Serj Tankian, the multi-million selling Grammy Award-winning musician, best known for his work with System of a Down, came to Oxford last Wednesday 22nd April to talk to an issue very close to his heart: genocide. Screamers is a film that follows the band, all of whom are descendents of survivors of the Armenian genocide, as they tour and it points out the horrors of modern genocide that began in Armenia in 1915 and continue to the present day.

The screening of the film, put on by a partnership of the University’s Development Office and the Aegis society, gave an opportunity for students to ask Serj and other panellists Raffy Manoukian – London-based philanthropist and donor to the University who helped fund the film – and Professor Theo van Lint – Oxford’s professor of Armenian Studies and Fellow of Pembroke College – their questions in a panel discussion. We caught up with Serj before the event:

Have you had much time to see Oxford?
I’ve been to Oxford before! We actually played about an hour away in Reading over the summer and stayed in Oxford overnight. It was beautiful.

Not spent much time here today then just been travelling?
No we’ve just got here and have been travelling all day. Haven’t had any time to eat- [eats]

Do you know particularly or have any relationship with the other two men that are on the panel with you at the talk: Raffy Manoukian [London-based philanthropist] and Professor Theo van Lint [Calouste Gulbenkian Professor of Armenian Studies and Fellow of Pembroke College]?

I Know Raffy really well- I met him because he worked with the BBC on the production behind Screamers. I met him through that and became since then and he’s been very very active in promoting awareness about genocide. In terms of pushing the film as well getting distribution for it and screenings and working with different non-profit organisations he’s done a great job. He’s done a lot to be respected.

How did you get involved with making the film?

I was approached by the film maker Carla Garapedian a number of years ago and she was keen on getting System of a Down involved in making a film about genocide. So I met with her and I was really interested in presenting the similarities of different genocide and holocaust because I see a connection between them all. She was down for that idea which was cool and I thought that the uniqueness of the experience of the Armenian genocide in terms of it being denied by the perpetrators still after 94 years.

Urm, so, we kind of had a meeting of minds and I said OK let me go back to the other guys from SOAD and see if they are willing to participate and they were so we, you know, as a band we didn’t do anything differently than we did on a regular basis: our concerts, our activism, our meetings with congressional delegates. Everything that we do we did anyway we would do anyway with or without the film. We allowed her access so that she could film it and tied that into her story. So the film is really about genocide but it involves the band.

A lot of your song writing is affected by your politicization- how did this politicizing come about?

The hypocrisy of the denial of genocide in a well known democracy was the first spark for my politicization as a young adult and made me wonder how many truths there are out there that are being denied for economical or geo-political interests. Since then I’ve found a lot of others truths or injustices I might say that need shedding of light. So that was the first trigger for me growing up.

Was your primary motivation for making this film to raise awareness of the genocide issues surrounding it?

When I first decided to be involved with the film, one of the primary reasons was to raise awareness of the Armenian genocide another was to raise awareness of the human disease of this genocide in general. I think we haven’t realised the importance of prioritizing the reaction to genocide intervention to genocide as a global society and we still allow different interests to supersede intervention regarding genocide- Sudan being a prime example of our times today and how we- when I say ‘we’ I am primarily referring to the western nations and governments- have not really interfered in a major way.

Like you see Sudan collaborating a number of years back with the CIA and US intelligence on Al Qaeda authorities within the country because obviously Bin Laden had spent a quite a bit of time there and it’s purported that Bin Laden was there after it was known that genocide was going on- this was after George Bush Jnr. called the atrocities genocide within Sudan. So you start to think and think OK I guess for America that meant that fighting terror was more important than helping victims of genocide and that is a prime example of how our priorities are misplaced.

Are any of your songs particularly relevant to the issue of genocide?

System of a Down has two songs that touch upon genocide: one is from the first album we ever made and one is from the last album that we ever made. The songs are ‘P.L.U.C.K’ and the other ‘The Holy Mountains’.

Do you think that you could have been part of such a film if you didn’t have your status as a musician?

I would have wanted to have been part of such a film if I weren’t a musician- I’m not sure that anyone would be interested in asking me though!

So, do you consider it important for musicians such as yourself and Tom Morello to speak out on political issues? Do you think that it is an important voice?

I think every artist has his or her own vision- I think that it is important for every artist to follow that vision. I don‘t think every artist should be political. I think that … I’ve always said that a really great love song is more important than any political song ever written: it can change the world in much more interesting ways than any political song. However, that said, I think that music is a great narration of our times. It’s a great truthsayer of our times.

You listen to Bob Dylan’s music of the sixties and on and you see that it’s a great way of presenting some truths and a great way of fighting injustice and power through the arts. So, I think it’s definitely been part of my vision in life to always, you know, kind of bring certain topics to the forefront- you know, whether it’s through music or through conversation. Every artist has their own vision and I respect that.

Which love songs and political songs do you think are the best ones for conveying their message?

One of my favourite – I don’t know whether you can call it a love song – but one of my favourite songs is ‘Yesterday’ by Paul McCartney as one of those songs that is changing. It is a change oriented type of song. It makes you think back in time but it also paraphrases life in such a beautiful way.
But there are a lot of beautiful love songs. I think more sixties- because that’s when a lot of great lovin’ was going on [laughs]. The Summer of Love and a free and open society. But there’s a lot of good stuff being written today or quite recently.

Are there any up-and-coming bands or those of the past that are particularly good at conveying their political message?

There’s a lot more bands touching upon political subjects today than there were, I would say, six or seven years ago. All I remember is that right after 9/11, certain parties, myself inclusive, Tom Morello [Rage Against the Machine] inclusive were questioning some of the actions that were taken and some of the ‘gung-ho’-ness of the flag-waving involved. I appreciate authenticity and emotion in any type of situation but there was a lot of fear-induced flag-waving going on if that makes sense.

Also reactions that were prevailing: ‘Let’s cut them down’ that kind of stuff- very illogical type of response which I guess is acceptable for a tragedy. However, I don’t think that most people understand that the sources of those tragedies were injustices themselves from elsewhere- that it stemmed from somewhere and it didn’t just come out of thin air as a tragedy. It came as a reaction to foreign policy of the US, Britain and a lot of nations post WW2 and 1 having to do with the Armenian genocide and other topics. There are a lot of things that if we go back in history and look at how we’ve interacted as nations we can see how things are affected by that today.

Last term, there was a motion put to Oxford University Student Union amounting to a condemnation of the actions in Gaza. This provoked fierce debate amongst colleges as to whether it was the place of the student union to put forward a strong opinion on political issues- do you think that Student Unions should?

Most activism has started in universities. Historically, you look at the sixties, seventies, eighties, and I think university students are at a prime age and period of cognisant recognition of the world around them to be able to stand up for things and still have the youthful romanticism necessary to not be sceptical enough to actually put in their time and efforts to do so. I think that it is a very promising thing.

I don’t like sceptics of activism; we have plenty of it ourselves in what I do and what Tom Morello does- people saying ‘why should we listen to you you’re musicians and not foreign policy experts. I say I’m a human being beyond my particular job description and I happen to be involved in a number of things that include American foreign policy and I read a lot about that and I have so for the last 25 years so that doesn’t make me an official expert but I’ll sit down with an official expert and I’ll have a good repartee, you know?

Is there anything else that you think is particularly important to say in relation to Oxford students?

I went to university myself – I didn’t go to Oxford [laughs] but I went to Southern California University. It was a time of growth of the mind. I personally don’t think that you learn anything constructive in University. I think what you learn in University is to allow yourself to learn. I think that that’s what you learn. You learn to be open to things and to allow things to enter your mind without critically cutting it down and that openness to learning. You’ll retain some of the knowledge obviously but I think the average is about fifteen percent if at all. I certainly don’t remember anything that I learnt from my business degree in college except maybe a few quotes or something like that from funny professors if anything.

But I think it’s important, though, to have the community where you’re able to communicate with other people about things happening not just domestically but around the world and having like I said the lack of scepticism to be involved in standing up for what you truly believe in.

Trinity Term: a summery haze of afternoons spent languidly out on the lawns, the gentle lapping of the river against the side of an ambling punt. Long days followed by long nights locked troglodytic in one’s room as finals and prelims creep ever-closer.
As the clichés shake off dust for yet another year, I ask readers: who among us would pass up the chance to be a stereotype for the evening? And what could be more quintessentially Oxford than turning up, pitching one’s rug, unclipping one’s woven picnic basket, quaffing its contents, and enjoying first-rate student drama, whilst the sun sets gently over the spires and towers of Oxford? Yes, I am talking about that stalwart of aestival festivities: the Trinity Lawn Show.  
The Merton and Magdalen shows are generally considered to be the biggest and for time immemorial, Oscar Wilde and Shakespeare have been the playwrights of choice for our al fresco thespians. Tradition, you might have noticed, sticks fast in Oxford, and accordingly this year’s programme of lavishly eye-catching costumes and received-pronunciation includes Love’s Labour’s Lost at Merton, and All’s Well That Ends Well, performed against a backdrop of Edwardian splendour in the Magdalen College President’s Garden.
An adaptation of Waugh’s  embodiment of Oxonian life, Brideshead Revisited, is also coming to Oxford. Astoundingly, this will be the first time our dreaming spires have seen a production of it, so dig out your favourite Aloysius lookalike, adorn yourself with a scarf tossed jauntily over one shoulder, and get ready to see the hallowed lawns and gargoyles of blissful Oxford transformed, before your very eyes, into the hallowed lawns and gargoyles of blissful Oxford!
Such is the mythology and protocol surrounding these unique productions that the lawn play is something budding actors and directors aspire to do. But for all the joviality and light heartedness that characterise these shows, serious work and thought underpins each line. It is all too easy to overlook the obvious difference in acoustics between theatre and garden, and losing words in amongst the hedgerows and the chaises longues is a real risk.
So expect actors who have thus far successfully restrained their inner Brian Blessed to erupt magnificently into glorious fountains of camp.
The highlight of each performance is undoubtedly the gala night on the last Saturday of the run. I will warn you all now though, tickets sell out incredibly quickly, primarily because the chance to drink champagne, nibble canapés and don black tie in an exclusive setting at a non-exclusive price is an offer few can refuse.
So keep your eyes open for news, as these romantic and rosy-coloured summer nights spent chuckling at fellow students who strut around in period costume are the cherry atop a sumptuous Oxford cake of which everybody will want a bite.

For those keen to start watching immediately, Noughth week offers a ‘powerful evocation of the British sex trade’ in the form of Edinburgh Fringe sell-out A Thousand Pieces, at the North Wall Arts Centre.  For another light hearted start to Trinity, there’s Manon at the New Theatre, by the darkest of ballet choreographers, Kenneth MacMillan.
First week’s highlights will include an angry King Lear at the OFS. Then there’s His Dark Materials at the Playhouse.  A triumph when it appeared at the National in 2004, we are excited to see how it transfers to Oxford. Bear the Imps in mind too,  still at the Wheatsheaf on Mondays from First week.
For Second week there’s Betrayal by Harold Pinter at the BT: inspired by his affair with Joan Bakewell, it’s considered one of the Nobel Prize winner’s greats. In the late slot, a production of The Little Mermaid, based on the Anderson fairytale, plans to divide the audience with a fishing net! And at the OFS we have Fatboy, the tale, naturally, of Fatboy and his wife Fudgie and their rise to become king and queen of the world… Sunday also sees the Experimental Theatre Club’s annual Playday  – a place for people to put on plays in a ‘safe environment’. Sounds ominous.
Third week will be offering us All’s Well that Ends Well at the Magdalen Garden Show, one of the great delights of a sunny Trinity.  This years stars such as Roseanna Frascona and Hannah McGrath will light up Shakespeare’s blackest of comedies. Then there’s Collaborations at the Playhouse – four contemporary dances, based on John Donne’s ‘no man is an island’. The Oxford Revue also infiltrates the Playhouse on the Monday of this week.
At the Keble O’ Reilly Much Ado About Nothing is being shown in a ‘pretty madcap’ way, going from cafe, to street, to quad.  One insider told the Cherwell that they plan to ‘parade around Keble gardens and juggle whilst improvising Shakespeare with rubber ducks’.  Right.
This week has clearly been deemed crazy week, for Twelfth Night at the OFS will include performers breaking into slow motion and transfixed in dust, made, we’re told, out of light.  And the BT has The Love of the Nightingale with an all female cast playing around with stuff from Greek myth and elsewhere.
Fourth week: Even the directors call The Pitchfork Disney (BT) a warped play. And from the description it sounds it: ‘twenty- eight year old twins locked up in their home eating chocolate and sedatives’. But at the Keble O’Reilly this week we will be considering profound questions in This is India, which looks at cultural collisions as British Sara settles into a family in India.
Fifth week has A Real Doll at the BT. This is the sex doll, Alicia, who becomes the companion of Jeffry until an electric shock brings her to life. He discovers that love cannot be ordered from the internet. Then there’s the great Renaissance play The Changeling at the OFS, showing Beatrice as she succumbs to the assassin De Flores. For all you Disney aficionados, The New Theatre has Beauty and the Beast this week.
Having languished with English for five whole weeks, Sixth week is a chance to change into French by watching Phèdre at the BT.  The Cherwell’s going to tell you all about watching plays in foreign languages soon – so watch this space! This week also has Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus at the Keble O’Reilly – ‘Ugly hell, gape not! Come not, Lucifer!’
 The OFS has Tick Tick Boom, a musical presenting a composer falling into oblivion, while Oriel Arts Week heralds a production of The Spanish Tragedy, a bloody and darkly comic play by Thomas Kyd. In Seventh week the BT offers Caroline Bird’s Uncivil Partnership about a female string quartet playing at an unconventional wedding. But it is the Keble O’Reilly which finally offers us a play by Trinity Term’s patron saint, Oscar Wilde: Lady Windermere’s Fan.
 Last week we burnt books with Doctor Faustus, this week we shall drown them with The Tempest by acclaimed director Asia Osborne.
Krishna  Omkar returns to Merton‘s garden show for Eighth week with Love’s Labour’s Lost, while Tim Hoare and Matt Ryan will certainly offer us something splendid this week with Trojan Women. The final week of term is not likely to slide away quietly amid our exhaustion.

Californian rapper Andrew Nielsen—alias MC Lars—is the architect of post-punk laptop rap. Lars was a visiting student at Corpus Christi between years at Stanford University and has returned to the town many times whilst touring.
His new album, This Gigantic Robot Kills, sees MC Lars maintaining his unique style of ‘nerdcore’ whilst also diversifying from his usual comedic rap.
Although he has moved from recording beats in his bedroom to laying them down in professional studios, his style of commenting on pop culture and life events in a knowing and amusing way has not changed.
Dan Gallacher caught up with him at his gig at Oxfords O2 Academy.

To readers who don’t know MC Lars, how would you describe your music?

It’s post-punk in that it takes the ideologies of bands like post-first generation punk bands who used different sounding music with DIY messages. It’s laptop rap because it’s hip-hop I do on my computer. I tell people it’s the Beastie Boys with a little Chemical Brothers and some ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic.

You started your own record label, Horris Records, how much of a challenge has this been?

This Gigantic Robot Kills came out of a partnership with Horris Records and Oglio Records, under the guise of Jaret from Bowling for Soup’s new label Crappy Records. It was a challenge putting the album together but these guys helped me with the final tweaks and mixes. I’m all about giving away music for free, but with their involvement we are going the brick and mortar retail route and are kicking butt on both fronts. Bowling for Soup took me on tour in 2005 and are working on a new CD, staying in the pop-punk game. They are very great guys.
 
You’ve played in Japan, Australia and the UK. Do you worry some of your lyrics, like ‘Hyphy’, or ‘crunk’, get lost in translation?

People always ask us ‘what does hyphy mean?’ Crunk is pretty universal I’ve found, but there’s always that cultural clash when you bring up subcultures to different people. The Internet has kept everyone pretty much informed though, so the cultural divide has shrunk in the past few years.
 
BBC Radio 1 are celebrating thirty years since The Sugarhill Gang released ‘Rapper’s Delight’, which they see as the first ever Hip Hop track.  Would you agree?

‘Rapper’s Delight’ was the first hit rap single, but the first rap song was ‘King Tim III (Personality Jock)’ by the Fatback Band, which came out a few months before ‘Rapper’s Delight’…but of course that Sugarhill song was the epic hit so Radio 1 is right to give it its proper respects.

Anyone who’s heard your music or seen some of the T-shirts you wear will know your weren’t a big fan of George Bush, how do you think Barack Obama’s doing after his first few months? Is Obama punk rock?
 
Obama is punk rock in that he’s a self made man. Bush was an example of old world politics and conservative ideologies. I guess we’ll have to see how Obama does, but I definitely voted for him and definitely believe in him.
 
You lived and studied in Oxford in 2003.  What was your favourite Oxford haunt?  Did you discover any hidden gems that the readers should check out?

My favorite places in Oxford to hang out were the Radcliffe Camera and the Cellar on Cornmarket Street. George and Danver was always awesome too!

A lyric in your new song ‘Hipster Girl’ states ‘Donnie Darko makes no sense’ yet my housemate tells everyone he understands it. Is he talking rubbish?
 
It’s a very complicated plot. If you’re willing to accept the fact that physics, logic and the linear progression of time can be changed however you want arbitrarily, then it makes sense. I just don’t like how Jake Gyllenhaal is so surly and dysfunctional.

And what’s next for MC Lars?

 I’ve got an Australian tour, a US tour, then I’m back to the UK, and then hopefully will be getting to work on the new album!