Sci-fi metal, thrash, prog, punk influenced. Voivod have a hand in it all and their influence on countless bands over the years is immeasurable. The band are celebrating 35 years making music but it’s not without it’s ups and downs of course with breakups, lineup changes, the death of Denis “Piggy” D’Amour as well as touring with some of the best bands in the world, all of which has seen Voivod come through to the other side in 2018 with a new album titled “The Wake”. Voivod have been on tour since it’s release and are hitting Australia in January 2019 so we chatted to drummer and original member Michel “Away” Langevin about the coming shows as well as jump into a bit of history with the band and more.
Andrew: It’s good to chat to you today, really appreciate it! How’s things with you and the band at the moment?
Michel: Oh fantastic! Just back from a very successful tour in Europe and the new album “The Wake” has amazing reviews and is doing very well so we’re just surfing on it and getting ready for Japan and Australia early next year.
Andrew: Yeah that’s obviously big news for a lot of Voivod fans in Australia and of course in Japan. The press release was saying it’s been a couple of decades since the last time you were in Australia so it’s been a while!
Michel: Oh yeah the last time we were there was 2000 so we’re pretty excited! We don’t really know what to expect but we will try to cover as many albums as we can.
Andrew: Sure it’s quite a difficult thing for a band that’s been around as long as Voivod has to come up with a setlist to not only please the fans but to also please yourselves I guess.
Michel: Yeah I mean these days we try to cover, let’s say from “War And Pain” to “The Outer Limits”, so the 80’s and early 90’s and then the material from “Post Society” and “The Wake”. Unfortunately we have to skip over a couple of periods, the Eric Forrest and the Jason Newsted periods. Eventually some of that material is going to come back to the setlist but right now it’s pretty much the first 7 albums with the last 2 I would say.
Andrew: Well let’s get into some of the back catalogue stuff that you will possibly be playing for us because just recently, I guess it was last year you had re-released some of those earlier albums right?
Michel: Yes BMG re-released the Noise catalogues, so “RRROOOAAARRR”, “Killing Technology” and “Dimension Hatross” with a lot of bonus material that I had from the Voivod archives, so it’s been doing really well. Now we are working on the re-release of the MCA catalogue, so “Nothingface”, “Angel Rat” and “The Outer Limits” is our next mission.
Andrew: Obviously some of those albums are quite iconic and some of the staples of what you guys are known for, when you think back to some of those songs even when you just play them live on stage, what are some of the memories that come out of those old songs from those days?
Michel: That’s actually a very good question. If I play the material from the mid-80’s I will immediately be transported to first world tours with Celtic Frost, Posessed, Kreator and if we play some of the “Nothingface” material, it will bring back memories of tours with Faith No More, Soundgarden, Rush and so on. So it’s interesting for me, because I’ve been part of all the lineups for 35 years, to play material from this last catalogue. But with every lineup it sort of morphs into Voivod so there’s a very good flow, according to what people tell us after the shows the new material fits in with the old material and the flow is intact so that comes naturally.
Andrew: Yeah “The Wake”, I guess conceptually speaking, sort of comes back to some of that earlier material. You talk about a lot of the stuff that you were talking about back in the early days and that stuff from 30 years ago seems to be quite relevant still to this day.
Michel: Yeah I know what you mean, it’s just that of course we try not to repeat ourselves but it’s such a recurring nightmare where instead of talking about Chernobyl we talk about Fukushima, instead of talking about the Ozone layer we talk about global warming and so on. So to us it’s always been important to deliver that Voivod message, a more environmental message I guess and true sci-fi folktales in a way. I know that the lyrics from the new album, Snake [Denis Bélanger, vocals] was influenced a lot by the state of this planet and he really wanted to talk about it but it’s sort of told in a sci-fi way again.
Andrew: Yeah obviously a lot of fans love that stuff and it has become a trademark of what Voivod is. When you went back into the studio to record these new songs, even when you were writing them as well, what was the idea? What were some of the things that were influencing you and some of the things that you wanted to achieve with these new songs?
Michel: Well from the start when we started writing the album 3 years ago, Snake told us he likeed to write long stories so immediately it gave Chewy [Daniel Mongrain, guitars] a lot of musical ideas where some musical themes would come back but rearranged differently. So it turned out to be quite a puzzle and we learned to record demos in the bus and backstage which is a great process, now that we have a formula we will be able to release more material more quickly. But it was Chewy’s master work I think in terms of layers of music and intricacy of the compositions, so everybody in the band had great input but Chewy worked extra hard on this album with Francis [Perron, producer] who owns the studio where we are recording at these days.
Andrew: And I believe this was the first album with Dominique [Laroche, bass] as well on bass so what was it like to have him?
Michel: He was on the “Post Society” EP that we released a couple of years ago and the album “The Wake” is sort of a continuation from “Post Society”. He’s been with us since 2014 and has totally morphed into a Voivod [laughs]. I mean it was always in his blood in the sense that his first show was Voivod, same with Chewy, the same show and he was always into Slayer, Metallica, Voivod and a huge fan of the band so it was in his blood from the start. But now he’s a person that’s accepted by everybody that has been following Voivod, it’s really amazing and the chemistry in the band is fantastic. He brought a lot of ideas to the album as well so it’s great.
Andrew: Chemistry is obviously an important thing in the selection process, Voivod has had many members come through over the years so is that selection process changed at all? Do you have a certain way of knowing who to pick and is there a certain element that they have to have in order to be a member of Voivod?
Michel: It’s probably a good idea to play with a pick at the audition for Voivod because we really come from the Motorhead school, so that’s something that other bass players we had play with a pick. That’s the first thing I can think of really but aside from that you sort of feel it at the audition. It was quite difficult with Eric Forrest during The Outer Limits years where we had many different bass players for a couple of years but with Rocky it’s super easy because he’s a childhood friend of Chewy like I’m a childhood friend of Snake. One day Chewy had said, ‘I know somebody that I”m 100 percent sure he can do it’. So we tried him out and that was it, it was super easy.
Andrew: That’s good to hear. With all the different members that you’ve had and I’m sure you get asked this a lot but having someone like Jason Newsted [ex-Metallica] in the band for a number of years must have been quite an interesting experience. What was it like working with him?
Michel: For me as a drummer, every time there’s a new bass player, I sort of have to adjust my style, in a good way. With Jason it was more Geezer Butler oriented and stoner rock, some sort of stoner rock and metal. I really loved playing with Jason, he’s a super tight bass player so you have to be on your toes, very positive of course. He was playing with Ozzy [Osbourne] as well, for the most part of 2003 he played 2 shows a night because we were opening for Ozzy and we did the Ozzfest all across the US and so on. Quite a warrior and very intense, still a great friend and brought a lot of attention to the band of course which was great. When we cross paths he comes on stage and plays bass with us on the song “Voivod”, we just did that too but when we usually go to San Francisco. We did that once at Hellfest, did that with 2 bass which is great.
Andrew: Jason was a big fan of Voivod as many people are, how does it feel when people tell you, even from other bands as well, when they say Voivod has been a huge influence on their music?
Michel: Well it’s always a pleasure for sure. It’s interesting because with Voivod it’s not only from the metal scene but even from the hip hop scene so it’s varied. Just the crowds showing up is very interesting, how they come from every scene you can think of and also very young and not so young and then old all mixed together. But they all have the Voivod shirt on so it’s amazing and it keeps us going.
Andrew: Well we are looking forward to seeing you in Australia again as it’s exciting to see you in our country, we don’t get to see you very often so I think the fans are going to be very excited about it. Thanks for your time, really appreciated and we will see you very soon in 2019.
Michel: We’re excited! We will have a killer setlist for you, cheers and thanks a lot!
TOUR DATES
Wednesday January 23rd – Brisbane The Crowbar
Thursday January 24th – Canberra The Basement
Friday January 25th – Melbourne Max Watts
Saturday January 26th – Sydney The Crowbar
Tickets: DRW Entertainment
