The Metal Voice spoke to Triumph Guitarist Rik Emmett about all things Triumph as well as his new book/ solo music 'TEN TELECASTER TALES' via ECW Press (out March 25, 2025)
The book ' TEN TELECASTER TALES' represents the evolution of Rik's life story into a combination of musical composition, guitar playing, and prose. Ten Telecaster Tales remakes the idea of the “concept album.” It is music that arrives inside a book. It’s also, arguably, the most comprehensive attempt at liner notes in the history of electric instrumental fingerstyle guitar albums.
When asked if there was more of a demand for Triumph today than there ever was Emmett said, "I don't think more than ever, but I do think that there's a very lovely awareness that exists on a level that 45, 50 years after the fact, who would have ever expected it? There's this thing called the Coalition for Music Education in Canada. And these folks, music educators all across the country, they pick a song to be sort of their national song for the year. And they picked (TRIUMPH's) 'Hold On' from the 'Just A Game' album of 1979. And you kind of go, 'Wow, that's great.' So, I re-recorded a new version of it and they're doing overdubs on it as we speak. They get people to write string arrangements for school orchestras and bands and choir arrangements and stuff. The woman who's the executive director, Stacey Sinclair, she sent me this link. I got to see this choir in Chatham, Ontario of kids in grade two and three and four, and they're all singing my song. And it just blows my mind that such a beautiful thing can happen while I'm still around to enjoy it. It's a cool thing. Translated by BLABBERMOUITH
"When interviewer Jimmy Kay noted that it's "a reboot for TRIUMPH" in a way, Rik said: "I think that there are things about what TRIUMPH was that makes it so that it can still have validity now for people like me. Some of it, not all of it, but some of it has aged very well, and especially given the crap that we're having to go through now in terms of politics and the COVID things we've gone through and isolation and mental health and stuff, music is something that has always had a therapeutic value, a spiritual value. And I don't care what kind of music. I would say metal might be a type of music that has more of that value than maybe other stuff. The more it gets towards pure pop, the less interesting I find it. And that was always true. In TRIUMPH I was always trying to say, 'How do we reach those people in the seats? And how can I talk straight at them?' I don't wanna be lecturing at them or hectoring them,' and I don't think, 'Oh my god, I must try to find a way to reach the commercial market.' It was, like, 'Well, no. I'm a musician and I'm gonna do what I do to satisfy myself.' I was in a band with a couple of guys that, they were pretty strong-headed, strong-willed — they knew what they wanted to do and how they were gonna try to do it. But I do think that we picked this name TRIUMPH that was supposed to be about the spirit of reaching those people and giving them something that mattered, a soundtrack for their lives. Not every song, but every album, there had to be songs that tried to do that."
Emmett, who quit TRIUMPH — acrimoniously, in 1988 — over music and business disputes, went on to pursue a solo career, while TRIUMPH carried on with future BON JOVI guitarist Phil X for one more album, 1992's "Edge Of Excess", before calling it a day the following year.
TEN TELECASTER TALES'
Playfully, beautifully, the book lays bare an artistic journey in an act of discovery — that the storytelling inherent in writing good musical compositions translates into good storytelling about the process behind the songs, and how compositions turn into recordings. The notion of a “telecaster tale” implies something “vintage” at its heart, and it is humanity that glues the layers together.
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