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John Dolmayan (Armenian: Ջոն Դոլմայան) (born July 15, 1973 in Lebanon) is a musician, best known as the drummer for the Armenian-American alternative metal band System of a Down. His bandmates are vocalist/guitar/keyboards Serj Tankian, guitarist/vocalist Daron Malakian, and bassist Shavo Odadjian. John currently lives in Las Vegas, Nevada. He was first interested in drums at the age of 2. His father was a saxaphone player. When his mother would take him to watch his father play, he would mimic his father's drummer. When he was 4 years old, he asked his parents for a drum set every birthday and Christmas until he was 15 and he got his first drumkit.
Equipment
John Dolmayan's drumkit is a modified Tama Starclassic with a White Silk finish. Even though John is left-handed, he sets his kit up right-handed. The eleven cymbals are Paiste Signatures. His setup uses 2 bass drums. Now he has 3 rack toms, which can be heard vibrantly throughout "Hypnotize", and one floor tom. Most of his cymbals have moved, and so have his timbales which are mounted to align with the toms. John positions the left side of his double pedal on the left side of his hi hat stand. As unusual as it may seem, he finds this placement very natural for his playing style.
When he first started his career with System of a Down he used a few Paiste Dimension cymbals as well as signatures. He currently uses 24" as his largest cymbal.
Personal Projects
In Summer 2006, right before Ozzfest tour, John told the press in several interviews his intention to make an online comic company, "I've got over 5 and a half million comics right now, and I'll probably have about 20 million comics in a year's time. But it's not really a collection. The reason I'm accumulating all these books is I'm starting an Internet-based comic-book company called 'Torpedocomics'," which is very strange, because his views used to be negative towards the internet. "That'll be up in November 2007, probably." John said. Recently John has been playing live shows with a newly designed drum kit, featuring drawings from many famous comic book artists. John also said he may at some point write a movie script and might be involved in drum work regardless of SOAD's status.
Born July 15, 1973 Lebanon Flag of Lebanon
Genre(s) Hard Rock
Occupation(s) Musician
Instrument(s) drums
Years active 1997 – present
Associated
acts Serj Tankian (Solo)
Scars On Broadway
System of a Down
Axis of Justice
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