voila_la_scorie Voivod was one of those bands I snatched up on cassette in the mid-80's when thrash/power/speed metal was flooding the metal landscape. Though I bought a lot of stuff back then, very few of those bands impressed me enough in later years to be worthy of keeping in my collection on CD. Voivod's debut, "War and Pain" had a few tracks that I loved, and their third and fifth albums - "Killing Technology" and their seminal album "Nothingface" - managed to survive the decades of my changing musical tastes. Then early this year (2012) I took up interest in the band again and soon had my collection of their studio albums complete.

This is one of those bold move albums that either draws people closer or repulses them from the band. Or should I say revolts them? For my tastes however, this album is quite attractive in sound. The reasons often cited for disliking this album: new vocalist Eric Forrest is nowhere nearly as interesting and unique as founding vocalist Denis Belanger; Jean-Yves Theriault isn't playing bass on this; the guitars are just a wall of sound.

It's usually disappointing when certain band members we have come to love leave the band and the new members can't replace what was lost. But given the direction that Voivod was heading through the period of "Angel Rat" and "Outer Limits", I think it was a daring and bold move to take the new band in the direction of "Negatron" and "Phobos". On the other hand, the band had been moving away from their speed metal roots and these two more recent albums remind us that this is where the band came from. If the last album you heard was "Killing Technology" and then picked up "Phobos" ten years later, you would likely not be surprised by the sound nearly as much as by the line-up change.

I actually find this album really interesting to listen to, though I usually prefer to listen to a few individual songs like "Phobos", "Bacteria", "Neutrino", and "Forlorn" than the whole album straight through. The album is bookended by two sound effect instrumentals "Catalepsy" and "Catalepsy II", which are on their own not much but being there they give the album a sense of conceptualization, a sense that is reinforced with the bizarre and sometimes creepy sound effects that link the songs. You will also note that most tracks have a one-word title, further creating the idea of a theme.

There is little variety in the music. Almost every song is like being whacked by a giant tennis racket of distorted guitar, and given Denis D'Amour's penchant for weird and dissonant chords, that sensation of being clobbered is only stronger. The pace of the songs usually varies between doomy space extreme metal and a careening battleship of rapid-paced space speed metal. The songs do find time to fit in some interludes from the mayhem of sound with creepy undistorted guitar with spooky cosmic effects or abrupt tempo changes at times. The vocals are powerful screams from a terribly scratched throat - very much suiting the music - but sometimes they are distorted too and the lyrics are difficult to distinguish. That's a weak point for me. The music overwhelms the vocals.

Two tracks that stand out for me because of the mood they establish are the instrumental "Temps Mort" and "Neutrino". "Temps Mort" is a solemn and grim piece that reminds me a bit of something from Nine Inch Nail's "The Downward Spiral" but with accordion played by drummer Michel Langevin. It has a strong post apocalyptic atmosphere but with a folksy European funeral touch. It's a welcome interlude from the sonic assault that composes most of this album.

"Neutrino" has such a sparse but hideously creepy intro. The image that comes to my mind is of some enormous space creature hammering on the hull of a doomed spacecraft while the crew inside are frozen with fear. It gives me the shivers each time I hear it, a great example of how even heavy metal can create images with music.

If you love the classic Voivod then you should approach this with caution. If you want to hear something that will at first give you the feeling of listening to an extremely harsh hangover but later make you feel like you've just heard an album by a Sith Lord's evil twin's metal band, this might just appeal to you.

Conor Fynes 'Phobos' - Voivod (3/10)

Easily one of the greatest metal bands to have come out of Canada, thrashers Voivod have always made me proud. However, as virtually every band that has been around for so long can tell you, it's nearly impossible to keep the same level of quality throughout a career. Gracing the 80's and early 90's with such epic works as 'Nothingface' and 'The Outer Limits', the latter half of Voivod's work would see a turn for the worse. The result of some line-up changes, the band's album 'Phobos' represents a real disappointment in their catalogue. It appears that even the best bands will have lapses in judgement at times, and Voivod is no exception to this.

'Phobos' is a stark contrast to the groovy and upbeat thrash I was first introduced to the band through, and instead goes tends to go down the route of alternative metal. The change of line-up in the musicians is most noticeable with the vocals here, which deviate from Snake's charming Francophone inflections to something more akin to grungy screaming; all to mixed result. Having said before that this may very well be Voivod's most uninspired release, it brings to mind another album by a well-known metal band, Metallica's 'St. Anger'. In an apparent attempt to strip their sound down to a lo-fi bout of anger, the band looses alot of their charm, although the uninspired songwriting and muddy production here is made all the more bearable by a couple of really great moments.

The lesser of the two songs that spark my interest is the album's opener 'Catalepsy I', which features an eerie riff, courtesy of Denis. However, it is generally short-lived and doesn't take long before succumbing to the first of a great many songs here that do little for the imagination. However, 'Phobos's real strength lies in its title track; which- quite contrary to the rest of the album- is actually incredible. An eerie buildup leads to a highly spacey and dark riff, simple in construct but carrying plenty of presence through its ingenious use of delay effects. The anger brought about by the vocals is mixed with the eerie approach of Denis and his guitar work, creating a piece of music that instantly transports me to the Martian lunar landscape, and gives me a really unsettling feeling that I only wish the band had recreated on any other song here.

Of additional interest here may also be the closing track, '21st Century Schizoid Man'. Originally written and performed by prog rock giants King Crimson, it's unfortunate that Voivod does not bring their own magic to this classic track, but instead butchers it through a brutal production value and noisy delivery. Not to mention the lack of saxophone that gave the original such charm, but it may be of slight interest to a fan of either band.

'Phobos' really shows Voivod working with only a shred of their charm and magic. While this band has never stayed in one place for too long, it does feel as if the best aspects of Voivod's delivery are void here. Besides Denis' atypical guitar work (which is always of interest) and one fantastic track, there is little of interest to speak of here.

kluseba This is the ultimate apocalypse, the dystopian genocide or at least the vision of it. Dark, eerie, mechanically thrilling industrial sounds and weird voices suck the listener into an infinite black hole of despair, into a strange universe - the universe of the Voivod. Disharmonic song structures, depressing and melancholic monotony are mixed with angry screams of crazy despair, a singing style that works as a metaphor, as a dark instrument. Low tuned and spacey shredding guitars mechanise and "instrumentalize" the singer and make you travel between the universes as your synapses collapse. The bass guitar sounds low tuned, darkly vibrating. The drums feel like volcanic eruptions or colliding meteors in a hellish parallel universe. This diabolic mixture slowly leads you to a hiatus in madness. "Phobos", that's the perfect title to it, making allusion to the moon of Mars and the term of fear in a apocalyptic world with ho tomorrow. Songs pass by like the final chapter of a book of suffering, telling without a pity about a devastating dystopia leading to its final downfall. Strange, confusing and uneasy interludes give us some breaks, just to make us think about the unspeakable horrors in this universe. Rarely any album has been that intense and atmospheric, created such a tension and leaded us to such a dramatic climax, just to let us in doubt, depression and fear as the apocalypse has approached but not yet passed in the end. This is no easy stuff!

It is difficult to mention so called "highlights" in a conceptual album like this which works as a whole one. Some songs even just work in this context and that is maybe one of the reasons why the band's concerts at that time weren't much successful. How can you recreate such an atmosphere and play such songs on stage? The only song which also works as a song itself is "Forlorn", the intense final chapter of pain and despair of this album with the most addicting chorus. The bonus song "M-Body", the bands first collaboration with Jason Newsted, is also a little bit more harmonic and easier to listen to. The second bonus track "Twenty First Century Schizoid Man", a King Crimson cover, has been used on a few radio stations to promote the album and honours a great band and a milestone album and one of Voivod's main influences in the last years. The song has been adapted to Voivod's new and inhuman style without losing the uniqueness and charm of the original version, this band really has the talent to do reinterpretations and cover songs in a stunning and very personal approach.

The title song "Phobos" is somehow a summary of the album with its spherical shredding guitar play from another dimension and the crazy, inhuman screams out of nowhere mixed with weird and eerie sound effects. It is perfectly logical to make this song the title track. This song is the preview, the album is the entire movie, the bonus songs are the director's cut. If you like the song "Phobos", you must listen to the whole creation. If you are a newbie and want to get a good idea of the album, try this song first.

Voivod creates a dystopian, spacey, aggressive metal out of any category. This has nothing to do with the band's thrash and punk roots or the progressive works a few years ago, you can maybe best compare it to the last record called "Negatron" but there are still worlds between those two records. Voivod don't care about expectations or trends, they offer really heavy and inaccessible stuff which causes you headaches and vertigo for sure when you listen to it for the first time. This album doesn't give you any long breal, the dystopian and disharmonic atmosphere is never broken and you get constantly addicted to it until it is too late to escape.

This album could even be too much for you. It may disturb you, it may depress you, mix you up. You may not often be in the mood to listen to this album. But if you are, you will adore this true masterpiece.

This is not just music, it is surreal art, it is a strange game play, it is about existential emotions. The unholy and suicidal atmospheres which most of the black metal bands try to create are nothing in comparison to this album.

In the end, this album is like a good old wine. The more you listen to it, the more you will like and you get ultimately drowned into it after a first and maybe shocking and disturbing experience. But as good old wine, you need to take your time and be patient to fully enjoy this record. On the other side, too much of it may make you lose your mind. Don't underestimate this album. I assure you that it's pretty much intense!