Tonight I went to see System of a Down at the DCU Center in Massachusetts. This was my first real concert and I didn't know what to expect. I ended up purchasing ticket numbers 1 and 2 at the floor section during pre-order...Tickets don't get any better! (Unless they are VIP) I planned o­n leaving at 4:30pm for the show (7:00pm), but my friend got to my house 40 mins late and we ended up arriving more around 6:00pm. The line was huge and I was worried that we we're going to be in the very back of the floor. So we waited for a half an hour until they let us in.

To our surprise the floor was almost empty. We we're maybe two or three people behind the very center-front. I was VERY exctied. Not knowing what to expect from a concert I started talking to the people around me. Just about all of them were nice as could be. They said there was nothing to worry about. That made me feel a lot better.

Bad Acid Trip came o­n soon enough and everyone just stood perfectly still and clapped after each song.
The Mars Volta came o­n after them and the same thing happened. (Well those of us who we're still awake after their 40 mins of ambient music clapped.) I was confused...where are the crazy mosh pits I thought?
Anyway now it was System of a Down's turn to come and dazzel us! I couldn't wait! They pulled down this HUGE curtian that had the Mezmerize logo o­n it and covered the entire stage. So we stood and waited without knowing what was going o­n for 30 mins.

In the meantime, we ended up pushing ourselves up to the railing and an older man and his short friend pushed their way through to the front as well and started smoking some joints. They we're blowing the smoke right near us, I was about to vomit. This pot smoking man decides he is bored out of his mind and doesn't want to wait for SOAD anymore so he starts a pushing people around, trying to start a mosh pit..when all of a sudden *SMACK* A security guard punches him RIGHT IN THE FACE and grabs his shirt and yells "Hey mother f***er! Try that again you stupid f***! I'll kick your f***ing a** out of here!"...PWND.

20 mins has passed and SOAD still hasn't done anything. People start chanting "SYSTEM! SYSTEM! SYSTEM!" and more and more people start lighting up joints. The entire building was filled with the scent of Marijuana.
People went from standing next to each other to about standing INSIDE OF EACHOTHER. I was so close to o­ne guy I felt like I was somehow legally having sex with him. Then som--WOAH! THE LIGHTS ARE GOING DOWN!

All of a sudden through the massive Mezmerize curtian, a silhouette was seen. It was Daron. The girl behind me screamed bloody murder into my ear and grabbed me so tight I thought I was going to die.
"DARON! DARON! I LOVE YOU! WOOOOOOOOO!" Daron started to play "Soldier Side" PERFECT. Then it ended and the massive curtian fell to the floor and there they all were! SYSTEM OF A DOWN!
Serj, Daron, John, and Shavo all standing no more than a meter or two away. Without a second to lose, they bust out into "BYOB" and the lights turn o­n and almost blind us all. Woah, whats this?! The crowd went CRAZY! This didn't happen with the other bands. Oh my...Woah. I'm over here, I'm back here, I'm falling o­n top of some girl I never met, I'm being tossed like a red headed step-child here! This is awesome! My first concert, my first floor tickets, my first mosh. People were CRAZY. Everyone was singing along to BYOB and at the same time jumping all around.
The entire crowd became o­ne person, and we all swayed together. Myself...I was still in shock. I couldn't believe that I was right infront of Serj Tankian. Was I dreaming? *KICK* "Son of a-" Nope!

"BYOB" ends and "Revenga "starts up, the crowd is still going full speed ahead and thrasing away at each other. The moshing reminded me of 10,000 people all trying to get the same last piece of bread. Well I got kicked in the face about three more times and elbowed a few times too. Meanwhile there are two girls, o­ne o­n each side of me throwing up the horns right in my face.
This concert rocks! *crap* Oh s*** I just fell down, but oddly enough 3 or 4 hands come to help pick me back up. Wow. That was really awesome. People stopped killing each other for just a few seconds to help poor ol' me get off my a**. This is turning out to be an amazing first concert, and o­nly two songs have gone by.

It was basically the same drill for the next few songs. Know, Needles, Deer Dance, and Suggestions, and Psycho went by (They were all awesome might I add).
Somehow the crowd still had the same energy as it did from the start. Here I am o­nly 8 songs in already gasping for air and trying not to get shoved around too much. "Chop Suey!" starts to play and the crowd goes 100% ape s*** and suddenl--*KICK* Oh for craps sake....not again. Next up is "Kill Rock N Roll" and amazingly everyone at the concert already knows the words! Piracy? Warez? Pfft, nahhh. They played it really good, and after the song Daron explained to us that it was a track of their next album. He said "This song is off of a new album coming out in November..It's kind of like Mezmerize...except we put different songs o­n it."
Serj started to laugh at that as they broke into "Sad Statue" which just made me so hyper and happy it being o­ne of my favorite songs. During the chorus a few lighters went up in the air and the mosh pit turned into a lean-on-me dance.

The lights go out and a spotlight appears o­n Daron playing his guitar nice and slow. He starts to sing "Violent Pornography" in a nice slow tone and than the band breaks out into the REALLY fast and loud version of it. It was awesome. At the end of the song instead of "Turn off your T.V." he said something like "Everyone f*** me!" at which point Serj cracked up.
After that they broke into "Mr.Jack". About half way through they played "Sartarabad" and after that they finished off Mr.Jack. At this point I was having a lot of fun, but at the same time I was exausted, and I really needed just a few seconds to catch my breath. I said in my head "Please play Lost in Hollywood! Please don't play anything too heavy!"...and with that "Cigaro" starts....F*** me. Another slow intro by Daron had me cracking up. "My c*** is not bigger than yours..." he said as he slowly strummed o­n his guitar. The audience cheers him o­n and laughs, than as soon as he finished they bust into a crazy fast version of Cigaro, which lead right into "This Cocaine Makes Me Feel like Im O­n This song".
At this point I'm dehydrated and gasping for breath, but I don't want it to stop because it's so much fun! Then RIGHT as "Bounce" starts these two morons next to me decide to light some joints and I just start getting dizzy and sick feeling like I'm going to vomit. So I say "excuse me" about 100 times and find my way out of the floor area. Which was very hard becasue every mofo in the place was jumping up and down. I finally got out and caught my breath. It felt good to have some semi-fresh air.

I'm still kind of standing o­n the very edge of the pit when "ATWA" started, but I managed to find my way back into the mayhem before "Forest" started.
Forest is my all time favorite SOAD song. I was so excited, and they played it so well. That just made the night right there. They could have said "F** this" and walked off stage and I would have been happy still. Right after Forest, "Lost in Hollywood" starts. Looking around I see just about everyone holding up either a lighter or a cellphone. It was amazing. I had my eyes shut during most of this song. As did many other people near me. The moshing stopped for this song, and we all just stood there. Waving our hands in the air like b****es and relaxing to the song... Daron sang the song VERY well except he accidently slipped and said "I'll wait here, wait crazy" instead of 'you're crazy'...

That relaxing didn't last for long when SOAD busted out their latest Single "Quesion!" o­n our sorry a**es! Serj sat there with his acoustic guitar, and everyone cheered and jumped during the entire song. After Question!, "War?" was played and it was the biggest surprise of the night. The better half of the song was slowed down to a really mellowed out tune. It was nothing like the loud-thrashy war I knew. It was very nice. It was like they remade War? for Mezmerize or something.

The next four songs were a real big treat. Prison Song, Aerials, Toxicity, and Science all had the crowd going off the walls. These are all great tracks off of Toxicity as you all know and they were all played amazingly. (Except Serj said the wrong date in Prison Song. He said something else instead of 1985. /fanboy +1).
After those songs "Suite-Pee" came o­n, and before they played Daron came o­n and said "This is the first song...off of our very first album!" The audience went pretty crazy but not as crazy as they did for "Sugar".
Before they played Sugar Serj and Daron thanked everyone for coming. Serj thanked all of us, the DCU Center, and o­ne random bald security guard. It was weird. Serj put his hand out to high five the guard but I don't think he was paying attention. Remember when I said the crowd went 100% apes*** for Chop Suey? Well they went like 500% ape s*** for Sugar. I've never felt so much energy in a room at o­nce. It was amazing. Shavo jumped o­n top of o­ne of the speakers and he crouched down and played the song like that. There were two kids with an Armenian Flag, and when Shavo saw that he waved at them and tossed up the horns.

Sugar ended and Serj and Daron left the stage. John tossed about 6 drum sticks into the audience and Shavo threw a bottle of water at some people. That was it. I was expceting a 'Thank you! Goodnight!" or something, but then I remembered they already did that before Sugar. So I was happy. I walked away sweating and smelling of ganga. I was so sweaty it HONESTLY looked like I had just got out of a pool. o­n the way home I was so thirsty I stopped at a 7-11 to pick up a gallon of water...and a umm..a...Nacho Slim Jim as well.

Now I'm home and I'm sitting here typing up this review...and now that it's all over and I look back at tonights events. I can honestly say that was the best night of my life.


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