B.Y.O.B. (song)

"B.Y.O.B."
Song

"B.Y.O.B." ("Bring Your Own Bombs") is the first single released from American heavy metal band System of a Down's fourth album Mezmerize. Like their earlier song "Boom!", it was written in protest against the Iraq War. B.Y.O.B. means "Bring Your Own Bombs", as opposed to the common interpretation "Bring Your Own Bottle", referring to the Iraq War as a party for the United States. It is also a playable track in the music video game Guitar Hero: World Tour, and a downloadable track in the Rock Band series.

Awards

• System of a Down won the "Best Hard Rock Performance" category in the 2006 Grammy Awards.
• It was nominated for the Kerrang! Award for Best Single.
• The track was the band's only Top 40 single of their career, peaking at #27 on the Billboard Hot 100.
• It was voted #76 in Total Guitar's 100 Greatest Riffs ever.
• It was voted #63 in Digital Dream Door 100 Greatest Metal Guitar Riffs.
• It made onto numerous "Top 40" play lists around the globe, including Germany, New Zealand, Australia and the United States, and occasionally made it to #1 on other music shows.
• It made #134 on the Y2KROQ Top 200 Songs of the Century

Music video

The video for "B.Y.O.B." was directed by Jake Nava.

The music video shows an army of drone soldiers marching through the streets, wearing masks that show words such as "DIE", "TRUTH", "OBEY", "BUY" and "GOD" like a television screen, with the members of System of a Down playing in the middle of the venue. During the chorus, the band is shown playing inside a night club. Midway through the video, Daron is shown screaming the words "Blast off! It's party time! And we don't live in a fascist nation! Blast off! It's party time! And where the fuck are you?!", when the soldiers attack the night club and force everyone to put on the drone masks, except they depict various television shows and cartoons. At the end of the video, the members of System of a Down are wearing the drone masks, which seem to be playing static.

The music video was censored for air-play reasons.

The song itself was featured in the fourth installlment of the Guitar Hero series in 2008,Guitar Hero World Tour. It is regarded as one of the most difficult songs to be performed in vocals, predominantly due to the recurrent screams of Daron Malakian, as well as in both drum and guitar.

Live performance

Live, Daron Malakian switches to a reggae-style offbeat riff when singing during the chorus.

The song was performed on May 7, 2005 on Saturday Night Live, 10 days before the release of the album Mezmerize. During this performance, towards the end of the song (during the downward guitar slide, following the line "Why do they always send the poor?"), guitarist Daron Malakian screamed, "Fuck yeah!". This was missed by television censors, and it became a controversial matter for a few days thereafter. However, the rest of the song was able to be censored on time without any trouble.

The band also performed the song at the 2005 MTV Europe Music Awards, after winning the award for Best Alternative Act. The performance was criticized for the sloppiness and apparent lack of interest of the band members. In addition, Daron Malakian changed the lyrics during the breakdown to "Blast off! It's party time! And this ain't no bullshit political punk rock!" instead of singing "Blast off! It's party time! And we don't live in a fascist nation" in a direct reference to MTV, which had categorized the group as "political punk rock" on an earlier review.

Track listing

CD

No.	Title	Lyrics	Music	Length
1.	"B.Y.O.B." (Explicit Album Version)	S. Tankian, D. Malakian	D. Malakian	4:15
2.	"Forest" (Explicit Live Version)	S. Tankian, D. Malakian	D. Malakian	5:12
3.	"Prison Song" (Explicit Live Version)	S. Tankian, D. Malakian	D. Malakian	3:32
4.	"Sugar" (Explicit Live Version)	S. Tankian	S. Odadjian, D. Malakian	4:00

• The live tracks were recorded at the Big Day Out 2005 festival.

Digital download [1st version]

No.	Title	Lyrics	Music	Length
1.	"B.Y.O.B."	S. Tankian, D. Malakian	D. Malakian	4:15

Digital download [2nd version]

No.	Title	Lyrics	Music	Length
1.	"B.Y.O.B."	S. Tankian, D. Malakian	D. Malakian	4:15
2.	"Cigaro"	S. Tankian, D. Malakian	D. Malakian	2:11

Trivia

• "B.Y.O.B." was written by Daron Malakian for his own band, Scars on Broadway in 2003, and it featured Casey Chaos on vocals. Demo version still can be heard on Ghetto Blaster Rehearsals.

External links

• Listen to B.Y.O.B. at the band's official website