
Tankian: No!
Boyd: It was our first time, truly such a memorable experience. We were there for like 10 days, all through Asia. And we got to Europe in a few weeks. Did Japan, all over Indonesia, Thailand.
Tankian: Wow, so was this one giant tour?
Boyd: Yeah (laughs). The one where we did South Africa and India we also did Japan and all over Southeast Asia. It was really fun though. I touched a cheetah. (They both laugh) That’s not a metaphor either. I touched a cheetah.
Tankian: It’s hard to touch the fastest animal on the planet.
Boyd: It is, I had to wait until it was napping.
Baltin: Is that important, having done it for so long, to still get new experiences?
Boyd: That’s definitely one of the reasons why it’s still fun. There’s a lot out there still.
Tankian: The reason I was asking about India and South Korea, we’ve never played there. I find it more exciting to play places I’ve never played before. And that’s getting rarer and rarer as you do European festivals and this tour again and again. You end up going to the same spots because it makes sense. But even in a city you’ve never been to in a country you have.
Boyd: Or even a new venue.
Tankian: Yeah, a new venue. Give me anything (laughs). I guess part of it is we’ve all been doing it for a while, so we need that freshness to keep it going.
Baltin: Does it also make it more fun to play with bands you’ve known for 25 years?
Tankian: It’s awesome. Let’s talk about Spain. Remember that one show in Madrid where the roof collapsed (Festimad, 2005)?
Boyd: That was scary. And then we all ended up going like four hours after our original set time. We went on stage and the crowd was insane. There were crazy, crazy winds and they had one of those canopy tops. I just remember we were backstage forever, hoping the weather would change.
Tankian: Iggy [Pop] was there too, and the Stooges. So we’re backstage, we’re all waiting to play, we’re hanging out having a good time and we hear the roof has fallen. And we’re like, “Okay, how long is it gonna take to get this?” They don’t know.” We’re like, “Are they cancelling?”” They’re like, “No, no, no because the crowd flipped over a car and burned it. So we’re definitely not cancelling.” We didn’t even have water, forget about the food. We ran out of everything. I’m drinking coffee to stay up. I remember we got off stage at six AM and you know who was in a worse situation than us?
Boyd: Prodigy, right?
Tankian: (Laughs) So I see Keith [Flint] walking up, “Firestarter” dude with his head and I look at him and I go, “Go get them fires started.” I couldn’t help it. I’m half asleep. And it was so sandy or whatever it was. So you remember these things.
Boyd: Do you remember being on Snocore with Mr. Bungle? Mr. Bungle was hugely influential to both of our bands, and they were playing second, like before Incubus and System Of A Down. Cause they would come out and Mike [Patton] would be a real rabble rouser, say horrible things to the audience. We would be on the side of stage cheering, fanboys. But it happened a handful of times where you were like, “You guys need to listen to them. Neither of these bands would be here if it weren’t for this band.”
Tankian: All I remember was neither Mike nor I could sleep on a bus, I still can’t. I fly everywhere. So he couldn’t sleep on a bus either so we’d end up hanging out all night, not sleeping, then drive to the next place, get a day room and sleep like for three or four hours. But we had some of the most interesting conversations.
Baltin: Being asked for so much, how do you determine when to say yes?
Tankian: Let’s talk about that. I think it’s important to really, really know what it is you want to do as an artist, because otherwise you’re just reacting to things coming at you.
Boyd: It’s like 10 well-placed “No’s” and two very-placed “Yeses.” You gotta scan the field, “Definitely no, how do I say no to that?’
Baltin: Fame is such a fascinating concept to me. The more musicians I talk to the more awful it seems.
Tankian: It’s a weapon you can use for good if you want to. The Armenia stuff is the perfect example because I don’t deserve that kind of attention there. But they were calling for me to go because I supported concrete changes, reforms in Armenia for many years, openly writing to the ex-president and saying, “This is untenable, this is embarrassing.” So the revolution happened, and I ended up flying in early May and going. And these people were so happy cause they just got liberated and even though I don’t deserve them looking at me as if I’m important for the revolution, as long as they felt that was important and helped them in their inspiration, that they feel good about it, then it’s fine. Just like if someone takes a picture with you or me or anybody and walks away happy. And that’s where fame can be useful, if you apply it for good. But, overall, I f**king hate it because I’d rather not deal with that and just do my work because we’re artists, this is what we do.
Boyd: There’s a quote, something to the effect of fame is the price you pay for talent. Essentially it’s insinuating that it’s the dark part of having talent, it’s the shadow aspect. There is something in American culture that we’ve always had an idol worship, or fame worship, and you see it in the people who are famous because they’re famous. And they get more famous because they were famous.
Tankian: Now it’s international culture. I don’t think there’s one country in the world where this is not a big thing.
Boyd: The thing is understanding in our culture, actually there’s more a shadow aspect to it than there is an advantage. There are small advantages here and there, and you can use them for the betterment of the bigger picture situation, you can use your voice or that platform to create some form of meaningful change or propel your art further or push somebody else’s art up/ But there is a massive price tag. I have friends who are famous in movies and they can’t sit here in a cafe, they can’t just go for a walk down the beach. That, to me, seems horrible. We’ve been lucky enough to come from an era in rock and roll where it brings with it a modicum of “fame,” but not to the kind if we were in Led Zeppelin or the Stones. That’s a different thing. We came from a time where it’s like, “Oh my god, Serj, I love you guys. High five, have a good day.”
