Nothingface
In the previous posts Hinsides Magazine had the pleasure to meet the legendary visual artist and drummer Michel Langevin, more known as “Away” in the Canadian rock band Voivod.
A conversation that revealed some questions that had been unanswered for decades and will be featured as a whole in the next physical issue of the magazine. In todays post you can read the background story to why Michel were one of our most wanted participants.
The cover of “Nothingface”. (MCA Records 1989)
Obs! Stormarknad. (Skövde)
In the late eighties It happened from time to time that I visited a large Walmart with my family to do the weekly shopping of groceries. On those occasions, if the time was right, I could take a stroll on my own to see if there were some interesting news to find in the record section? Two of the very first LP´s that I bought with my own money were actually picked up at this place, and one of them has since then been some kind of strange friend or enigma that I keep coming back to. Just like I used to come back to that Walmart in search of new discoveries and musical experiences. The record I´m referring to here is the ingenious ”Nothingface” by the Canadian band Voivod.
A band that I knew absolutely nothing about at the time. The cold sinister impression that the cover gave me, together with a low-price sticker, was luckily enough to push me over the edge and make a purchase. Something that would prove to be very rewarding as I instantly found the music to be both intriguing and a bit different from pretty much everything that I had heard before. What the ten year old version of my being did not realize then was exactly how special this album in fact is. And naturally so, because most of the records that you hear at a young age are big experiences regardless of how original the artist is in comparison to other musicians.
Art by Michel Langevin. (Taken from the backside of the cover of “Nothingface”.)
So, I had no clue if there were thousands of bands out there, sounding just like Voivod does on ”Nothingface”, but I liked what I heard and thought that this band did a cool mix of ”punk-ish” hard-rock. In addition to this I did also sympathize with the dark view on the future that both the images and lyrics expressed and felt that this band seemed to be concerned about the same things that I were.
This meant that this particular LP did spin for some time there before heavier bands came to steal all my attention in the nineties and It took quite some time before I finally rediscovered the greatness of this album again.
It´s not easy to remember when this rediscovering actually happened, but perhaps it was when I were putting a mixtape together before attending to a festival some years ago? With all years of intense musical experiences since my initial acquaintance with “the face of nothing” it struck me how odd and unique this band and LP still appeared to me, and how much I do appreciate Voivods rare blend of sound pollution. Which felt kind of overwhelming actually. To relive all the impressions and to realize that my experience of hearing something quite unique while still being a child made me curious again and determined to dig further into the imaginative worlds of Voivod. A journey that I´m still not finished with, but eager to continue.
Another iconic album and cover. “Killing Technology” 1987
A significant part of experiencing the whole concept of Voivod are, without a shadow of a doubt, the sharp and horrific art of Michel Langvine. It´s even possible that the cover of the before mentioned LP were my first exposure to digital art as Michel were one of the early explorers of computer made imagery. Being interested in both music, art and literature, that are the main focus of this publication (in case you didn’t notice) and on the mission to find out more about this band I knew that I had to get in touch with Mr Michel somehow.
The fruits of this revelation are to be found here