As their music has endured over the course of the two decades since their last studio album, System of a Down shows have remained a rare commodity — before this week, the band had played a grand total of three U.S. shows in the past three years. Yet for Serj Tankian, Daron Malakian, Shavo Odadjian and John Dolmayan, the ability to reunite sporadically, play a couple of packed-house shows and then wander off in separate directions is possible because of how fine-tuned their craft has become, full of easy instrumental virtuosity and effortless onstage chemistry.

If you were plopped into MetLife Stadium on Wednesday night (Aug. 27), unaware of the greater context of the performance, you’d think that System of a Down had been pummeling stadiums together ceaselessly for years, and that the Eas

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