"" is a song by the band
System Of A Down . It is the third
Single of their fourth album ''
Mezmerize '', which focuses on life after death. The song was first premiered by the famous
Los Angeles, California radio station
KROQ on
May 23 ,
2005 and was released to alternative and rock radio stations on
July 12 of the same year.
"Question!" is written in the key of E minor - a somewhat unusual key for System of a Down, which normally relies heavily on Cm, C#m, and F#m. The song uses five different time signatures (5/4, 9/8, 6/4, 3/4, and 4/4). The acoustic guitar intro and part of the verse is in 9/8 (3+2+2+2, essentially 4/4 with an extra eighth note on beat 1). The verse briefly switches to 3/4 (when Serj sings "Are you dreaming?"). The guitar motif after the acoustic intro is in 5/4. This same section appears throughout the song as well. The chorus is in 6/4. The heavy tremolo-picked section towards the end underneath the vocals is in 4/4.
Serj Tankian plays acoustic guitar in the intro and deeper in the background behind lead guitarist
Daron Malakian .
The song is sometimes compared to one of System of a Down's other songs "Aerials," which also deals with the nature of life in the lyrics. Both are primarily sung by Serj but seem to have Daron as back-up in the chorus. Music similarities are not as easy to spot. Aerials does not have the wide variety of time signatures that Question has (a problem that allegedly makes the song difficult for even the band to play) and the bass is used more for atmosphere in Aerials, whereas in Question it only shows up separate to the guitar for a repeated riff.
The video was released on
August 5 , 2005 on
MTV and the band's website. The opening scene is of a boy with gray hair, clothes, and skin shooting a red bird with a
Slingshot , which coincides with the start of the song. At this point the video switches to a scene of the band members on a theater stage, performing music for a play. The play is based on a theme of life, death, and
Reincarnation , revolving around two lovers, a man in a dark suit and a woman in a red dress, who are shown both as children and adults. As the music reaches its climax, the woman collapses and the man screams in grief. The video closes with an intense scene of a woman being
Euthanized followed by shot of a newborn baby wrapped in red cloth. The color
Red is central to the video, tying together the bird, the girl, the woman, and the baby in a cycle of rebirth.
Shavo Odadjian produced the video (and co-directed it alongside
Howard Greenhalgh ) after allegedly having an image of the video in a nightmare. It is claimed that before the dream he had no intentions of producing the video. In fact he didn’t want any special treatment over other possible producers for being in the band so he submitted his idea anonymously. Shavo also in his dream originally saw duplicates of him and the bandmates as all of the audience during the opera scene, but decided not to do that in the music video because it reminded him of the hip-hop group
Outkast 's music video for their song "
Hey Ya ", and didn't want to make it seem anything related to that.
#"Question!"
#"Question!"
#"
Sugar " (Live)
(Lyrics: S. Tankian, Music: S. Odadjian/D. Malakian)
#"
Forest " (Live at the
Big Day Out 2005)
(Lyrics: S. Tankian, Music: D. Malakian)
#"
Prison Song " (Live at the
Big Day Out 2005)
(Lyrics: S. Tankian/D. Malakian, Music: D. Malakian)
#"Question!" (Video, Live at the
Hurricane Festival 2005)
#"Question!" (Music Video)
#"
B.Y.O.B. " (Music Video, Clean Version)
(Lyrics: D. Malakian/S. Tankian, Music: D. Malakian)
#"
Sugar " (Live at the
Big Day Out 2005, Clean Version)
(Lyrics: S. Tankian, Music: S. Odadjian/D. Malakian)
#"
B.Y.O.B. " (Live at the
London Astoria 2005, Clean Version)
(Lyrics: D. Malakian/S. Tankian, Music: D. Malakian)
