INTERSTELLAR EMPATHY
Voivod mean a lot to many of us. In my case, they were
one of my early pathways into metal.
Back then no-one sounded even remotely
like them. They had something very familiar (the punk ethos) and (naturally) alien that seemed
to go right under my skin... I had been playing their first four albums religiously, but when Nothingface was released they shot at the very top of my personal
Olympus. My Voivodian Love felt powerful but at the same time very fragile: I felt I had to
protect it. That included (oh, the madness!) turning
down interview chances simply for fear of being "disappointed" or worse still, falling hopelessly in love with one of them!
I kept hearing how nice and down to earth they were, and I was determined that it should
stay that way... Seeing them live was always torture & delight at once! Well now I can revela that Away,
with his dreamy and troubled air, was always the one I wanted to talk to really
badly: I felt he knew something dark and secret that also lurked in my early childhood's
subconscious... Having grown up a little since, these days I am no longer afraid
of damaging my love for music as, by now, I know that it will stay with me
forever. So Roadburn 2012 definitely meant coming home for me: Away was finally
all mine for an hour and a half!
It must have been hectic for you in the last few days,
Michel, how are you feeling?
Well for the very first time since we got here I was able
to have some extra sleep. For the first two days I had to do our sound-check in
the morning, open my art exhibition and do some interviews. The other guys were
going back to the hotel to sleep but I couldn’t do that… So yesterday when we
started the show I felt really little tired but I had enough adrenaline to keep
me going. It was a hard show to bring home, you know, playing fast and
complicated early material and the Jack Luminous song: I was really stressed
out, we all where, but it went really well and that gave me a big boost of
energy.
You strike me as a very laid-back person: it is pretty
unusual for chilled people to pick up the drums, how did it happen?
Like with so many other bands, I met some friends and we
thought of putting a band together; there was already who could play the guitar
and the bass so I was left with no choice… I started banging on the drums and
loved it so I never stopped!
Don’t you think that the drums bring us the ancestral,
primitive side that still lives inside us?...
Totally!!! I can easily imagine our ancestors sitting entranced
around a fire while someone is beating rhythmically on something… And you know,
if you are a stressed kind of person with some forms of anxiety, playing the
drums makes it all come out, so once you are done you can be laid back again.
Yes, it’s something that helps me a lot when I feel anxious.
I have noticed that the very moment you sit behind the
drums you switch on and enter the zone immediately…
Yes, nowadays I truly feel in my element when I sit
behind the drums: as soon as I feel the cymbals and touch the kit I am in a
dimension where I can be completely free. It is an instant switch that is one
hundred per cent pure instinct, and it is no coincidence that many parts of our
songs are tribal if you see it like that.
So it’s like with some types of meditation: something visual
triggers the mind to enter instantly in another dimension…
Exactly like that! I often compare playing drums to
meditation because many people ask me how is it possible that after an hour or
an hour-and-a-half long thrash metal show I do not look tired or even sweaty in
any way? Well it’s because my body does really shift into another dimension! I
don’t even get exhausted that much because there is a way to “float” over
things…
Have you ever had an out-of-body experience?
No, I have never experienced anything like that. I do not
meditate and I am not thirsty about all that kind of psychic experimentation
like remote viewing and so on, but I do believe that art and music do channel
us into something else. I truly believe that everything in the universe is
interconnected, that there is an inter-dimensional path that can connect us to places
that are not actually tangible for us, and what I do somehow leads me to it.
I often feel that art is a portal towards something
else: that sensation is very strong when what you began to create eventually
becomes something else altogether, something with its own life!
Yes, completely!!! If I were to try to discover these
dimensions I would probably use ancestral methods like potions or “magic” herbs,
because I am not into the use of heavy drugs. You can reach some higher states
of mind by the use of LSD but after a year or two you pay the price, like Syd
Barret did, so that’s why I do not try to discover what’s out there by the
drugs method.
So your love for sci-fi stems from an interest in the
new sciences, like quantum physics?
Oh yes! I am not trained in art at all; I have a purely
scientific background and at university I studied physics. My main goal was to
become a physicist because I truly wanted to find a way to understand all these
ideas that I had about the universe since I was a kid. Then the first Voivod
album came out though, I understood that I could be a professional musician so
I left the academic world. I actually got my nickname Away from the times when
I was so busy with university that I was always really late for rehearsals: it
came a point when I had to chose between my studies and the band… 1994 was a
crazy year for me because I had my lessons in the day and rehearsals every
night!
Glad you eventually chose Voivod! Are you excited
about the outcome of the CERN experiments in Geneva?
In Dimension Hatröss I describe a micro big-bang between
particles where the Voivod goes into: it is exactly the same thing… In the 80s
I was buying scientific magazines where there were articles on this gigantic
particle accelerator that was being built in the next 20 years, so I made a
concept album out of that incredible notion. The next thing we know, it’s all
happening right now!
[b]It was kind of exciting when they initially thought
that the neutrinos were going faster than light-speed because I kind of expect
that Einstein’s ideas will progress into something new. These are indeed exciting times! I still religiously buy
Discovery magazine…
Do you feel that science is the only way towards
knowledge?
No I don’t… The scientific community is against magic,
mythology and so on but I have read books by people who are primarily into
magic which gave me deeper insights than science. Well, it’s hard for me to say
because I am such a fan of science…
My view is that they complement one another other somehow…
Yeah I think so… It’s like when in 1996 we saw the orbs
in the sky in Buffalo: that was a phenomenon related to U.F.O. mythology, but
if the scientific community were to do more about understanding such phenomena
we could really have a more balanced view in-between myth and science.
Our understanding of the universe and how it works is
still rather basic.
And yet many thousands of years ago people seemed to know
stuff like constellations and the movements of the planets without the aid of modern
instrumentation… Incredible!
We are funny people: we are capable of the most
barbaric acts and yet we do wonderful things too!
Well, the barbaric side of us humans makes me ashamed of
belonging to this race: I have real trouble with certain periods of our history,
like the Inquisition and all the genocides…
The genocide of the American Indians was something
appalling, and it pains me that people ignore it completely…
These kinds of things are hidden away. In America what is
left of the indigenous inhabitants is constraint in areas where you just don’t
see them, but if you happen to just go through the Indian reserves it’s really
really bad… What they have to deal with daily is unbelievable… People just do
not see that, only perhaps in big cities where you see them sleeping rough on
the pavements.
Is it true that the French Canadians sided with the
indigenous populations during the war against the English?
Actually some Indians sided with the English and some with the
French because they were long-time enemies and had been at war between
themselves for many thousands of years prior to the arrival of the westerners.
But the French speaking people of Quebec right now cannot connect at all with
the rest of Canada… You see, in the last couple of years there has been a
conservative government that is a replica of the old Bush one: all funding for
art has been cut, they refused to sign the Kyoto agreement and all they focus
on is selling oil abroad. Right now they are going through a big scandal
because of fraud at the elections… For many years Quebec has been trying to
separate itself from Canada: we had two referendums which did not work out and
at the moment there is a resurgence of the separatist movement because
everybody is really fed up.
Do you think Quebec will manage to obtain full
independence?
It’s hard to say because whilst people say that the new
generation is really active thanks to the internet and the social media, so
it’s easy for them to organize a prompt manifestation in the main square, at
the same time they seem far too interested in their iPhones and shit like that
to truly, deeply care… They are stuck right in the middle of the consumerist
game: on one side they have wonderful tools to organize themselves, on the
other they do not seem to be ready to be really involved on a personal level.
The ones who are truly fighting are the old guard, so if they could find a way
to combine their passion with the younger generation’s skill in using
technology, they could succeed. Personally, I was not a separatist before, but
the new developments made me change my mind…
We are both huge punk fans, and it’s impossible not to
relate to the Occupy movement. What I find incredible is the lack of awareness
in most people: have we grown up with too much of everything to even begin to
care?
It’s hard to say but, without going into these conspirationist
theories, I think there is a mass brainwashing going on. As I said before, on
one hand it’s great that people have all these modern tools and technology, but
they seem to have far too many distractions to really be able to stop and truly
think with their own brains. What was important in the 80s, when we discovered
bands like Crass and so on, is that everything was done by mail, and that meant
a lot of personal involvement and time spent on what you truly deemed as
important… Back then there was a big preoccupation about nuclear war, but after
a while people seemed to forget about it, as if all the nuclear weapons had
suddenly gone away! But the interest faded away and I remember doing interviews
in the 90s saying that there could still be wars and people reacted as if I
were so out-dated, as if I were out of fashion or something! I was saying,
look, the weapons are still there, in fact are even more lethal: they are
laser-guided and soon there will be robots involved (today’s drones)… It’s only
in the last few years, with the supposed threat from Iran and North Korea, that
people have become a little bit more aware. So for a long while people stopped
putting together anti-war movements like we saw in the 60s with the hippy
generation and in the 80s with crust punk.
Did you ever visit the Crass community? They changed
my outlook on life! I think it is really important that their legacy is brought
forth: I am so happy that you brought Doom to Roadburn!
Crass changed my life too, but sadly I never met them…
When I started to tour in the mid 80s the only access I had for this kind of
alternative music were the counter-cultural libraries in London where I could
find these rare publications, and that’s how I found out about the movement.
Today it’s really easy to find information online so… sure, there is a
community out there who is involved, but “online”, you know?... To be honest I
am not involved enough to know whether there are new bands carrying on that
ethos; I am still pretty much into the old guard, although there were some
bands in the 90s who were quite good, like Tragedy for example. I am sure there
are still bands out there actively promoting the DIY philosophy and pacifism…
Did you get to see Doom last night?
I was never going to miss them! I invited them personally
- as Voivod are curators for this year’s Roadburn - but we had already played
together at Maryland festival last year and they were my absolute highlight of
the event! I called Walter and said “You’ve got to get them on the bill!” The
guys in Doom are so honest, humble and nice, and to me they are the real deal: this
is what I want to hear and see; the logo, the look, everything! Naturally now I
want to play with them in London: Voivod and Doom together would be just perfect… (And sure it happened!) We invited also Discharge, Broken Bones and Amebix,
but only Doom could make it in the end.
Did you hear when Doom said during the concert “Stop
smoking, it only kills you: don’t fall into that trap!” Who says these things
these days? It just came from the heart…
Yeah, that’s why I love them so much, they are so honest
and real. I don’t think I have met anyone like them, you know?...
And that’s why people love Voivod so much: we can feel
the honesty and the nice vibes…
Well, we were always true, we were always humble… Many
people over the years have said to us that we would never get anywhere by being
“nice”, that we needed to have more attitude. We never cared about that!
Who told you that, the labels?
Labels and other musicians: people who think that only by
being a jerk you become “famous”.
Well you were never “rockstars”… It is the right
moment to mention Piggy. Last night I called home briefly: that’s the only use
I make of my mobile phone, otherwise it stays shut and forgotten in a corner
because not only do I dislike the rat-race for the newest model but I am aware
of the radiations that it emanates… No wonder cancer is on the increase!
Oh yes, I must be one of the 5 people in the world who
does not own a cell phone… I don’t need to live with another phone ringing in
my pocket, if people need to speak to me they can call me at home and if it is
important they will leave a message. I am really afraid of cancer… In Canada
there are no regulations for antennas for wi-fi signals, so in Montreal you can
find one on top of every church, which is pretty much on every street corner,
since Quebec was very Catholic! That’s way too much… We are bombarded with
invisible waves that go right through our body and there’s nothing we can do.
That really freaks me out!!!
So you live in the city, do you?
Right downtown… I am definitely a city person. I come
from a very desolated place 300 miles from Montreal, a grey industrial place.
All I could see from my window was factories and that had a strong impact on my
art. So I always dreamt of moving out of there to the big city. Once I did that
I never wanted to go back to the rural environment. I am really happy to live
right downtown on top of the subway station. Montreal is very cold during the
winter season, so we live pretty much in a subterranean version of the city
where we have everything, shopping malls, theatres, all connected by tunnels, so
I can go to the cinema in my t-shirt even when outside is below zero! I think
it’s the biggest underground city in the world…
You could live all your life without catching a
sunray if you wished to!
If I wanted to, yes. It would be probably not too good
for my health but…
No vitamin
D!
Ah, but the sun is really bad for the skin right now,
with the big solar flares… In 1989 a big solar flare hit Quebec and the
magnetic overcharge caused a huge black out. Today we are more prepared for
these events… We are expecting more and more to come, but we are more equipped
than before.
There was a big one a couple of weeks ago but nothing
bad happened…
Yeah, all the systems we have now are more resistant. You
know, we had the northern lights up there where I lived as a kid. I remember
the first time I saw them I got really scared as I had no idea of what was
going on… My parents gave me the scientific explanation for the phenomenon, the
magnetic winds from the sun interacting with the magnetic protective layer of
the north pole. I sort of understood but it really scared me so I began to look
at the sun and the environment around me as something far too powerful and
unpredictable…
Unsurprisingly, the sense of vulnerability that
emanates from you art is incredibly intense and touching: the environment where
you lived as a young child affected you deeply.
That’s why there are many little characters against very
big elements. My experiences with a hostile surrounding started as early as 3
or 4 years old. From my window all I could see was a factory so I thought that
beyond that the world actually ended. As I grew up a little – I must have been
4 - and could reach the window slightly more easily - I noticed that there was
a train track and trains were going back and forth, so I thought “wow there
must be something else behind the factory”, so one day I sneaked out to see
what was out there. I tried to reach the factory but there was a dead end
street where I was suddenly attacked by this seven-year-old with a razor blade:
that was my very first encounter with the real world. A year later I gave it
another go, and walked towards that dead end street. I saw a bunch of stray
dogs and kids having a fight and one of them chased me and cut me again with a
razor blade… The next thing I knew, my family told me we were moving right at
the very end of that cul de sac! I was so scared that I didn’t get out of the
new house for a year, so when I finally did, a kid saw me and yelled “come and
play!” so I reluctantly walked towards him. There were empty sheds all around
and suddenly a group of kids run out of them to attack me: it was a trap! I
turned back and started to run towards home but I didn’t look when crossing the
street so a car hit me. It was really bad, I went to hospital and it took me
about 6 years to recover from the incident and the psychological implications
of all those “adventures”. It wasn’t until I was 12 that my fear of blades and
all sharp objects, and fear of cars and all types of machinery, became kind of manageable.
I got over all that by drawing and illustrating my nightmares. You see, the
factory noises also concurred in making me very anxious and I had bad dreams
all the time. When I was waking up I would draw what I dreamt, so the Voivod
concept came to light: every noise corresponded to a character, so all the
voivodian mythology was all there. I knew all the noises coming from inside the
factory by heart: I was always paying attention for a new one to appear and I
would imagine that some sort of mechanical snake was on the lurch, and so on…
This is pretty much how it all came about, as big therapy-process.
Hehe yeah, maybe… This was just the short version… There
was a lot of bad stuff going on in that period, but all those little characters
were born…
Were your parents aware of all your fears and so
on?…
No… My parents were very loving but they both worked at
the factory and they were never there. For dinner we were having frozen food
and we pretty much fended for ourselves.
Yes, I had an older sister and two younger brothers.
I was an only child and was very lonely because both
my parents worked. Actually Mom worked from home giving private tuition to
students all afternoon in the kitchen, but I was not allowed in there for hours
on end, and sometimes I was very scared on my own…
Aaaw, me too! I was not just scared of the outside but
also of the inside of the house as well. I remember that when we first moved to
the new house at the end of the road, I stopped outside – I was only 5 – and
thought that there was something not right about it… I thought there were
visitations, nothing negative or aggressive, but I could feel a presence and it
real scared me. There were people who had lived in that house for a long time
before us and they actually died there…
Do you think we can leave a sort of energy imprint
behind?
Well, if I want to be really logical about it, I could
say that it’s perhaps an interdimensional thing, but perhaps it could be that
the energy is looking for a body to enter; I really don’t know, I should read
more about this subject… But I am a strong believer in multi-dimensions and I
can explain a lot of phenomena like that.
I also had a lot of “experiences” as a child and they
carried on ‘til I was a teenager; as I grew older they seem to become more
sporadic. Do you think that when we are younger we are more open, more
perceptive?
I am not sure, all I know is that my experiences slowly
faded away… I guess a lot of people would say that it is just imagination, but
some of the stuff was so intense… The earliest memory I have was when I was 3
and it was something very strong and very real. I feel very awkward about these
recollections, which are still so vivid in my mind, because that’s when people
can say “this guy is a little strange”, if you know what I mean… But with
hindsight, especially now that I see my flying saucers on big banners (the
huge Roadburn 2012 banners all over the city of Tilburg)… sometimes I think
that some people could be… more receptive… and… maybe there is a message to be
delivered that most people cannot hear but we could… because we are a little bit
different… I was already talking about psychic entities when I was a kid… you
see where this is going… (he looks a little hesitant)
We can omit this from the interview if you want…
No, that’s fine. I would not go as far as describing things
in detail unless the recorder was off, but the point is that… sometimes I
believe that everything I talked about in the Voivod concept is a message from
somebody else. It is hard to explain, but it doesn’t feel as if it came from
me. I know it is not something I can explain in logical terms, and that’s why I
am so reluctant to speak about these things. I have already told you much more
than I usually say, I don’t want that people thought “oh no, Away has lost it!”…
Well you are in good company: I am sure that when I
(rarely) talk about my own experiences most people think I’m mad haha!
Yeah, I’ve had that a lot… Well at least you won’t think
I’m nuts haha!!! But at the same time I have to let these things out into the
world somehow, so I try to do it subtly with my artwork. If people really look
closely they will be able to see that there is a message behind it all. The
medium is quite mundane, if you know what I mean, but there is a lot of
mythology and symbolism in there. I was raised with Heavy Metal magazine and
there were a lot of cartoons in it, which I loved: at 13 I really wanted to
become an artist for that publication and I studied the work of the various
artists who appeared on it.
Do you still paint?
No, the first 4 Voivod album covers are the only
paintings I ever did. Then I jumped onto computer graphics right away because I
was not trained in art and it would take me months to do one painting… After
Dimension Hatröss I bought a computer to accelerate the process. I do a lot of hand-drawing
during the tours though, while at home I draw digitally with my graphic tablet.
Shall we talk about music? Tonight I am really looking
forward to a Finnish act called Oranssi Pazuzu: they are a clever, down-to-earth
bunch with a strong sci-fi theme in their music, which is very psychedelic,
progressive over a very strong black metal edge. It’s really great stuff, you
should check them out!
Yeah, thanks, I will…(his big dark eyes light up)
Pink Floyd are one of my earliest influences, so when
you guys did the cover of “Astronomy Domine” on Nothingface I thought wow, they
are my spiritual brothers: they are into Crass AND Pink Floyd!
Haha, yes, we also believe in brotherhood within
music… I was a big fan of Syd Barret when I was young and Piggy loved David
Gilmore, so we decided to do a track from Ummagumma where Gilmore was playing,
so it was like paying homage to both at once.
Ummagumma is my favorite album by Floyd, which is
yours?
Mine is Animals because it had a factory on the cover, so
I would listen to it whilst looking at the factory from my window and think:
“One day I will be out of here!” Just imagine, today as we were setting up
Animals was playing, and it is always a very special emotion for me… I carried
on listening to them also when I was in high school, when punk had exploded and
I was into it too, but a lot of people at the time had a real problem with
that: “either you are a punk or a hippy!” and I was like “no way!”
Well most of Crass founder members came from a hippy background…
Totally!...
That leads me to the next question: are you familiar
with the avant-garde metal genre? To me the adjective “avant-garde” refers to
open-mindedness and freedom of expression in searching for something off the
beaten path, and somehow I cannot use it to define a specific niche genre. What
do you think?
With Voivod this has been an issue because there has
always been someone saying “why are you doing prog rock” or “why are your
vocals not more like that or the other?”… Music should be about what you feel
like doing without limitations. Avant-garde metal for me could be anything,
like having drone mixed in with more classical metal styles and so on… Actually
it is pretty much what Roadburn is about!
Are you familiar with US black metal acts like Agalloch
and Wolves in the Throne Room?
We invited Wolves in the Throne Room to play here, they
are really good. Actually it’s funny you mention Agalloch: I saw the name on
the bill yesterday and it really struck me, so I wanted to see them but in the
end I could not. [b](Well John Haughm was there for Voivod, right under the stage
and as excited as a kid! – werent’ we all J)[/b] But I shall pay attention to them, it is a very
beautiful name: the name is very important for a band as makes you want to hear
their music. Oh, we toured with Nachtmystium in 2010 and I really liked them…
So have you been following black metal and its
evolution throughout the years?
Yes I have. I like Darkthrone because they had a crust
punk influence, at least as far as music goes… I can relate more to the first
wave of black metal but I in the second era I liked Mayhem and I listened to
the more symphonic stuff like Dimmu Borgir. But you know, everything took me
back to Bathory and I kind of preferred them. To be honest my first reaction to
the stuff that was going on in Norway, with the murders and the heavy drugs, wasn’t
good… I truly disliked the neo-nazi Satanist stuff, besides, when we played in
Norway in the early 90s some friend of ours from Sweden told us that they could
not play there for fear of being killed: the band was actually surrounded by black
metal kids who threw stones at their tour bus… I thought that was awful and initially
it really turned me off the whole scene. But I know that Voivod influenced
Norwegian black metal, which is a very strange thing: we played Hole in the Sky
two years ago, and all the black metal bands were all saying how much they
liked Angel Rat! Of all our albums that is probably the one I would have
thought they might not dig, but on the other hand, it’s moody and dark… Angel
Rat has become slowly a big favorite for many people.
When it came out it was not well received because
everybody expected Nothingface II… Why the change and was it conscious?
Yes, Nothingface was very popular in the underground, so
people were disappointed by Angel Rat. It was actually the product of a conscious
decision… In fact yesterday’s gig, during which we played our earlier and most
complicated stuff, made me think back at that period. Our music had become so
complex that we were spending most of our time onstage working out the notes,
being really focused not to make mistakes and having less interaction with the
crowd, less eye contact. So after we toured with Soundgarden in 1990, exactly
when people looked for the more technical stuff from us, we realized that we
were missing out big time: while we were concentrated on our instruments,
Soundgarden were jumping in the crowd and around the stage… So we thought,
maybe it’s time to go back to the time when we did not have all these time
changes, and Angel Rat was the result of that. Also, we thought of making it
more accessible as MCA was throwing a lot of money into the band and we thought
we might get the big break after selling 300.000 copies with Nothingface: we
felt the pressure of not disappointing those who supported us, and at the same time
we did not want to be thrown out by the label. We worked really hard at Angel
Rat, but in the end it was still too weird and it sold half of what Nothingface
did. We kind of knew that we had missed our chance, but we also realized that
it was what we were able to do, so that was the beginning of our “strange”
period. In the 80s Voivod felt really strong and positive but in the 90s it all
crumbled and it was never the same… I shouldn’t really say that because I
really love all the Voivod phases, since I have been in all of them, and I love
all the different friends who played for Voivod, like Jason Newsted, who is a
great friend.
It was a strange time because things seemed to just collapse…
Yes… Of course Nirvana had just come out with Nevermind
and that was all that people wanted to hear: for the 80s bands it must have
been like for the 50s bands when the Beatles showed up! It was like, shit, how
can we compete with that? They had touched a nerve and suddenly there was no
interest for our music... Such is the music business: I was not really worried
about it because I had my art and my job as a graphic designer.
You mentioned that you wanted to do well because you
had a contract with a major…
We did not want to disappoint the trust that people put
in us. In fact we left MCA in very good terms. They heard Negatron, which was like
a hardcore/metal album, and they said “we love you guys, but we do not know how
to market this kind of stuff, so you are free to go”, which was great. We were
always very humble and honest with ourselves and the others, and that worked in
our favour. Other people it was loads more difficult, like for example my good
friend Jess from Carcass: he had a lot of hassle with the major he was signed
to, and that really made him angry and frustrated for a long time! Can you
imagine no longer being able to use the name of your band?... That was a big
lesson for me.
So, as a honest person, how do you interact in a world
that is based on business?
In all the years I have been involved I have learned the
trade on my own skin, so I can deal with it pretty good BUT I always hire a
manager to sort out the various dealings: I could not handle the labels by
myself as I know I would start to argue and it would turn out really bad, so I
prefer to have a professional manager to take care of all that.
Some bands prefer to stay small, work with small
labels and thrive in their niche so, in your experience, can a really honest
person keep his integrity when working with a bigger label or a major?
Yes! Just think of Tool… I would have never believed that
Tool could become such a huge band, but they always remained the same nice
people. The main thing is to keep your music really original and fresh, that’s
the real question: if you succeed in doing that, you will have no problems. My
main advice to younger bands is always to avoid being a copycat!
Is popularity something necessary for an artist?
It depends on the person: for some it is food for the ego,
for others it’s a good way to make a living; but for the most people I know it
is all about spreading your art across… It can get quite frustrating if you
don’t get any recognition for what you passionately do, thinking that all your
hard work is only appreciated by a small handful of people… On a personal level,
I hope to reach as many people as possible and yet I tend not to worry about
the financial side of things, but then again I am doing well with my graphic
design - I have a lot of requests from bans to do their artwork - so I am able
not to rely on music to make ends meet. Ideally, I would have half of the year
touring and the other half at home doing art, and that would grant me a pretty
good life, but I can understand the hunger that some may have to become
popular.
Is the new album ready and are you pleased with it?
We recorded it before we came to Roadburn and we are
going to mix it as soon as we go back. I am very pleased with the songs:
because we recorded while we were also rehearsing for the Roadburn shows, with a
focus on Dimension Hatröss and Jack Luminous, that rubbed off our new material,
which has a very modern approach but is also linked to the early era of Voivod.
Also, when Blacky came back a couple of years ago, we listened to a lot of
thrash metal together and I think you can feel that too. We shall tour in
Europe at the end of 2012 and will return in 2013: the new material is just
perfect for a live situation; we are very excited about touring with this
album!
All photos by Mystery Flame @ Roadburn 2012: UNFORGETTABLE!!!
