Triumph’s third album, Just a Game (1979), featured a moderate US radio hit, ” Hold On “, which reached No. 38 on the Billboard Hot 100. “Hold On” became a significant song in some select markets; for example, in St. Louis the song made it to No. 1 on KSHE…
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In 1979, Chris Houston (a.k.a. Pogo Agogo) joined the band and played bass on the 1980 release In Love With the System . Houston left the band just over a year later citing “creative differences” and time constraints as he pursued post secondary education.
In February 1978 Triumph subbed in for Sammy Hagar on a radio-station promotion date for 99.5 KISS-FM in San Antonio , Texas , followed by a run of five shows in Texas for JAM Productions (a promoter named Joe A Miller), then toured across Canada with fellow Canadian rockers Moxy…
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In 1978, the band Hell Razor formed in Ottawa , Ontario . It consisted of vocalist and drummer Dan Beehler, guitarist John Ricci, and bassist Allan James Johnson. In 1980, the band changed their name to Exciter and recorded a demo which they then sent to Mike Varney of Shrapnel…
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On August 26, 1978 they were headliners at the Canada Jam Festival at Mosport Park in Bowmanville, Ontario , playing before a crowd of about 110,000 people.
Triumph’s self-titled first album was originally released in Canada in 1976. It was later retitled on re-issues as In the Beginning . The second album, Rock & Roll Machine , followed in 1977 and contained a version of the Joe Walsh song ” Rocky Mountain Way “. Neither of these…
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Keeler and Young left the group soon after the band’s first single was released and in the summer of 1975 Moore and Levine met guitarist Rik Emmett , who was playing at Toronto’s Hollywood Tavern in a band called ACT III. After jamming with the pair at Moore’s house in…
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Before Triumph, there was a four-piece blues-based band consisting of Tom Lafferty (guitar), Peter Young (organ), Mike Levine (bass) and Gil Moore (drums, vocals). This group, called Abernathy Shagnaster (Abernathy Shagnaster’s Wash and Wear Band), signed to Canada’s Attic Records in 1975 and issued the non-charting single “Hobo” / “Got…
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Helix were formed in 1974 for a battle of the bands contest in Kitchener, Ontario , Canada by drummer Bruce Arnold and lead guitarist Ron Watson. They were originally a six-piece, consisting of Arnold, lead vocalist Brian Vollmer , guitarists Watson and Rick “Minstrel” Trembley, keyboardist Don Simmons, and bassist…
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Kick Axe was formed in Regina, Saskatchewan , Canada, in 1974 by Larry Gillstrom (guitar), Victor Langen (bass guitar), and his brother Gary Langen (drums, lead vocals), but at those times they called themselves Hobbit. In 1976, they changed the name to Kick Axe. After several line-up changes, by 1979,…
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