Shavo Odadjian, one of the founding members of the Grammy-winning metal group System of a Down, sat down with Newsweek to discuss his busy schedule with his new band, Seven Hours After Violet, his current tour with System of a Down, his entrepreneurial ventures with 22Red, and his passion for sneakers.
System of a Down, comprised of members Serj Tankian, Daron Malakian, John Dolmayan, and Shavo Odadjian, achieved massive success with their second album, Toxicity, released in 2001. The album’s breakout hit, “Chop Suey!” earned a Grammy nomination and led to Toxicity reaching multi-platinum certification. Odadjian originally signed on to be the manager before joining the band permanently as the bassist in 1995.
The 51-year-old Armenian-American has always been a Renaissance man, dabbling in the arts across various media. He’s an avid painter, directed videos for System of a Down, and teamed up with RZA to score Babylon A.D. alongside Hans Zimmer. Now, Odadjian is following new passions with 22Red, a lifestyle and cannabis brand and stepping to the forefront with Seven Hours After Violet.
Shavo, thank you so much for taking the time to do this with me. First, it was just the 24th anniversary of “Chop Suey!”. Can you take a second to reflect on that and the journey so far?
When Daron [Malakian] brought that song, no one knew what it was going to become. It’s just a phenomenon, and I’m grateful and blessed for it. I remember it like it was yesterday, filming that video. I even remember when we were deciding on having that be the first single before the album came out. These are all vivid memories because that was such a monumental moment for our band when we were writing and recording Toxicity. It’s just one of those things in my life that I think I’m going to remember forever. I’m just very grateful that the song has lived this long and still remains one of those songs that people like and love and kind of relate to. It’s been like a childhood thing for a lot of people who are older now, and they’re still into it, and their kids get into it. So, it’s kind of like a generational thing, like a classic song. It became one of those. There’s nothing more to say than that I’m grateful for that.
What’s it like to have one of those criterion songs that everybody knows, and it’s perfect for everybody?
It’s a little hard to believe still because we’re very grounded people. I still pick up my kids from school. Take them to school. I go to all the field trips with them. I do things that everybody does, and everyone looks at me a little weird. I’m like, “Why are they looking at me weird? Oh, s***, that’s right. I play in a big rock band.” It’s one of those things we have never let it get to any of our heads. Like I said, we’re blessed, bro, and very grateful for it, yeah, happy that it turned out that way.
Business of Fashion
Could you talk a little bit about 22Red, how that came about, and what all it entails?
22Red was originally supposed to be a lifestyle brand, period. One of my oldest dearest friends, Mike, we grew up together, and his business is manufacturing, printing, and making apparel, in-house in Hollywood. So, we’re like, “Man, we dress a certain way, we’re all into streetwear, and I collect shoes. I’ve been a shoe guy forever. Why don’t we make our own brand?” We have pretty cool taste. He’s always in his Rhude and Off-Whites and all that. We have some good taste, and we can do something.
As we started 22Red, we brought a third partner into the picture, and he’s a famous grower of cannabis from LA, like one of the oldest ones who grew some historical strains back in the day, that LA is known for. I’ve been an avid smoker of cannabis throughout my 20s, 30s, 40s, but I never really wanted to get into the business of it. Everything I’ve done has been solid. I didn’t want to taint that in any ways. That’s why I stayed away when California became legal. Everyone’s like, “Bro, you should get into that.” I’m like, “What? I’m into it.” I’m a connoisseur.
I enjoy the herb, I enjoy the smell, I enjoy the taste, I enjoy the look. It’s more of an experience to me, not just getting high. I’m older now, I enjoy the nuances of it. So, because of that, everyone thought I should get into the business. This third partner came in, Surreal Yields. That’s what they call him, because he yields a lot when he grows a plant. He’s very technical with his growing and very clean. When I saw his grow, I said, “All right, this is something I can represent, as long as this is the quality, and this is where we’re this is the standard, then I can rep that. And it could be a lifestyle- slash-cannabis brand.”
So that’s how we started in 2018, 22 is the number that has always resonated with me. I was born April 22. I was married May 22. My boys are two years and 22 days apart. I was 22 when System got signed. I was 44 when I thought of 22, two is always everywhere in my life, right? And then red came from my unknowing synesthesia. I didn’t know there was something called synesthesia. And I always thought everybody was like me. I always see colors when it comes to numbers, letters, and music. I didn’t think I was different. But when we were trying to name the brand and come up with some names, and nothing was sticking.
And everyone’s like, “Bro, you wear 22 on stage all the time. Maybe 22 would be great and then I was like “Red. I always see red when I think of twos, don’t you?” And then everyone’s like, “No, I don’t see any color.” 22Red just kind of flew out. It just kind of happened. And right away, my creative juices started flowing with that. It wasn’t like a cheesy name. We actually hired a branding company to do the work for us. And it did not work out. It was just a waste of money. They were thinking of crazy names like “urban legends.” They were just corny things. And then I said, “Bring me into the next meeting. Let me brainstorm with you guys. Don’t just have presentations for me.” The second they took me into the meeting, the first thing was 22Red, it came out right away. It was like 10 minutes into the meeting, like “Done, adjourned.” That’s when it was born.
A lot of cool things have been done since then. We’ve been in many states. We’re active in Cali. We’re active in Nevada. We’re active in Arizona. We’re about to drop in Maine and Massachusetts, and hopefully New York and New Jersey pretty soon. We’re making our way East Coast.
I’m really excited about the whole apparel and the lifestyle aspect of it now, because we’ve been revamping that for the last six years, we focused on cannabis and kind of forgot about the lifestyle side of it, but that’s the side that I wanted to do in the first place. And so we’re back at it, and we have some really cool things coming up. A couple of things I can’t mention because we’re in the midst of actually signing the deal. But once the deal is signed, we have some really cool things happening with 22Red that’s on that lifestyle tip that I’ve always wanted to do, so it’s finally coming to fruition. I just don’t want to jinx it by talking about it before it’s actually done.
Sounds and Colors
Tell me a little bit about your fashion inspirations and what you’re looking toward when you’re building that brand?
I’ve never liked branded stuff, like huge logos and big brands. If you’re gonna do a logo, it better be cool, and it better be a huge one. Like, I like the wraparounds. I know Palace used to have these big ass wraparounds on the back. I love that s***. But I like it to be, let’s say black on matte black. When I started the brand, it was minimalistic. When I created the hats, no branding, a little 22 right here. I love fitted and baggy, because they both work in today’s world. I think you can make them work both ways. When I dress, I’ll be like, in camos and a black T-shirt, but I’ll have something cool, like, “He’s got the cool little nuances going on,” but it’s not exploding. I don’t want to seem like I walked out of a high-end brand, like Louis Vuitton.
I’m glad you brought that up, because I actually wanted to know your opinion on the latest fashion trends. I know you’re a big sneaker guy. I’ve seen you in that Travis Scott one low a lot lately.
It’s just weird, because I have like, 300, maybe more, pairs of shoes, from A to Z. I have everything. I mean, I have ancient bomb like, old dunks, SBS. I have all the Off-White. I have a lot going on, but those Olives just are my shoes right now. It’s like I’ve had two, three pairs already, because I’m wearing them out. I’m wearing them at the gym, I’m wearing them on stage. I dress in those colors. I’m all about white, olive, and black right now, and that’s the color of the shoes. I’m just stuck to it. I wear a lot of camo or olive pants, that’s my thing. So it’s just been working man, and then when I wear all black on stage, I didn’t want my shoes to pop too much on stage, but that’s like, the low-key, subtle bomb color. I’m all about those shoes, and I can’t believe you noticed it. I was like, “I hope people aren’t noticing that I’m wearing the same shoes everywhere,” because I really love it. I guess that’s the story with a lot of sneakerheads, they have hundreds of sneakers, but they’re their daily, is their daily. That’s what’s with me.
I worked in sneakers for several years, so I have quite a collection myself, but my go-to pair is a pair of ASICs.
I need to get into those. I’ve been seeing a lot of people wearing them, and heard how comfortable they are. I just haven’t moved to that level yet of the New Balances, or the Asics. I haven’t gone there. The only New Balance I wear, though, are the Brooklyn Projects ones. Have you seen those? Those are dope. They have kind of this old Jordan-ish vibe. They’re really cool. They’re very comfortable.
Pants over the tongue or tuck the pants into the tongue?
It really matters which sneakers, though. Sometimes, I’ll leave the puffy tongue of an SB Dunk out. Or if I wear some Jordan Fours, I just got the Undefeated ones, those I wear the tongue out because they’re just dope like that. It also matters what type of pants you got. If it’s really baggy and wide leg, you gotta go over. If it has any bit of tightness, then you gotta go under or within.
Perfect answer. You were just at Comic Con. And you mentioned in a Q&A once your big thing is following new passions. Have you thought any about getting into comics?
My drummer, John Dolmayan, is my go-to when it comes to comics. He owns Torpedo Comics, which is humongous. It was his thing before System. It wasn’t called Torpedo. But he’s been doing comics since I think he was, like, 15 years old. I own some really cool comics, and that’s because of John. He’s hooked me up whenever there’s a good one out there. I enjoyed them when I was a kid myself. I got into it for a little period of time, where all my allowance money would go to comics. It was like ‘80s era. It was the era where X-Men were in the 160s, I guess, like that. Then, Alpha Flight was big at the time. It was that Canadian comic. I was all about them for a while. The New Mutants, I have the Silver Surfers, the early ones. I got some grails because of John, so I am into comics.
Also my new band, Seven Hours After Violet, we’re writing a comic series about Seven Hours After Violet, not the band, though, the name kind of a seven part saga where each issue Violet is portrayed a different way, where it’s not because Seven Hours After Violet, one it’s an acronym for Shav, but it also it means a lot to me, and violet means a few things and but I leave it to interpretation, because I’ve always loved I think art is always open to interpretation. It’s kind of an artsy name as well. It’s mysterious. It’s got a vibe.
So I never explained. Everyone asked me, “Who the hell is Violet? What’s violet?” And I never explained who or what. It could be a drug, seven hours after doing that drug, some weird stuff. I mean, it could be a planetary occurrence. It could be anything. There’s a bunch of stories I’ve written about what or who Violet is, and it’s kind of like a Twilight Zone Black Mirror tip, where somehow they all kind of connect at some point. It’s gonna be fun, and we’re gonna drop it with comics first, and then hopefully it could become something later, if the stories are good enough. So yeah, I have thought about it, and I am in the middle of it.
Music and Mentorship
That is so ironic, because I was literally just about to ask about Seven Hours After Violet and how that came about. So it’s wonderful how that all interconnected.
Seven Hours started off as just a passion project between me and Morgoth Beatz, who’s the producer that I met up with. What actually met him at a 22Red party.
So twos are the big deal for me, right? Well, February 22, 2022, we had a 22Red party, because that was the day of twos. So I met Morgoth on the day of twos, and we exchanged numbers. I wasn’t making music. I hadn’t made music for a while. But I really wanted to do metal again, and rock and heavy, that’s where my heart is at. Morgoth and I started talking about making music, and I kind of manifested him, bro. And I just needed, I mean, I’m full of riffs. I’m like a riff writer, I’m not a singer-songwriter. So I just write parts, and I know how to connect parts to write all the instrumentals of music. That’s why I like EDM a lot. I love hip-hop beats.
I used to make all the beats I’ve worked with RZA for Wu-Tang and all those guys. The dude turned into one of my best friends just by doing that together for so many years. He taught me a lot as well. We talked about and I just needed someone. I just didn’t want to run the board anymore. I didn’t want to do the music, run the board, engineer it, mix it, master. I just wanted to, kind of like, have someone that can create the beats, and I can just jam out on riffs and create all this, and then put it together. We were supposed to just write a track or two. We exchanged numbers. We got together a couple of weeks after, and just worked, and we wrote a couple badass jams.
After like three weeks, he said, “Why don’t we write a solo Shavo record?” I’m like, “Solo Shavo? I don’t even sing.” Most solo records have someone that could sing, and he’s like, “No, man, you don’t need to sing. You could be the DJ Khaled of metal and create all the music and then have all these vocalists flying in.” I was like, “OK, we could get back so many friends in the music industry.” But then, as the music became so good, when I played it for System’s manager, he was like, “bro, this is really good s***.” And he said, “You should take this on tour and stuff. But if you have only features on there, you can’t tour with features,” and I really love playing live.
I put the band together with Morgoth. He brought in all these people, and I hand-picked who fits the mold. We recorded vocals, created the record, got a deal, a 50/50 deal. We dropped the record, and we did a couple of shows. We went to Brazil, and just System of a Down’s energy kind of came back together again, and everyone landed on the same page again in a very positive way, not forced, not preconceived, like it was not a planned thing. I think our lives just ended up again together, where it was just like, man, we miss each other, and we realized we love each other.
There’s no animosity anymore. It’s like all this stuff that we read about each other saying in interviews and stuff was just hearsay and just clickbait. And really, we’re four guys that made good music together, and we loved hanging out and love being together. We’re family, and if you really think about it, within the last 30 years, we’ve known each other more than anyone has. We’ve lived moments together, experiences together that no one can. It just doesn’t happen. So why take that for granted? We met on the same page again, and now System started touring Seven Hours is touring. I’m doing both bands. I’m happy, bro. Finally, all this time of me bitching about, like my band not working, and this and that, all of a sudden, both are working, and again, knock on that wood. I don’t mean to be so superstitious, but hey, can’t hurt to knock on that wood.
That’s how Seven Hours was born. I’m in that place now where Sunday I leave on tour with System. We’re doing six stadiums in six stadium shows on the East Coast. We’re doing Jersey Met Life two nights. We’re doing Soldier Field two nights Chicago, and we’re doing Toronto two nights. And right after I had that, I come home for a week rehearsals with Seven Hours, and then I head out on tour. Dude, I couldn’t have written that better. So again, blessed.
So that’s what we got, bro. I’m busy as hell, but I love it, because I’m one of those guys, bro, I don’t like sitting around and saying, “Oh, I’m done.” No, bro, I’ll never be done, ever. I’m always going. It’s always good to have something new to work for, set a goal, and go accomplish. And I teach my kids that sitting gets you nowhere.
Touching back a little bit earlier, you were talking about your collaboration work with RZA. Tell me a little bit about how that friendship shaped your music since
Oh, dude, genius, master. He’s a buddy of mine, but I still look up to him like that, and I’ll never not say that. I say that about him, bro, because there’s just something he’s, he’s the man, right?
It started off as me being a fan. I’m a Wu-Tang head from day one. And so in ‘99 we got the opportunity to be on this compilation record for Loud Records. ‘Loud Rocks’ was the compilation. They asked us to pick a few songs to cover. I think there was Mobb Deep on there, then there was a few Wu-Tang songs. Then I saw someone else took Shook Ones, and that’s what I wanted to do. I thought we could have done a badass version of that, but anyway, Shame was on there. And I said, “This would be ballsy and really cool,” and so we covered it with Rick Rubin, he recorded it for us. I had become friends with Method Man and Redman, all because we were on tour together with Limp Bizkit in ‘99, and we were just like, “Oh, they’re wearing System merch on stage, Red and Meth. It was just bomb. He really did me some favors. That’s my ace. Method Man was my first guy that I was like, “Wow, man, my hero became my friend.” I was at a Method Man Show in LA after that tour. As I was walking on stage with Meth, it was at the House of Blues in LA that doesn’t exist anymore. I looked to the left, and there’s the RZA bro, and I was like, “Whoa, all right.” When we did Shame, I was a little hesitant in dropping it. I’m going to be completely honest, because I was like, the older Gods might get offended. I don’t want to offend nobody, because nobody knows what I’m thinking, right? You’re seeing me. I don’t want to come off as anything negative, right?
I needed some back from the band, and just to set the record straight because you need that. I saw RZA, and I pulled up on him, and I said, “Hey, my name is Shavo, I played for a band called System of a Down.” He goes, “Dope. I love your band.” I go, “Yeah, bro. I’m like, I’m a huge fan of yours, bro.” And then I just spilled my guts, bro. If I meet a hero, I’m gonna tell him, that’s my hero. I’m not gonna hold back. I’m not that cool guy. You know what he said? He goes, “I heard Shame. You guys got some set of balls, and I love it.” That’s what he said, bro. And he’s like, “What do you want?” I said, “I would love for you to do a track on there”. He goes, “Give me your number.” And I gave him my number, and I was in.
I didn’t expect to hear back from three weeks later. He hits me up, he’s like, “We’re in LA, we’re recording. I want you to come in. Let’s get that track going on.” So, I went into Track Records, and I met the entire Wu-Tang bro. And I’m like a kid in the candy store because they’re all my heroes, and I know everyone’s verses from every freaking track, because I study their s***, right? And because they’re such smart, smart people. They had Shame going on in one room, and everyone was interested in it. Everyone’s like, “Dude, that’s wild,” because we turn that song into a chaotic metal System of a Down song. When we cover a song, we don’t cover it identical to the way the original band did it. That’s not a fun way to do it. He said, “What do you want me to do on the track?” And I was like, “Man, I’m about to produce Bobby, I’m about to produce the RZA.” I said, “Why don’t you just mute the second verse?” Because we had it all done already. I said, mute the second verse, and you go on there and freestyle, do something new? Then he goes, “Give me 20 minutes.” In 20 minutes, he had that crazy verse. He said that s*** in 20 minutes. And I was like that emoji with the head exploding. That was me, bro, literally me. It was just this bond happened at that moment, and that day.
Then he invited me back the next day, and when I came back the next day, he got Ghostface on there, U-God on there, like a bunch of the other guys are on the track. So it became like System of Down featuring Wu-Tang Clan. I mean, come on, bro. That’s how we became friends. And then we realized we live literally a mile from each other, and we were both single at the time, so it became like this, “come over my house thing,” and I went to his lab, and he came to mine, and I just bought a Pro Tools rig, but I didn’t know how to work it. And he came in, he’s like, “oh, man, you got all the super tools.” I go, “Yeah, but I don’t know how to even turn them on.” He’s like, “I’ll teach you.” So, he became my teacher, but he said, “Under one condition, you teach me how to play guitar.” Every other day, I either was at his house or he was in my house, we were jamming. I would teach him chords and stuff. And he would show me how to run the 909 and the MPC. And then Wu went on tour, System went on tour. We came back. I had my 909 and I had like 50 beats in there, and he was jamming on the guitar with riffs. He took a guitar with him on tour. I took my drum machine with me.
Long story short, we decided to create Achozen which is the band that we did together. And he’s like, “I want you to create all the beats, and I just want to be the lyricist.” I’m like, “f*** yeah, bro, that’s crazy. Like, how am I creating the beats for this genius who creates all the beats for everybody?” And it just happened, bro, and that we have the record, we just never dropped it. It was a passion thing, and I made a really good friend. His kid was my ring boy when I got married, that’s how close we got. Our wives are friends now.