It's September of 1981 and Bruce is riffing about Triumph's album, Allied Forces. Featuring 4 tracks: Allied Forces, Magic Power, Fight the Good Fight, and Petite Etude. ENTERTAINMENT THEME: “The Fall Guy” with Lee Majors. STAFF PICKS: “Sign of the Gypsy Queen” by April Wine — Wayne. “Working in a Coal Mine” by DEVO — Brian. “Sausalito Summernight” by Diesel — Rob. “Bringing on the Heartbreak” by Def Leppard — Bruce. LAUGH TRACK: “Superfreak” by Rick James!
Brought to us by Bruce, Triumph was a great band out of Canada that tended to be in Rush's shadow. They hit their greatest commercial success in 1981 with their fourth album Allied Forces. Featuring Gil Moore on drums and vocals, Mike Levine on bass and keyboards, and Rik Emmett on the high vocals and the flying "V" guitar, Triumph wrote stunning anthems and driving rock pieces with a bent to the prog rock and classical styles. This podcast features this impressive album and a number of excellent staff picks from 1981.
Allied Forces
The title track is the fourth track on the album, with Gil Moore on lead vocals. A solid, straightforward rock song, it didn't get a huge amount of air play on the radio, but it got some attention on the new music video formats like MTV which were just becoming popular in the early 80's.
Magic Power
This was a very popular anthem, and it amazed the band to start playing this song and hear the audience singing the words back to them. There's a lot of influence here from Led Zepplin (slow starts with crescendos to a driving finish) and The Who (acoustic guitars forming the base, adding synth, followed by off beat drums).
Fight the Good Fight
A minor key hit with rebellious, libertarian lyrics: "All your life you've been waiting for your chance/where you'll fit into the plan/but you're the master of your own destiny/so give and take the best that you can."
Petite Etude
This is a straight classical guitar piece by Rik Emmett. Triumph often included a classical style instrumental piece on their albums.
Theme from "The Fall Guy" A TV show from 1981 which featured Lee Majors playing a Hollywood stuntman by day and moonlighting as a detective.
April Wine - Sign of the Gypsy Queen
Wayne's staff pick highlights another Canadian band. April Wine's ninth studio album "The Nature of the Beast" contained this cover of a 1972 song by Lorence Hud. This was a moderate hit at the time, though not as popular as "Just Between You and Me," which was their most popular song of this album.
DEVO - Working in a Coal Mine
Lee Dorsey originally sang Brian's staff pick in 1966. DEVO covers it here and gives it their new wave twist. This song was later included in the soundtrack for the movie Heavy Metal.
Diesel - Sausalito Summernight
Rob's pick features a Dutch band who hit number 25 on the Billboard top 40 with this one-hit wonder. It's a great storytelling song of a wayward trip in a Rambler not quite ready for the road.
Def Leppard - Bringin' on the Heartbreak
Bruce's staff pick is Def Leppard's first real hit in the US, off their second album High N Dry. They became successful with this song on video rather than radio.
Rick James - Superfreak We close out with this podcast with this soulful, and somewhat playful song.