Own an amp and you may be asked to join Voyd
As told by Darren F. Miller (guitar):
Voyd was a high school alternative rock band that Kevin Walby (vocals, guitar) started with Ryan Pegg (drums) and Ryan Keith (bass). For a lot of the early practices Pegg didn’t have a pedal for his kick drum, so he played it with his left drumstick instead. As with many high school bands, a lot of these early basement practices were recorded on a boombox, and I heard a copy at school one day. I asked Kevin (who I knew only by [his crazy] reputation at that point) to come over to my house during lunch, where I had a guitar and amp. Given the obvious equipment drought that Voyd was in at that point, I think that my owning an amp was the deciding factor behind my successful audition.
By the end of high school I had become familiar with a lot of Saskpunk bands and recordings, and I was a huge fan of all Steve Portman’s work. I knew that he had only really recorded punk bands at that point, and we definitely didn’t have any contact with the Saskpunk scene (unless you counted a Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan tent show that The Hawaiian Mafia were also booked for). Things were still pretty rough when we convinced him to record our first album, but he made it sound as good as possible (while drinking, scowling, and laughing wildly at some of the rougher takes).
Over the next five years or so we recorded another two albums and toured the country twice. We had a rotating cast of bass players: David Shanks, Charles Paul Bazin-Webster, and Prune… even Terry Mattson of longtime comrades The Junior Pantherz played bass for one show at Amigo’s! Finally the bass player from one of my favourite local bands (The Odds Are Against Us) joined the lineup and things really clicked. Stinky played bass for the last few years of Voyd’s existence, and eventually formed a new band (this time with me on bass) after Kevin left to get a master’s degree out in Victoria.
Before Kevin took off we knew that we had to release our final recordings, but we agreed that pressing CDs (as we had done for the last two albums) wouldn’t make any sense given the impending breakup. Threeohsix.org was in full swing at that point, and we were able to work out a plan with Smith so that anyone could just download the full album for free (not all that common at the time). We also burned about 50 copies for the first 50 people in the door at our farewell/album release show, but the shoddy and photocopied artwork has made a lot of people think that the surviving physical copies are pirated versions from an actual run of pressed discs.
The last time we played together was at a house show in Ryan’s living room to camouflage a marriage proposal to his high school sweetheart. Kevin and I are both out of town most of the year, and Stinky is working a very high-pressure drafting job (he designs structures that house tanks of explosive substances). Even though a reunion looks unlikely, we would all jump at the chance if circumstances lined up. In the meantime, please enjoy this final album in its original format!
Voyd – Revolutions: Parts One, Two and Three
[audio:https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/01 Revolution – Part 1.mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/02 Revolution – Part 2 (The Old US).mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/03 Revolution – Part 3 (Collective),https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/04 And That’s The Way The Cookie.mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/05 And Now That Jackass Is Our Ma.mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/06 The Old USA Numero Dos.mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/07 Ostie Disney.mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/08 Approaching A Self-Induced Tec.mp3,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/09 The Unmentionable Song,https://www.ominocity.com/downloads/Voyd – Revolutions – Parts One Two and Three/10 There’s No Invisible Hands.mp3|titles=Revolution – Part 1,Revolution – Part 2 (The Old US),Revolution – Part 3 (Collective),And That’s The Way The Cookie,And Now That Jackass Is Our Ma,The Old USA Numero Dos,Ostie Disney,Approaching A Self-Induced Tec,The Unmentionable Song,There’s No Invisible Hands]
Download full album
— Photo by Ryan Jackson