Voivod
As Voivod prepare to release their twelfth album, Infini, I caught up with the band backstage at Download Festival for a little chat.
How are you enjoying being here at Download Festival?
Well, we just got here and so far it’s a very nice day and we played Sweden Rock and it was raining and cold and I almost got ill watching Motorhead… but it was worth it!
Poor thing! Have you played Download before then?
No, it’s our first time here, and we’ve never been to the festival either, I has no idea how big it was really!
Who are you most looking forward to checking out this weekend?
I haven’t checked out the full line-up yet but I know that Duff McKagan is playing today and I’m going to check him out because I remember Snake out singer used to have an album of his and I really liked it so I think I’m going to check it out.
And who would be your idea festival headliners?
Oh, well I would probably have to go with Motorhead, Mastodon and probably Down. That’s probably it.
You also have a new album coming out on June 23 called Infini… is that it? Is that the last album?
Yeah, it’s definitely the last album we wrote with Denis D'Amour aka, Piggy, and there are no more tracks left now so it’s really hard to tell if it will be the very last album. I thought so last year but now that we are playing festivals again we are really excited.
It’s kind of strange because there are almost two line-up’s at the moment, the album is coming out with Jasonic on bass, Snake on Vocals and the guitar tracks by Piggy, but the line up of the tour is Blacky, our original bass player, Snake and Dan Mongrain from the band Martyr who is a good friend from Montreal. We might sit down next year and try to figure out if we can write more material.
Horray! Now, what one song do you think I should go and listen to because I haven’t got any of your albums… what song will make me buy one?
My favourite is Global Warning. For the tour it’s done with Blacky and we’re concentrating on the first six albums and songs from the new album and Global Warning is one of them.
Isn’t this your twelfth studio album? What inspires you to keep going?
Yes it is our twelfth album, it’s pretty hard to stop making music! After the release of Katorz in 2006 we took a couple of years off to mourn the departure of our good friend Piggy. We weren’t sure if we wanted to keep going, then after a few years the itch to make music came back and I realise now that we just can’t stop, it’s what we do best.
As for the live aspect, I am sure we will be touring for many years to come and I am hoping to write more music for Voivod.
Woo hoo! We’re happy! Now, what advice would you give to someone wanting to follow in your footsteps?
Well I don’t know if it’s good advice, but I mean I’ve stayed pretty grounded through it… we didn’t follow trends in the music industry and we wrote what we wanted to write at any specific time and I think that if I could give just one piece of advice it would probably to keep your publishing as much as possible because as years go by it gets really hard to track down your publishing if you give it away, and publishing companies can disappear and reappear under another name or go bankrupt… so make sure you keep your own publishing’s! That’s my advice after 26 years!
Brilliant! And finally, what does the rest of 2009 hold for you?
Festivals and festivals! We booked 25 festivals this year, but we want to book 50 next year! This year it’s all across Europe and we went to Japan last year with Testament and we got on very well so I think we’re going to go out to Mexico with them!
FemaleFirst - Ruth Harrison
Tagged in Download Festival