John Dolmayan has been System of a Down's drummer since 1997, when he replaced Andy Khachaturian shortly before the band recorded its first album. Born in Beirut in 1973 to an Armenian family, he grew up in the United States and completed the quartet that would define the group's sound. His function is technical before it is expressive. System's tracks change metre, tempo and genre within a few seconds, and those transitions only work if the drums execute them with absolute precision — a waltz passage spilling into thrash does not forgive hesitation. Dolmayan solves this with jazz-rooted phrasing played at metal speed: dense fills, rhythmic displacement and a limb independence that lets him hold two pulses at once. It is what makes "Chop Suey!" and "Toxicity" sound coherent when they have no business doing so. Away from music he is a serious comic book dealer and collector, owner of a business in the field — an activity that is not a hobby but a long-standing parallel profession. His public political positions, conservative in profile, contrast openly with Serj Tankian's, and the disagreement between the two has been aired publicly more than once. The band nonetheless remains together, and the four continue to perform side by side.
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