ANGEL RAT

"Angel Rat" is the sixth full-length studio album by Canadian progressive metal act Voivod. The album was released through Mechanic/MCA Records in November 1991. It´s the successor to "Nothingface" from October 1989, which was the band´s most commercially successful release up until then (and still is). Although Voivod shot a promotional video for "Clouds in My House", "Angel Rat" did not receive the same amount of praise and wasn´t as commercially successful as "Nothingface". It was the last Voivod album to feature the original quartet lineup, as bassist Jean-Yves Thériault (Blacky) recorded his parts for "Angel Rat", but exited Voivod before the release of the album. Voivod brought in prolific producer Terry Brown (Rush, Queenrÿche...etc.), who is responsible for producing, mixing, and engineering "Angel Rat".

When "Panorama" kicks in just after the short intro track ("Shortwave Intro"), it´s immedately apparent that Voivod have changed a lot since "Nothingface". Although "Angel Rat" is certainly a well performed release, all the most odd dissonant chords and time-signature changes are gone and instead Voivod present the listener with a melodic heavy rock/metal style. It´s still unmistakably the sound of Voivod with Denis Bélanger´s distinct sounding punkish vocals in front, but "Angel Rat" is a decidedly more melodic and straight forward release than anything Voivod had released up until then. "Nothingface" featured melodic moments but those melodic moments were woven into an odd dissonant and rhythmically challenging sound, which ultimately sounds very little like the music featured on "Angel Rat". Denis D-Amour still produce some pretty unconventional sounding riffs, which provide the album with a lot of identity and his at times futuristic sounding lead work is also a great asset.

I´ll be honest here and say that my guess is that Voivod were trying to make a commercial release to see how far they could drive their career (which is of course fair and understandable). When you know what came after "Angel Rat" it´s obvious Voivod didn´t succeed and therefore returned to a less mainstream oriented style on the subsequent releases, and if "Angel Rat" was their attempt at achieving commercial success I´d say they miscalculated a few things. First of all very few of the tracks on "Angel Rat" are immediately catchy and memorable. Even after listening to the album many times over the years, there are still tracks on the album I can´t remember what sounds like before I listen to the album. That´s not a good condition if you want to sell albums. Secondly the sound production is a bit "off". It´s overall a decent quality sound production, but it´s like the instruments are a bit detached in the soundscape (especially the drums) and I have to say that I was surprised to learn that this is a Terry Brown production.

When that is said "Angel Rat" is still a good quality release and tracks like "Clouds in My House" and especially the brilliant "The Prow" can be viewed as highlights. Upon conclusion "Angel Rat" may be Voivod´s botched attempt at achieving commercial success but it´s also an interesting and unique album release in their discography. It suffers a bit from being bookended by two of Voivod´s strongest albums, but a 3.5 star (70%) rating is still deserved.

(Originally posted on Metal Music Archives).