The drummer says getting back on the road was not his intention, and explains why the band agreed to 16 more shows and a second documentary.
Gil Moore did not expect to be doing this. Triumph‘s drummer says a return to touring was never part of his plan, and then the first leg happened.
The band’s “Rock & Roll Machine Reloaded” tour, their first road work in more than three decades, opened in April and sold in excess of 135,000 tickets across 27 dates. Live Nation, which produces the tour, wanted more. Triumph agreed to 16, announced on August 24, running through November and December.
“I can’t tell you how excited the band is and how the first leg was just, it was overwhelming how positive the vibe was in the audience, in the dressing room, on the bus, everywhere that you can imagine, in the airports,” Moore told WNST and Baltimore Positive founder Nestor Aparicio (as transcribed by Blabbermouth). “It was a love fest, the whole thing. And it was hard to say ‘no’ to Live Nation when they wanted to extend it, because we knew there were great cities that have been really loyal to Triumph that we hadn’t played yet. And it’d be nice if we could just play every single city and retrace our entire history. Of course, we’re doing our best. We added 16 more. We did 27 the first round. So, yeah, we’re getting up there in numbers. It’s close to 60 shows.”
The two legs together total 43 dates.
Moore was candid about how little appetite he had for this before it started.
“I think for me personally, it wasn’t part of my game plan to get back and do a rock and roll tour. But then I got into it, and it was kind of like it grew on me so fast, and I thought, ‘Wow.’ If we weren’t having such a blast, it would be different. If we were out there slogging it out, and people aren’t getting along, and that kind of crap, I wouldn’t be there. It’s the fact that we had our families with us, and the band was just having a blast the whole time. And the audience, too. I mean, there were people crying at certain songs, and multi-generations in the audience. It was overwhelming, when you looked at the audience. The emotion coming to the stage from the audience was crazy, crazy different than… Back in the day, when it’s all kids and everyone’s cheering, and now you’re seeing, hey, we’ve all spent decades together on the planet, but this music is pulling us back together in a positive way. So it was kind of overwhelming, honestly,” he explained.
Asked what he had not known a year ago, that he knows now, he talked about the people he is playing with.
He said: “How perfect the shows would be. And I don’t mean perfect like we never made mistakes. Of course we made mistakes. We’d just laugh it off and grin at each other if somebody made a mistake. Perfect in the sense of the harmony of the audience, the band and our families. The total feeling of this one love that’s in the venue that’s unmistakable. I’ve never seen Rik Emmett as happy ever in my life. The guy hugged me a couple of times, and it brought tears to my eyes on stage. I couldn’t take the emotion. Watching Phil X and Rik Emmett feed off each other. These guys are monster guitar players, but they have such respect for each other’s playing. As a drummer, getting to work with Brent on every aspect of the drum kits themselves, of stick control exercises backstage, discussing this drummer and that drummer, and this type of rhythm and that type of rhythm. I’ve never had another drummer to collaborate with. Guitar players get this all the time, ’cause tons of bands have two guitar players. That’s nothing new. But two drummers, pretty rare. And thankfully, to fill Mike Levine‘s shoes, you had to have somebody that was a monster stage presence, and Todd Kerns is that monster. And what a singer. I mean, Todd‘s vocals are incredible on top of how he plays bass, and a super human being. So I guess I’m going on and on here, but that’s just what I really think.”
The touring band is Emmett on guitar and vocals and Moore on drums and vocals, with Phil X on guitar, Todd Kerns on bass and vocals and Brent Fitz on drums.
Founding bassist and keyboard player Mike Levine has not played the dates. In December 2025 he said he has “a problem” with his hand that “precludes” him “from being able to really play well.” He has continued working on the tour away from the stage, and Moore says footage of him will feature in the show’s video content.
The second leg brings a larger production. Moore said the band held back on the first run for practical reasons.
He continued: “ Well, we’ve got a lot of kind of three-dimensional or what we call two-and-a-half-D content, which I think is really, really cool, effects in the show. And we’re gonna have some more upgrades on this leg, too. We had a lot of lasers back in the day, and we didn’t have lasers on the first run. We just didn’t have enough truck space. But with this tour or this run, this part of this tour, yeah, we’re putting in a major laser infrastructure into what we’re doing. So I think we’re gonna have some really, really cool lasers. I’m working on trying to put in a couple old-school effects that we didn’t carry on the first tour, ’cause they were considered too clunky and old school. And I’m, like, ‘No, I think you need the old and the new.’ I think you need the fancy video or I’ll call it the the 3D or the two-and-a-half-D video. You need that. You need archival footage. Of course we have to have Mike involved in that footage as well if he’s not playing. So all of that stuff combined, it’s a great learning experience, and we’re just polishing it a bit more. And like I said, we’re adding some more pyro effects and some more laser effects and organic old-school stuff that I think is gonna be even better on this run.”
Moore confirmed the band are filming a follow-up to “Triumph: Rock & Roll Machine“, the 97-minute documentary directed by Sam Dunn and Marc Ricciardelli for Banger Films, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2021 and reached audiences in 2022 after the pandemic delayed its release.
“The ‘Rock & Roll Machine‘ documentary did really great things for us, and I felt like it was a great payback, too, to people that were kind of after us, ’cause we hadn’t toured,” Moore added. “But the documentary ends with a big question mark, as you know, and it’s, like, ‘Okay, what’s next?’ Well, that’s why we’re doing a part two, which is, ‘Well, here’s what’s next. It’s this band.’ This is the ‘Reloaded‘ band, and you’re gonna see it full on. We’ve recorded it from the point of view of a fan. In other words, I went back to when I was a kid, and I wanted to be kind of backstage. I wanna see how did you set the drums up? Where did you guys come in the building? What’s it like to be in the dressing room? All the stuff that you don’t get to see when you’re a fan. Well, I can remember being like that as a kid, so I thought, ‘Okay, be a kid.’ This is something that everyone’s gonna wanna see, is wanna get on the tour bus with us and see what we talk about, listen to the jokes, all the things that you don’t really get to see, the backstage maze, all of that. So as well as the actual show itself, there’s gonna be all this behind-the-scenes footage, which I think’s gonna be really special. I’m hoping we get it out in 2027, and we’re continuing to record it on leg two, so anybody that comes to leg two, hey, you might end up in it.”
Triumph have partnered with PLUS1, directing $1 from every ticket sold to the SoundsUnite Charity, which provides free music learning resources, music wellness programmes and collaboration tools to marginalised and at-risk young people.
Triumph formed in Mississauga in 1975 as a trio of Rik Emmett, Mike Levine and Gil Moore, released their self-titled debut on Attic Records in 1976 and worked their way from bars and school halls to Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto and Reunion Arena in Dallas.
The anniversary has brought other markers. Magic Power: All-Star Tribute To Triumph arrived through Round Hill Records in June 2025, a 15-track record produced by Mike Clink with contributions from Slash, Alex Lifeson, Nancy Wilson, Sebastian Bach, Dee Snider, Joey Belladonna, Lawrence Gowan, Deen Castronovo, Jeff Keith, Mickey Thomas and Phil X. In October 2025 the band entered the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, adding to inductions into the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame in 2007, the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2008, Canada’s Walk of Fame in 2019 and the Metal Hall of Fame in 2021.
Rock & Roll Machine Reloaded leg two dates with April Wine:
- Nov 17 – Van Andel Arena, Grand Rapids, MI
- Nov 18 – Heritage Bank Center, Cincinnati, OH
- Nov 21 – CFG Bank Arena, Baltimore, MD
- Nov 22 – Petersen Events Center, Pittsburgh, PA
- Nov 24 – Resch Center, Green Bay, WI
- Nov 25 – Rocket Arena, Cleveland, OH
- Nov 27 – Fishers Event Center, Indianapolis, IN
- Nov 28 – Great Southern Bank Arena, Springfield, MO
- Nov 30 – Rio Rancho Events Center, Albuquerque, NM
- Dec 01 – Fontainebleau Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV
- Dec 02 – Grand Theatre at The Grand Sierra Resort, Reno, NV
- Dec 05 – Theater of the Clouds, Portland, OR
- Dec 06 – WAMU Theater, Seattle, WA
- Dec 08 – Oakland Arena, Oakland, CA
- Dec 10 – The Kia Forum, Los Angeles, CA
- Dec 12 – Viejas Arena, San Diego, CA
