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Guitar
Magazine review,
May 1990, p. 150.
© 1990 by Cherry Lane Music Company, Inc.
NOTHINGFACE - Voivod (Mechanic/MCA)
PERFORMANCE: Jarring;
HOT SPOTS: "The Unknown Knows," "Pre-Ignition," and "Into My Hypercube;"
BOTTOM LINE: Mind-banging, futuristic Canadian metal.
Voivod is a French Canadian quartet that has come down from a small
town north of Montreal, bringing with it a bizarre, futuristic hybrid
of metal that bangs at your mind until it infects you with its computer
bug. The band's music is a jarring, disjointed mass of menacing
riffs, gentle vocal harmonies and demonic rhythms, that clash and
contrast as they mix together to form odd tales of the mythical
wandering Voivod. Few "thrash" bands so artfully make sense out
of seemingly unrelated pieces of electronic rubble. Each of Voivod's
involving songs is a jigsaw puzzle of dread and jamming guitar.
Denis "Piggy" D'Amour is a guitar rhythm killer, who has mastered
a library of riffing styles, sailing them across the rivet-gun bass
of Jean-Yves "Blacky" Theriault. Piggy's solos are more atmosphere
than action, patching odd intervals and power surges onto the jumbled
memory chips of the band's mindworks. Voivod so intently leaps from
point to point that much of Nothingface doesn't always make sense.
But when the band connects its peculiar rock circuitry, as on the
diverse jazzy churning of "The Unknown Knows," or the explosive
"Pre-Ignition," you know you're listening to music tapped directly
into the future of metal.
-- Buzz Morrison
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Nothingface
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Released
in 1989 by Mechanic
./ MCA Records
All songs written and arranged by voivod except 'Astronomy Domine'
by Syd Barrett
Produced, Engineered and Mixed by Glen Robinson
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All-Music
Guide review
4 1/2 pts.
AMG
REVIEW: Arguably the best of the Denis Belanger-era Voivod albums,
Nothingface is highly recommended to just about any aficionado of
twisted, original heavy metal or prog-rock. Although its roots are
in progressive rock, the group knows when to lay off the virtuosic
overkill and play it straight. A superb, tripped-out cover of Pink
Floyd's early psychedelic masterpiece "Astronomy Domine" is
the album's highlight, and its video aired numerous times on the
early-'90s MTV show Headbanger's Ball, introducing many to the band
for the first time. Vocal melodicism is stressed heavily on Nothingface,
with Belanger's vocals pushing such tracks as "Missing Sequences"
and the title track, as do guitarist Denis D'Amour's jazzoid-metal
guitar riffs. The group's lyrics may be hard to decipher for some
(relying heavily on themes of science fiction that often paint unsettling
pictures), but ultimately help complement what the group is doing
musically. Nothingface also turned out to be their most commercially
successful album, making an appearance on the Billboard charts.
Jason Newsted of Metallica
has praised Voivod as one of his favorite metal bands on numerous
occasions, and after hearing Nothingface, it's easy to understand
why.
-- Greg Prato
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