I love Rik!! This is from 1999, I love the Styx reference too! It explains some of the things he lost!
http://www.melodicrock.com/interviews/rikemmett.html
How did your name get into the Styx summer tour equation?
A friend of a friend of a friend let me know that they were shopping for a vocalist for a summer tour. I already had some commitments, but I made a few alternative suggestions back along the pipeline.
Did the band approach you at all?
The band did not officially and directly approach me. But when I caught wind of things, I did send an e-mail to Tommy, and thanked him for the compliment of his (and his band mates) considering me for the gig.
Did you know Tommy Shaw previously / socially?
I have had some previous interaction with Tommy when the Damn Yankees were
first gearing up, but that was not in person - if I recall, there might have been a phone conversation.....We have never hung out socially, and do not know each other personally: but professionally, I respect the guy, and admire his talents.
The offer from Styx reminds me that you have been solo now for over 10 years.
You walked away from a Platinum selling act that along with Rush were one of the biggest bands in Canadian history. Any regrets at calling it
quits from Triumph?
Nope.
And you were both power trio's! Did you guys know each other well or hang out?
Nope. In the very early days of Triumph, Alex Lifeson had come out to a downtown Toronto gig once, if I recall correctly, and had been a warm guy, with nice compliments, etc.
Years later, I had done a GUITAR PLAYER magazine recording project with Alex, and found him to be a terrific recording artist and a really nice person: witty, engaging, a
very together guy. But I have only met Neal and Geddy ever-so-briefly at industry award functions, in passing.
I have a great respect for RUSH, and for the generous coattails that they provided for a band like Triumph...but it would be an overstatement to say that we "know each other well". I do not know them, practically, at all and although Alex and I kept threatening to invite each other to a backyard barbecue someday, it never really happened.
Generally, I think, it is somewhat of a fantasy, perhaps based on L.A. based rock bands "partying" together, that rock musicians "hang out' together. We all have careers: we have families. We have lives. We simply don't "hang out" much at all, never mind together...
Why was that the right time to go solo?
In my humble personal opinion, TRIUMPH had run its course, and had maxxed out on its potential. There were conflicting goals and desires inside the band: it had ceased to be the rock band that I wanted to be in. It was not the band that could fulfill my musical ambitions or expectations.
Were things (relationships) within the band not going well?
There were some major problems, yes.
The relationship between you guys seemed to go downhill even further after the split.... I heard that the band - for want of better wording - ripped you off as far as royalty payments ect... How did you feel about the guys using your friend Rick Santers on the Triumph album Edge Of Excess - after you produced Rick's own albums?
That didn't bother me in the slightest. I will admit, that initially, I had hoped that the other guys would see fit to retire the band name "TRIUMPH" with dignity and class, and had argued for that at the time (1988).
But my former partners did not want to do that. They wanted to continue on without me, and, as controlling majority partners in the partnership, decided to enter into a long, protracted, complicated legal negotiation and lawsuits in order to settle issues of publishing rights, unpaid royalties, partnership draws of funds, etc.
Once that paradigm had been established, I relinquished any hope that the issue of Triumph's future would be settled amicably, or that I would have any influence. It simply became an issue of how I could extricate myself from the partnership. After that, it ceased to be important to me. It was simply none of my business what they did: who they hired, etc. My only honest emotional reaction was a feeling of sympathy for Rick, (and
later, local axe guys Phil X and Mladin) and what they might have to go through: but I hoped it would be a positive experience for them, and a positive one for their careers. You might want to track them down and ask them if they think it was.
That album was Ok, but missed that certain spark - maybe your spark! - did you hear it and what did you think of it?
I have not listened to it sufficiently to make public critiques of it.
I can say, that upon first hearing it, I was absolutely convinced that I had made the right decision for myself, and that the direction that TRIUMPH chose to go in, and the directions that I have shown in the six CDs I have recorded since leaving the band, illustrate vividly that there were artistic differences within the band that were irreconcilable.
So how did all the triumph re-union rumors get started?
Beats me.
There was a real on again off again frenzy through last year that you guys would get together. Was it ever an option?
Not for me. I was never directly approached, although feelers were sent out through intermediaries. I have no legal stake, no financial stake, in a reunion.
TRIUMPH, by virtue of the settlement I finally (and wearily) decided to accept in 1995, some 7 years after leaving, is no longer any of my business.
I would guess it's pretty obvious who might have a vested interest in stirring up a frenzy about get-togethers - but it certainly ain't me.
Is there any slim chance of it happening in the future?
I once helped write a song with Sil Simone that made it on to the TRIUMPH Surveillance CD that was entitled, "Never Say Never". So I suppose there is always a chance that anything could happen.
But reunions usually only happen for two reasons: one is money....but frankly, I don't think TRIUMPH could generate the kind of gross revenue that, pared down to a third of the net, could match what I make now on my own.
Plus, after all the dirty water under the bridge, I would have an extremely difficult time trusting my former partners to play the revenue thing straight with me, anyway.
Plus: there is all of that complicated legal stuff.....if I don't own any Triumph business, how can I legitimately claim any of the revenue from CD catalogue sales, T-shirt merchandising, licensing deals, etc. etc.?
They fought so long and hard to exclude me from all of that: I can't imagine how they could fashion a verifiable, reasonable deal that would make me feel welcome again.
Which leads us to the second reason: nostalgia. The warm fuzzies for all of the great
by-gone years. But as far as I'm concerned, all of that stuff got completely vaporized when my former partners did such a thorough job of burning bridges for 7 or 8 years.
Listen to the cut "Too Little, Too Late" off of my RAW QUARTET CD.....you'll get a sense of where I'm coming from on the whole nostalgia issue.
Sure. Absolutely was your solo debut. What vision did you have in mind for your first solo album? For me that was one hell of a great melodic rock album.
Thanks. That was the vision: to make one helluva melodic rock CD.
To make something that was a logical growth from the TRIUMPH image, without
disenfranchising old fans, while at the same time trying to make some more personal statements as a songwriter - which was difficult to do in a band image situation.
I still rate it is my favorite Rik Emmett album - even above your Triumph album's Sport Of Kings, Thunder Seven and Surveillance.
Those two Triumph albums had a few moments, but generally I don't think
they are as strong as ALLIED FORCES, JUST A GAME, and some of the stuff
on THUNDER 7. It's just personal taste, I reckon.
I tend to prefer JUST A GAME because the songs on there still have the individual
songwriting credits, whereas later records had 3-way credits, which I kick myself about now (obviously). Sales numbers-wise, and even now, with crowd reaction at live gigs, the GAME material and ALLIED FORCES stuff is the heavy fan favorite stuff.
Songs like Big Lie, Saved By Love and Middle Ground are just wonderful. Can you tell me the lyrical story behind those three tracks in particular. Big Lie was an interesting social commentary...
Thanks. Yeah, BIG LIE was a tongue-in-cheek kind of political/social soapbox thing - I always thought that the companion to it, lyrically anyway, was WORLD OF WONDER. You can go back to ORDINARY MAN from ALLIED FORCES to trace the lineage of that kind of song lyric writing.
I tend to trust people when they are individuals.....when they start to organize into religions, political parties, big business, etc., they start to lose their humanity and begin to take on some of that BORG Collective horror for me....
SAVED was about relying on the people that I loved, and who loved me, when I was going through the dark, tough times of changing my path in life. MIDDLE GROUND was the first song that I wrote when I left Triumph - it's about that experience, trying to find myself, my own space. It's a folk song, really. Should've just done it acoustically. It's better at solo shows, now, I think.
Ipso Facto followed that album up and it was a little different again.
Did you just think that it was time to experiment and diversify a bit?
The first half was pure rock and then it kind mixed between acoustic pop and blues with maybe even a little jazz influence...
Not experiment. Diversify, yes.....but the hard rock songs on there were because the record distributor (MCA) and the label (Duke Street) and my manager (Ross Munro) were afraid of the softer, mellower, older Rik Emmett.
They really insisted on getting some old-fashioned AOR rock that they could market to the older fan demographic. I was willing to oblige - after all, I like all kinds of styles of music. But surprise, surprise - the older rock fan wasn't buying CDs from guys like me anymore, and the younger rock fans had all gone Seattle grunge and post-punk and whatever. The demographic pie had been sliced into thinner pieces, and diversity was a death sentence - as was any semblance of progressiveness, or melodic late 70's or 80's rock. This
was not even worthy of being spit upon as dinosaur rock: it was 2nd generation dinosaur droppings......Thus spoke the pharisees of style.
I think it was only released in Canada though. Does this frustrate you - that you have to have different labels for different countries to release product?
Sure, it's a little frustrating, Andrew.
I wish that I was independently wealthy, and/or that a major label saw fit to sign me to a worldwide deal that made the making of CDs, the distribution and selling of them, an easy thing. But none of that is going to happen any time soon, so I'll just have to be content with fighting my little guerilla warfare against the mainstream biz the best that I can. It's actually turning itself into a tidy little living, thank you very much. And the CDs are getting better and better, and the experience has made them easier to get done!
What happened after 1992 and the gap between Ipso Facto and The Spiral
Notebook? What did you spend your time doing?
Played some gigs, wrote some songs, raised a family......Fought the personal war (still going on today) between the manager & agents and music biz, content to try and sell a nostalgia arena rock guy, and a maturing, middle-aged musician/recording artist/songwriter who wants to keep moving ahead (within reason).
Ha! That album was more diverse and a mellower Rik Emmett than we were used to...
Who's "we"? Is that the royal "we"?
Er, just my opinion! I felt that the album was a big departure in style for you.
To a more mellow acoustic pop feel?
Don't you ever feel like you do injustice to something to lump it all up in a ball?
Does THE HARDEST PART seem "mellow acoustic" to you? Does THE PENDULUM? Does SILENT REVOLUTIONS?
I'll admit, the CD focused, intentionally, on a singer/songwriter approach: no guitar pieces, no instrumentals, and no bluesy rock. But we had entered into the age of boutique marketing. The demographic pie slices were even thinner. The music industry did not have the vaguest clue what they were going to do to market a guy like me. And, as a songwriter, the best thing I had was an extremely heartfelt, tender, sweet, romantic song about marriage - LET ME BE THE ONE. Personally, I got a little kick out of screwing with expectations anyways: my true fans, the ones who really know me, know that I'm the guy who wrote Suitcase Blues in '78, and who wrote TAKE MY HEART on Progressions of
Power in 1980, and who co-wrote "I Love You the Way that You Love Me" for ABSOLUTELY, etc. - so they knew that I could make a CD like SPIRAL.
But all of the people who were only half paying attention, all of the people who only get their entertainment in soundbite form, and who only listen to the hits off of a CD, and who rely more on style than substance, (liked Triumph for the flashpots & laser lights) and surface rather than depth: they were probably surprised.
Scratch that. They weren't even aware - SPIRAL went right under the radar. And the record company, and the distributor, and the manager, and the artist - no one had a clue, or the financial resources or willpower, to pump it up into the mainstream's notice.
After 1995 you had another 2 year break and it would seem that your
label disappeared also. What was that like?
I wondered what I would do next...I wrote some songs, I played some gigs, I raised my family.....I upgraded my home studio and began climbing the huge learning curve of digital recording...(with the help of many good friends...)
And in 1997 - 2 albums! The first 2 records in your trilogy....
What were your ambitions going into this project? Ten Invitations....your thoughts on this album?
INVITATIONS was a CD of nylon string classical guitar pieces - a CD I had been waiting all of my professional life to make. I had no expectations of ever having it make it into the mainstream - and I haven't been proved wrong. But it's a record that I'm proud of -
especially because I recorded it myself, in my own little digital studio, and I started a little label and I put it out and I made a go of it, independently.
Swing Shift album? Are you happy with the response you got from these
releases?
Delighted, yes, thanks.
1998 - and the final release in the trilogy has been released - Raw Quartet. What was your vision for the trilogy?
Pretty obviously, I think - nylon string instrumentals, archtop swing & smooth jazz, and finally electric blues - the three elements of my guitar roots.
Has this been achieved?
What do you mean by "achieved"?
It is what it is.
To clarify, are you happy with the result?
I wish I had had a million dollars to spend making each CD - I wish I had another million to spend marketing them.
I wish the people on ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT thought that the CDs were as news worthy as Pamela Anderson's breast reductions....but I am content that the CDs are finished, and out there, and have some pretty good tunes on 'em.
I am happy that they are getting some recognition, and that it looks like I might make enough dough to go ahead and try to make another CD. And then maybe another.
And another.
The critical response seems to have been very good.
And I appreciate that.
What about the commercial success?
As long as this OPEN HOUSE thing is self-sustaining, I will be a pig in
muck...!
I would like to put my kids through college, and pay off my mortgage.....Oh, and my van is 10 years old....I'd like a new set of wheels soon.......Fortunately, the "commercial" success of the Cds translates into a renewed interest in booking Rik Emmett for live gigs,
and the whole Internet Web-site thing has spawned some vitality and currency that is exceedingly gratifying.
Plus, my relationship with YAMAHA has been rejuvenated, so there is another level of exposure in the guitar magazines, and through clinics, etc. It feels like there is something growing, which is very, very gratifying...
Which is more important for you?
You can't separate artistic from commercial in what I do - they co-exist.
"Critical" is what you contrasted commercial with - and I have never had much "critical" success, except grudgingly for the occasional technical thing or two. I think I am getting a lot of critical and media-related sympathy and interest now, because I seem to
be an old dinosaur dog who has learned new tricks: plus, the whole website/indie label/guerilla boutique guitar record trilogy thing seems to be worth something....It's that whole currency/vitality thing........The lure of a tiny little buzz way way off the beaten
path........
What is your favourite solo album?
The next one that I will make....
What about your favourite Triumph album?
Answered earlier. JUST A GAME has songs that are still credited to me alone: when they get played on the radio, I get my songwriter's airplay royalties from the collection agencies. I also have a preference for some of my songs on ALLIED FORCES, but it bugs me that way back when I voluntarily surrendered 2/3rds of the songwriting credit for all time.
As far as publishing copyrights and royalties go, for the entire Triumph catalogue - they are gone forever. So I guess my favorite CDs are the ones in my solo catalogue - THOSE are the ones that I get royalties for.
I really love the production and grandness of the Surveillance album. Did you guys have a set plan for the album before you went into the studio?
I did - and I shared much of that with Tom Trumbo, who spent the majority of the time in the studio with me on that project. But I think it's fair to say that my vision was not the same one that Mike Levine had: nor the same one that Gil Moore had.
Tom ended up, by virtue of his political position, compromising the visions. It was extremely disappointing to me: I would never assume to speak for my former
partners, but I think it's safe to say that they did not think I had an all-purpose vision for Triumph and its artistic image.
Surveillance was also the last album you guys recorded together. What was the experience like?
The band was in a pretty bad state. Everybody had their own personal problems that they were dealing with - and MCA was clearly unhappy and frustrated with the band's inability to deliver the home run hit.
Everybody pretty much cut tracks separately. Gil Moore worked in another studio almost entirely, doing his vocals. He also worked with outside writers to get songs that he could be the lead vocalist on and that he thought might be hit singles for the band. He also rewrote the lyrics to a song I had written, ROCK YOU DOWN, on the last day of
mixing, and re-cut the vocal on the same day the masters were being shipped out to L.A. It was an experience I will never forget. It was one of the straws that broke this camel's back.
How about your favourite tour or live experience?
Allied Forces was the best tour - but having the private jet for one of the tours (Sport of Kings - maybe? Thunder Seven?) was pretty cool.
Best live experience - pretty hard to top the US Festival in '83...250,000 people...
I also personally had some good gigs in San Francisco over the years, and San Antonio was always like a homecoming, because it's where it started Stateside for us. Playing Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto was always a thrill, as it was in any of the NHL rinks - Spectrum in Philly, Nassau Coliseum in Long Island, The Aud in Buffalo: Triumph always had great shows at Joe Louis in Detroit, and at the Rosemont Horizon in Chicago.
Best memories of Triumph years?
Playing Name That Tune in dressing rooms, waiting for flaky club owners to pay up in the early days. Running around dressing rooms playing Exotic Headgear.
Sliding down the boardroom table in the law offices of Lang Michener.
Haha! Solo years?
On stage with Colleen Allen & Sil Simone: working with drummer Randy
Cooke (esp. on the blues project): going to Doug Riley's place to get organ od's on RAW Q. cuts: playing all of the Grass Roots solo shows lately: heavenly custom built
audiences!!!
What is next up for Rik Emmett? I read that this is the last album in your
solo instrumental series. Does this signal a possible change in direction for your future recordings? Maybe back to the rock style that made you famous? What other plans do you have?
Maybe a rock record - I'm not sure yet. I have some folk songs in the can - I may do another trilogy, with prog rock as 1, folky acoustic as 2, and instrumentals as 3....maybe it will all fit on one 75 minute CD....I don't know yet.
I haven't written much - I am too busy gigging and touring to support the trilogy that just came out. Don't rush me!!!!!
