KILLING TECHNOLOGY - 1987 / VOIVOD
Hace unas pocas semanas he tenido la suerte de haber sido fichado para escribir críticas de discos en la web española de METAL HAMMER, nada menos, y ésta es la primera de todas. Espero que vengan muchas más.
LABEL: NOISE RECORDS
RELEASE DATE: 3TH OF APRIL, 1987
LINE-UP:
SNAKE (DENIS BËLANGER): VOCALS
PIGGY (DENIS D’AMOUR): GUITAR
BLACKY (JEAN-YVES THÉRIAULT): BASS GUITAR
AWAY (MICHEL LANGEVIN): DRUMS
SONGS:
KILLING TECHNOLOGY
OVERREACTION
TORNADO
TOO SCARED TO SCREAM (BONUS TRACK)
FORGOTTEN IN SPACE
RAVENOUS MEDICINE
ORDER OF THE BLACKGUARDS
THIS IS NOT AN EXERCISE
COCKROACHES (BONUS TRACK)
VIDEOS:
Most people know that VOIVOD is a canadian band from the area of Quebec (Jonquière) whose extensive body of work (spanning more than forty years) is synonymous with change and evolution. They are one of those bands which never releases the same album, but at the same time they don't incur in too drastic changes from one record to the next one and that evolution is better observed when looked in hindsight, because we can realize that, as time has gone by, Voivod have leapfrogged chapters and left different eras well differentiated from one another, only to go back (in a more or less obvious fashion) to their own past.
These canadians have been mostly linked to thrash metal, although they are far from being the genre's most prototypical band, given the futuristic, postapocalyptic, sci-fi and progressive flair of their music. All this may sound more or less recurring and mundane as of today, but I don't think it was something easy to digest during the first half of the eighties. Not to mention the huge and unusual (also for its time) role of BLACKY's bass guitar and, above all, the dissonant and weird guitar work by the late axeman PIGGY, one of those musicians ahead of their time and with a very innovative style whose comparison with that of any of his peers is really difficult. A paramount piece for Voivod to become such a pioneering entity. And there is also SNAKE's persona (the vocalist and Voivod's most punkish element, together with Blacky) and AWAY's work on drums, whose input also covers everything related with the band's image at all levels (logos, album covers and so on). All four members combined made of Voivod something almost unique.
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| Voivod, circa 1987. Clockwise: Piggy, Blacky, Away and Snake |
Futuristic industrial metal? Voivod have done that, during their tenure with ERIC FORREST (nicknamed E-FORCE). Progressive, dystopian and inventive thrash? Likewise, thanks to the fairly recent contribution of another brilliant musician like DAN MONGRAIN (CHEWY, who replaces Piggy; do not forget to check his other band out, MARTYR) and that of the current bassist DOMINIQUE LAROCHE (ROCKY). Music focused on simpler rock patterns? No problem, they have their albums with JASON NEWSTED (JASONIC). They even have that one record which can hardly be tagged as heavy metal (ANGEL RAT, from 1991), and they have just played a few shows in Canada in which they have played their hits along a symphonic orchestra.
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| Worlds Away, a wonderful book about Away's craft |
*This is something I forgot to include when I wrote the original text which is on Metal Hammer's website, but the fact that Voivod have played and toured, along the years, with bands in many cases as different among each other as CELTIC FROST, KREATOR, RUNNING WILD, SOUNDGARDEN, TANKARD, PRONG, OPETH, EXODUS or FAITH NO MORE are, speaks volumes of their versatility and evolving spirit.
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| Current Voivod, circa 2018. Rocky and Chewy are between Away and Snake |
Before I go on, I have to say that the first vinyl pressing of the album had just seven songs, with the first three making the KILLING SIDE, and the remaining four, making the B side, the RAVENOUS one, but subsequent editions on CD, etc, began to include two more songs, TOO SCARED TO SCREAM and COCKROACHES (each of them at the end of each side), taken from a Picture Disc called COCKROACHES which had been released earlier that same year of 1987.
A moment ago I was talking about this record's special aura (and the band's as well), nicely propelled by Away's work as a drawer (this man has, at least, one book devoted to his craft with the pencils), which finds an obvious highlight on this album's front cover, with the picture of that blood-sucking lord from outer space, who shares his name with the band (something that comes from the slavic term VOIVODE which refers, among other things, to a military leader), driving a spaceship from the inside. As iconic and glorious a cover as it gets, and it finds its answer in the drawing that Away did to illustrate the recent box set called FORGOTTEN IN SPACE (2022), on whose cover you can see a very similar picture but seen from the outside, with that scary character looking you in the eye, instead of at the helm of the spaceship. Those who can check the contents of that box set may notice that, while on Killing Technology you can see three white planets in front of the vessel, what's on the picture to be found inside the box there's something similar, but with the Voivod with his back turned and what it seems to be the Earth ahead of him. Just a fun fact.
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| Beware... |
And just in case this album itself wasn't important enough when contributing to the legendary status of its creators, the titular track opens the proceedings with one minute of spooky ambient sound and the whistling of a machine which lead to a mechanical voice uttering the sentence We are connected, three words which have become part of the legend and a link for all the band's followers for many years now. When the actual music begins, so does madness and there is no turning back. Lots of speed and a sound which has a lot in common with some of the other glorious albums that the great HARRIS JOHNS (the band itself helps coproducing the record) produced for many thrash bands of its day, some of them also on NOISE's roster (Kreator or Tankard, again, just to name a couple). After five minutes, Away abuses his kit, Snake seems to be delirious and the song ends. But only to borrow another minute and a half in which this song could have passed for a different one, wasn't it for the famous initial voice, which insists in reminding us all that we are connected.
OVERREACTION makes perfectly clear that Blacky's bass guitar doesn't only work as an anchor and as part of the rhythm section. In the hands of this musician it becomes a weapon of mass destruction, as we can all notice when listening to the song's intro. Piggy's own peculiar chords do the rest and the middle section is gold (We're lucky, we die young).
TORNADO is one of my favourites. Keeping in mind that this album is quite lineal when it comes to its levels of aggression, this song's are among the heaviest, having more in common with the title track than with Overreaction, for example, thanks to the speed / thrash metal rapid fire during the verses and a fabulous refrain.
The first bonus track is the already mentioned Too Scared To Scream, which happens to be the least interesting song of the lot. But one thing's certain, what's good according to Voivod's standards is outstanding for most, and this song is also great, with Away's relentless double kicks spearheading the proceedings, something that applies to the whole record.
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| Enjoying themselves |
The beginning of FORGOTTEN IN SPACE, up to the moment when Snake screams All systems go!, manages to encapsulate everything that Voivod's music means to me. Those twenty one seconds remind me of dystopian landscapes, like that scene in the second installment of the TERMINATOR (JAMES CAMERON) saga in which SARAH CONNOR has a nightmare with an apocalyptic blast, or that glorious videogame saga called DOOM. To top it all off, this song seems to be about some kind of outer space prison. Forgotten In Space focuses on the most progressive side of the band, with Piggy contributing some guitar playing which had to be really adventurous back in 1987. Total madness, like that of the inmates of that prison. The title speaks for itself.
This album is home to four of Voivod's best known tracks, at least when it comes to their more or less usual showings at the band's live shows until today. The first two would be Killing Technology and Overreaction, and the other two the ones which are coming next: RAVENOUS MEDICINE and ORDER OF THE BLACKGUARDS. Both help to reinforce the fact that Voivod, among other things, also master the art of naming their songs with some of the coolest titles out there. Ravenous had its own clip, brimming with Away's drawings and in which Snake introduces us to the science hospital the song refers to. The main riff ranks among the very best and it never ceases to amaze me how a song this hysterical and insane might easily be the record's most affordable moment if we are talking about its overall sound. Order has another huge riff by Piggy while Snake (never your everyday's singer) keeps on doing his thing, many times screaming or just talking, more than properly singing.
THIS IS NOT AN EXERCISE is also one of the best songs on the record, being another long tune in which everything can be found, and all good. From the amazing thrash assault which takes place after the first minute, going through a passage which reminds me of the beginning of Forgotten In Space, more or less during the first half of the fifth minute, to Blacky's brutal bass playing, pretty much in the vein of the intro to Overreaction.
COCKROACHES, the second bonus track and the shortest song on here, puts the hostilities to an end. Its surprising chorus is quite punkish and the song itself is very enjoyable as a whole. The band's awesome level of proficiency, on all fronts, during these almost fifty minutes is shocking, to say the least.
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| Piggy, dearly missed |
Voivod would take another step in their brilliant career with another wonder, DIMENSION HATRÖSS, which took only fourteen months, give or take, to see the light of day. That one is another record and a different story, but it strikes me as simply wild how Voivod not only created an album like Killing Technology, but also managed to masterfully follow on its wake only one year later, to the point that Dimension might be their most renowned record.
See ya!
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