In _layout.gsp that is being used by your view:
<html lang="en" ${pageProperty(name:'page.ngapp')} > ...... </html>
Then you will be able to alter the value in subsequent gsp views that use previous layout:
<content tag="ngapp">ng-app='angularApp'</content>
EDIT: In newer version of grails that I was using (2.4.4) I had to specify the attribute - value combination without quotes:
<content tag="ngapp">ng-app=angularApp</content>
Finally the rendered view will have whatever you wanted there to be:
<html lang="en" ng-app="angularApp" > ..... </html>