VOIVOD Frontman Talks About New Album, Possible Future Releases

Metal-Rules.com recently conducted an interview with VOIVOD frontman Denis Belanger (a.k.a. Snake). A few excerpts from the chat follow:

Metal-Rules.com: Were the 10 songs on "Katorz" the most developed of the ones you were working on, or are the forthcoming ones as developed?

Snake: "Well, they're pretty much developed. We didn't choose the songs, we just picked up the ones that had bass lines on them because it happened that Piggy had went to Chophouse (studio) at one point. So they were looking for bass lines on the tracks. Jason was playing on the porch with his 10-watt and Piggy was recording. Jason would say, 'Are you cool with that, Piggy?' and he'd say, 'Yeah, cool, keeper,' and they'd move on. They did 10 tracks, and we picked up those 10 with the bass line on it because Jason couldn't redo the tracks, the other tracks, because he had an operation on his shoulder. So back then, he couldn't go back to the studio so we decided to pick up the 10 with bass lines one them. It was by chance that we ended up with those particular songs."

Metal-Rules.com: For the rest of the songs you won't need any outside guitarists to finish any leads and all the rhythms are done?

Snake: "No, everything is pretty much there man. It's like…wow, incredible. He probably knew something was going on and wanted to make sure before he checked in that everything was pre-recorded or something. I never asked him, I never had the chance to. It's as if he knew something was wrong…I dunno."

Metal-Rules.com: In a [previous] interview, Jason Newsted said that it might be interesting to use guest musicians to maybe play a special VOIVOD show in Montreal. Is this possible or something you've talked about or do you see the band as a studio entity only?

Snake: "It would be cool to do a show. I know a lot of people would like to come as a guest and play and give a tribute to the guy. I know it would be special. We're thinking about doing it around November (2006). But yeah, if we release the 13 other songs that we have to release, probably in 2007. I think we already had offers from guitar players who understand the circumstances and say ‘whatever you decide'…you know. We are thinking about it, maybe a replacement. As long as it's Piggy's music because we have so much material, we have a lot more material hidden in those boxes and I'm sure were can work with these somehow. As long as it's Piggy's music I think we can call ourselves VOIVOD still and keep going even if it's somebody else playing. We've got to think about stuff like that, it's weird. But we are not sure yet, it's still up in the air. We know it would be a big task to replace Piggy, it's not going to be easy."

Metal-Rules.com: When do you guys plan to start work on the next VOIVOD album or have you looked that far ahead?

Snake: "Right now it's just a matter of getting the schedule together. Jason is with SUPERNOVA now so he will be busy for quite a while. They'll do an album and a tour but I think Jason is gonna be free around November and after that, January or something so maybe around spring 2007 we will really start getting back to what we were at and finish what we have in our hands and deliver the next part of 'Katorz'."

Metal-Rules.com: I've read that there are a number of Piggy's acoustic or clean guitar recordings as well. Is this something the band might release, or is it not really VOIVOD material?

Snake: "I think it's a bit personal to be released…the entire thing. It's really tough because on the original thing, you can hear him breathing and he was really sick. There is good playing but sometimes he…he was on morphine, so it's a bit too personal to deliver it like that. But there are some good moments of lucidity and it's really…wow, freaky, and flying. It's just like…my god, it gets really deep. At one point, it's tough to listen to this so we're not sure about it."

Read the entire interview at www.metal-rules.com.