System of a Down – Chop Suey! (from the 2001 album Toxicity)
Lyrics by Serj Tankian and Daron Malakian
Music by Daron Malakian
I don’t pretend to be perfectly correct, but I thought I might give all of the possibilities for some difficult to hear sections and fix the obvious mistakes contained in the actual album insert. (For the most part though, when the disparity isn’t obvious, I would think the artists should be trusted about their own lyrics.) This is how I hear the song…with backup vocals sung simultaneously along with the lead singer in bold type.
Update: I've been advised to add some more depth to this write-up, so I'll include some of my own interpretations of the song...I don't know how successful this'll be though.
Wake up (wake up)
Grab a brush and put a little makeup
Hide the scars to fade away the shakeup (hide the scars to fade away the shakeup)
Why’d you leave the keys up on the table?
Here you go, create another fable
It strikes me that this song may be about someone like a low-rate prostitute, slapping on some makeup late at night when she wakes up, attempting to cover up her pain and anguish, being forgetful and distracted, then leaving her apartment to go out and continue to experience the part of her life which she wishes were fictional but carries very real meaning.
You wanted to! Grab a brush and put a little makeup
You wanted to! Hide the scars to fade away the shakeup
You wanted to! Why’d you leave the keys up on the table?
You wanted to!
The exhortations of "You wanted to!" may be the woman's inner thoughts about her profession, berating herself for not selecting a different route, possibly due to her own feelings or maybe from the comments of long-lost family or friends or even teachers or priests who always told her to work hard in school and she'd go somewhere, be someone...or they may be her perception of condemnations direct from God, which would tie in to the lyrics later in the song.
Well, I don’t think you trust…in…my…self-righteous suicide
I…cry…when angels deserve to DIE!
The first line of the refrain seems to be the woman's response to everyone, possibly including herself, stating that she has the urge to end her life because she can't stand what she's doing with herself, but that she knows that nobody she's talked to or had a real relationship with would believe that there's no way out besides death, and that maybe she also believes she can rise above and succeed at a more fulfilling and less degrading life. The second line could be her perception of God or others mocking her, saying that her angelic spirit has been tarnished and that they're all crying false tears and strumming their violins over her unwillingness to shape up and escape her shitty life by fighting instead of throwing it all away; it also could be her own thoughts and emotions, her sense of melancholy and frustration over her perception that she deserves death because of her actions.
Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
(Scream of pain and frustration at a depraved and monotonous life)
Wake up (wake up)
Grab a brush and put a little makeup
Hide the scars to fade away the (hide the scars to fade away the shakeup)
Why’d you leave the keys up on the table?
Here you go, create another fable
You wanted to! Grab a brush and put a little makeup
You wanted to! Hide the scars to fade away the shakeup
You wanted to! Why’d you leave the keys up on the table?
You wanted to!
Well, I don’t think you trust…in…my…self-righteous suicide
I…cry…when angels deserve to die…in…my…self-righteous suicide
I…cry…when angels deserve to die…
The second line in the slightly modified second refrain supports the idea that she is the angelic spirit who supposedly deserves to die.
FATHER! (Father!)
FATHER! (Father!)
FATHER! (Father!)
FATHER! (Father!)
This certainly appears to be the woman, with her completely shattered resolve, crying out for help and comfort and peace from the only one she thinks she has left- It's also possible that she's crying out to her actual father, but considering the next few lines I think that's unlikely
(Note: At various points in that section, people have variously interpreted the singers as saying any combination of Grandma, Granddad, Grandpa, and Fucker, which could be lamentations for all of the people she's known and lost or disappointed, possibly them 'Fucker' for abandoning her or herself 'Fucker' for obvious reasons.)
Father, into your hands, I commend my spirit
Father, into your hands, why have you forsaken me?
In your eyes, forsaken me
In your thoughts, forsaken me
In your heart, forsaken, me, oh
This would be the woman's final plea, her last attempt to give her life back to God, to get him to forgive her for her life of "sin," she's possibly confused that God would hate her when apparently Jesus sought the company of prostitutes and other malcontents. She searches for some place in God's consciousness where she might find hope and a loving place, but fails.
Trust…in…my…self-righteous suicide
I…cry…when angels deserve to die
In…my…self-righteous suicide
I…cry…when angels deserve to die.
So, in the end, we are left with the fallen angel, who has nothing left in her life but her sorrow; she now implores everyone to trust in her self-righteous suicide, the death she believes would possibly cleanse her soul, and she gives one last lamentation of the perceived fact that she deserves to pass from this harsh world. Whether she kills herself or continues her life is not necessarily resolved.
There are some kick-ass fan-produced
anime music videos set to Chop Suey!, most notably a
Dragonball Z one, which has clips from the
History of Trunks, and one for
Neon Genesis Evangelion, with clips of the
Evangelions destroying various
Angels, which is perfect considering the lyric "angels deserve to die," though I don't really think the
Eva pilots are exactly crying about killing the beasts. ;P