Back in the mid to late ’80s, you couldn’t say the name of the
\nband Triumph without immediately conjuring up the name of Rush.
\nAfter all, the bands had quite a bit in common: both were from
\nCanada, both were power trios with guitarists who could run the
\ngamut of styles in their playing, both groups wrote music that
\ncould make their listeners think – and both groups’ first albums
\nweren’t the strongest efforts they would ever put out.<\/p>\n
Of course, this is a Triumph review, not a Rush review… that
\nwill come later. For now, let’s focus on
\nRock & Roll Machine<\/i>, the full-length American debut that
\nappears to be a compilation of two earlier Canadian albums. In
\nretrospect, I’d rather have the two full-length Canadian releases,
\nbut I wasn’t up to making music industry decisions in 1978.<\/p>\n
If there were only two words one could use to describe the band
\nat this time, they would be “in flux”. The lead vocal duties were
\nsplit between drummer Gil Moore and guitarist Rik Emmett, though on
\nthis release, it seems like Moore has the lion’s share of the mike
\nwork. Rounding out the trio is bassist\/keyboardist Mike Levine, who
\nalso was a co-producer of the record. (To Levine’s credit, he
\ndoesn’t try to mix his contributions to the forefront and hide the
\nwork of his bandmates.)<\/p>\n
The group was in flux because they were caught between the more
\nheady direction their music would eventually take and the bar-band
\nmentality, singing about rock music and life on the road.
\nRegrettably, it’s the bar-band mentality that wins out on Rock
\n& Roll Machine, and it gets real old, real quick. Songs like
\n“24 Hours A Day” just fall flat, and their cover of Joe Walsh’s
\n“Rocky Mountain Way” – well, let’s just say I was never a fan of
\nthe original work.<\/p>\n
There is a sign of things to come musically on the song “Street
\nFighter” and the reprise which segues into the original song. Why
\nthe song wasn’t just combined into one piece I don’t know; it works
\nwell that way. It’s not the strongest cut that Triumph ever wrote,
\nbut it’s a decent start that deserves your attention.<\/p>\n
Emmett also calls himself into the spotlight with his guitar
\nwork on “Blinding Light Show \/ Moonchild,” a song which allows him
\nthe freedom to demonstrate his chops without becoming too showy. If
\nonly he had followed that on “Rock & Roll Machine,” which is
\nalmost strictly a lead guitar device featuring some
\nnot-too-impressive riffing by Emmett.<\/p>\n
As nice as it was for Triumph to have the availability of two
\nstrong lead vocalists, Moore just didn’t seem to have what it took
\nto really push the band into the forefront, while Emmett really
\nisn’t given a chance to show his power on this disc.<\/p>\n
\nRock & Roll Machine<\/i> is a tentative first step from
\nTriumph, and it doesn’t quite hint at the greatness that was just
\nahead of the band – greatness which they would taste just one album
\nlater. But that’s another story for another review.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25500,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6012],"rating":[5619],"class_list":["post-36706","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-triumph","rating-rating-c"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36706\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36706"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36706"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}