 Jimmy K here, Metal Voice. Look at us. The Metal Voice shirts are now on sale, just go to the video description to find out on how you can purchase one. Metal! Welcome to the Metal Voice, Alan. Hey, it's not Happy Gilmore, it's not Doug Gilmore, simply Gilmore. I'm trying. How are you? I'm great, Alan. How are you doing? All right. This is a great pleasure. Long time fans and glad to have you here on the show today. Yeah, it's nice to be here. Great. You know, I wanted to, you know, I think studios are super important. They're like temples of sounds and so many bands. I mean, they're so historic in a way, right? And Metal Works is a sort of a proud Canadian institution. Is that the right word institution, Alan? I would say so. Institution. And I thought, you know what, I mean, you got so many things going on with Triumph and I thought, let's just celebrate Metal Works for a second, Gil. Let's celebrate Metal Works and just talk about that a bit. Yeah, I appreciate that. I mean, it's hard for me to imagine, you know, how many years have, you know, gone by in the rearview mirror. But, you know, when we look at the music, that's what tells us where we've been and what we've done and who we've interacted with. And, you know, we've just been very fortunate because a recording studio is really just a host for a musical artist or a producer, a musical entity. And we've been lucky to be, we've hosted just some great great artists. And you know, it's amazing, Gil. 1978 is when you opened up. I guess 40 years, has it been 40 years? Yeah, we actually, the company actually started in 1977, believe it or not. And we only lasted for, I think, five or six months in our first location. And the spot where we are today opened up on Mavis Road and we moved. So the original location, there was really no studio. It was just, it was literally just the guys in the band and some, at the time, cassette recorders. No. They had these, you know, a little bit better than what they'd had previously, cassette recorders that you could, you know, plug a microphone into and record the band. So that's how humble the beginnings really were. The company was actually called Design Staging. And we changed the name to Metalworks when we moved to Mavis Road in Mississauga. Metalworks before Metal was even popular. Yeah, it was, it was funny, you know, I've been questioned about that word so many zillion times. Because in the first incarnations of the studio, you know, there was a resistance of country artists and jazz artists and so on, R&B artists, because they thought, oh, those guys just do metal. But you're right, metal was a new word. And, you know, I don't, you guys would know probably better than I would, considering, you know, the name of your show. But, you know, I remember the first time I heard it was out of John Kay's mouth in Born to Be Wild. And, and, you know, it was really a new term. It really was. But we intended the metal in Metalworks to be what we understand it to be in terms of metal music. That was, that was sort of intentional. Oh, there you go. Just some quick stats. And again, I'm just taking this off Wikipedia, Gil. Seven million, seven million albums in Canada sold, produced or mastered or a part of Metalworks, right? And 27 million in the US. That's, that's insane. That's incredible. And if I name a couple of bands, you got Guns N' Roses, of course, you have Rush, you have Kim Mitchell. Those are the bands, of course, you have so many other bands, other flavors of music, right? Yeah, we've, we've had a lot of international artists and so on. And I think, at last count, you know, some of the records that were done that originally may be sold a million, that have now sold nine million or 10 million, those kinds of things. Our studio manager did a count and he said, we're closing in on 200 million. So it's, it's interesting when you look back, but you know, some of the, you know, Guns N' Roses as an example, I mean, I think, you know, we got a platinum award for, you know, Prince, same thing. It's gone maybe 10 times platinum since then. So, yeah, it's quite a, quite a collection. I saw recently Gil on Lyres Studio and Moran Heights here in Quebec. And I mean, you know, now that's, it's just a shell. It actually caught on fire and, you know, it was one of the top studios back in the day. And, you know, at Nimbus Nine right there in Toronto, like what has been the secret to your success when you see all these other ones, renowned studios falling by the wayside? Well, you know, you mentioned Moran Heights, which of course was a great studio. And, you know, Andre Perry was, you know, a kind of a godfather of sorts and recording here in Canada. Interesting anecdote. They got the first SSL, was a very new brand of console at the time. They got the first SSL in Canada. We got the second one. Isn't that funny? And, you know, I thought that they had some remarkable, you know, achievements through that studio. I don't know when I, when I asked myself, you know, what's, you're asking me, what's the secret to the longevity of Metalworks? I think it's just one step at a time, trying to do a good job for artists. And really the credit goes to our engineering staff, which of course over the years, we've had a lot of great engineers. And now our school is turning out great engineers. We, just in the last few years, one of our engineers won the East Coast Music Awards, recording engineer of the year. I heard last week, I'm not even, haven't even found out which one. I know Riley Bell, two years ago, Riley won the recording studio, recording engineer of the year, excuse me, at the Juno Awards. And, you know, I've never seen engineers typically winning that until they're in their late 30s or their 40s. And, you know, Riley, I think is in the 26, 27 age group somewhere in there. He's not even 30 yet. So we've, we've turned out some really good engineers from our school and that credit kind of goes back to the background of the engineers that have come through the studio. So I think longevity is, you know, being associated with the right producers and engineers and just trying to have a studio be a comfortable environment, be a good host. How did it start off? Because I was, you know, we were fans of trying back in the day, me and Alan, right? Still am. It's still on. Okay, sorry. Sorry. It was still planned. Was it, was it, hey, you know, did you go up to Mike and Rick and say, Hey guys, I have this idea. I want, or was it a band effort? Or how did, how did, what was the, the sort of beginning, the starting points of that? It was the, Hey, Mike and Rick, I've got an idea. And it was, it was followed by it won't cost that much money, which turned out to be a falsehood. Because actually, Mike Levine alludes to this in our upcoming documentary about how it started with, what did he say? He said, he said something like Gil's the kind of guy that'll tell you how to build a watch. If you ask him what time it was, he says, that's the story of the studio. But truthfully, I mean, I proposed the idea of a demo studio. And I said, guys, you know, we, we've got to do something better. We, we literally started with a cassette recorder when we were on Dunwin drive. So we moved over to Mavis. And I said, you know, let's do something better. I didn't know what better was, but it was a intended to be a demo studio so that we could work on our demos. But it was kind of one of those, you know, I don't know, it's, it's like a guy building his man cave. One thing leads to another. It's like, honey, this is only going to cost a couple of grand. And then 50 grand later, you've got, you've got the Elvis room, you know, it was, it wasn't like that. And, and ultimately we just decided, okay, we want to have a world class studio. We were the first 48 tracks studio in Canada. We had, you know, success right out of the gate, the first, the first record that was done there that wasn't triumph was a band you may remember from Vancouver called dug in the slugs and bang, the record went gold, right, right out of the gate. So it was like, that was kind of easy. Yeah. And that record was called cognac and bologna. And I thought, there you go. Bologna goes gold right out of the gate. You know, Gil, to do a second part to this in Toronto, I would love to do a walk around of the studio quickly, a walk around, you know, later on, if you're cool with that. Absolutely. We, we do tours all the time. The, it takes a while though now because we're, we're three separate divisions now. So our live sound and lighting company, it's still in, in, in the same area we are at 3611 Mavis, but it's a separate facility, just like our school is separate facilities. So you're welcome to come, you could tour all three and, you know, get a metalworks coffee while you're there. What's the inscriptions like for the school? Because I mean, everybody, anybody's got a computer these days are recording themselves at home. So I mean, schools like this used to be huge in the 80s and 90s. And now I'm just curious to see what the inscriptions are like. Well, we, we teach, you got to remember, we're teaching a lot of the technology. So the, the, for example, one of our programs is called Electronic Music Production, which is an audio based music program that doesn't really require the use of consoles and microphones and so on. So it's, it's more analogous to the way film music is produced, you know, Foley effects and stuff like that. And it's primarily the turf now of EDM, DJs, hip hop, that sort of genre, whereas we still have what I'm going to call more traditional audio programs where people want to understand how to record a guitar, how to record drums, things that can't really be digitized. You can emulate them, but we had a great discussion the other day about drums as a matter of fact. And the topic was, you know, how many various versions and then iterations of those versions, there's been over the last, you know, 30 years for drum synths. And I know I had a really early drum synth. And then there were the drum machines and the TR-808 became famous and so on. But the fact remains today, there's still a demand and a need for acoustic drums, which really you need two things. You need those acoustic drums and you need somebody that knows how to play them. And then the next guy in line is that engineer who knows how to get that sound. And I don't know that that's ever going to go away. But at the same time, I would agree with what you said, like the proliferation of digital media across the internet has meant that so much of the audio that's produced these days and the sound effects that go along with it, dialogue that goes along with it and so on, or mixed media where it involves video or augmented reality, all these various venues for sound, they're just exploding. So yeah, the interest in audio is not declining. It's just kind of like the interest in music. You know, there's those who feel like, oh, I don't like the direction music is taking. And I don't like TikTok. That's a bunch of garbage, people faking music on TikTok. But if you look at it from a bigger lens and really see where young people are going, the interest they have in music is increasing. And so doing a silly video on TikTok may be a way to express it, but may lead eventually to an interest in playing an instrument, becoming a producer, maybe a songwriter, a lyricist. You really don't know. Whereas that was all hidden when we were growing up. You never saw those people because they didn't have a venue. They couldn't get in the tent, so to speak. Got the image on the back of that first Triumph album with the studio, and so this random may meet, but the obligatory lady sitting on the couch there. And you got the studio with all the buttons and that. I mean, you know, that's the kind of image you have, but like your point is it's techno music is so popular. Some of the biggest DJs in the world are getting paid enormous sums. And this all plays in the part into what you're doing at Metalworks. We got a real interesting learning experience out of working with Drake because Drake's engineer is a graduate of the school at Metalworks. His name is Noel Cadestre. And, you know, Noel's been with Drake since the very beginning. He's still with him. And kind of watching the way he worked and talking to him about the changing recording techniques with Drake and seeing as Drake got to the point where, you know, they were constantly traveling on the road. And he was using the skills that he learned at school to build makeshift environments to record Drake's raps. So whether it was on a tour bus or whether it was in a hotel room or whatever the case may be. And when we had a flood in 2014, I'm going to say 2013 or 2014, we had a bad flood that took out control room in studio two at Metalworks. And Noel was instrumental in helping me with the redesign to sort of restore the original, but bring in a lot of elements that were more in line with how the workflow has changed. And especially in the hip hop world, I would say. So, yeah, it's been quite an evolution. You know, I think that, you know, to look forward, you also have to look backwards. So I always try to tell, you know, young engineers, you know, learn something about history, you know, learn the roots. It's like in a sport. You know, if you want to be good at a sport, learn what kind of the masters did that came before, learn from the past, but look to the future. Here's a question. Guns and roses can't get a bigger album than use your illusion. What do you remember from those recordings? Were there any sort of cool moments that happened regarding guns and roses, use your illusion? Well, I guess the thing that I remember, or was sort of the biggest impact for me was meeting Michael Clank, the producer. And Mike is, he worked with Triumph just before he worked with guns. That's why guns ended up coming to Metalworks was because of Mike Clank bringing them there. And we've worked together off and on, right until this day. And in fact, this year, well, not this year, sorry, 2021, a Triumph tribute album is being released. And the producer of the tribute album is none other than Mike Clank from guns and roses fame. Yeah. As far as the guys, you know, you know, Duff, I remember was, was absolutely the most, you know, kind of outgoing, gregarious, slappy on the back, hangout kind of guy. And Axl was definitely in his own, in his own space, you know, he was, he did some very unique drawings in the lounge and on the, on the, on the console, you know, they got photographs. So he was constantly doing artwork all the time. But they were good guys. I mean, they, they, you know, a lot of the stories you hear in the press about debauchery and so on. No, there was nothing of that they, you know, Mike Clank's a very matter of fact kind of record producer. He's like, okay, we're going to start at this time, we're going to go to that time. And we got to accomplish something every day. Not that he doesn't like to have fun, but Mike's a, he's a good sergeant and arms to keep a band, you know, in line. And I think that's why he lasted so long with guns and roses is he was the guy that was able to, you know, keep, keep the platoon marching forward. You know, he had, he had that talent. Again, if we can touch on triumph a little bit, huge fan. And I think listening to the album is more and more over all the years, I, I stounded at how your voice was unbelievable. I think nobody ever talks about Gil Moore, the singer, you know, the singing drummer. Not only can you play drum, but your voice is fantastic. You had training, didn't you, Gil? Gil, you did a lot of vocal training, right? As years went by. Yeah, it's a funny story, but I, I only sang in the beginning was kind of against my intentions or my better judgment. I didn't really want to sing, but I was, before triumph, I was playing in a band and we had a, we had a job. I remember this like it was yesterday. We had a job at Honey Harbor and it was, we were getting 125 bucks for the job and our singer quit and it was like, oh my God, we're not going to lose that $125. So it was, what are we going to do? I phoned a friend of mine in another band at that time, who was a singer and I said, can you come and teach the rem, you know, the remaining band members to sing? So he came to the rehearsal, he gave us all a singing lesson. He, he listened to my voice and he said, okay, you sound a little bit like John K. So you can sing a couple Steppenwolf songs and I couldn't carry a tune in a bucket, but that was kind of how I learned to sing Trial by Fire just so that we could go to this, this, this gig in Honey Harbor and, and, and, and, you know, we were 125 bucks was a lot of money at that time. Sounds crazy now. But when triumph started, I thought, okay, I don't, I don't need to sing anymore. We've got Rick Emmett, he sings terrific. But then we realized quickly that with the energy level of the performance that we were trying to design, because we wanted a super, super high energy show that it was impossible for Rick to sing every song, especially because he sings high. That's an understatement. Yeah, so it was Gil, you have to sing. So I went, okay, here I go, getting stuck doing vocals again. And then what happened is later on as, as time progressed, it was during the Allied Forces record that I, I listened to the playback monitors and I actually liked a couple of lyrics that I sang. And it was the first time ever in my life I ever thought my own voice sounded, you know, let's just say passable. And then I developed an interest in it that was spark. And then, and then, yeah, you're right. And then I got kind of serious and I took singing lessons. And then I really started to enjoy singing and more and more and more and more. And actually when, when triumph finished, I think I was starting to enjoy vocals more than drums. That's a strange story for somebody that really didn't like it and didn't want to do it. And then really when I, when I learned Belcanto from the late Ed Johnson, who was an opera singer, and I realized, geez, there's a real science behind singing. And, you know, it's, it's, it's actually a lot of fun. It just changed my perspective. Whereas in the, in the early days in triumph, I was just, we'd go into the studio, Mike Levine would try to get me to cut the vocal and I'd be like, is it done yet? Is it done yet? You know, I'd be one take. Is it done? Is it done? If you got what you need, if you got what you, let me out of here. I don't like doing this. You know, to Alan's point, I got to say to Alan's point, after Allied Forces, okay, with Never Surrender and Thunder 7 and so on, your voice, you could tell there was more of a passion and you really started getting into, like, I mean, I would say Thunder 7 is probably you and Rick's best vocal performances, like together, right? As a, as a combo, the trade-offs and, you know, and just, just in general, it's just, it just kept going uphill. At least that's how I see it. I'm not trying to kiss ass here. I'm just trying to say it like it is. Well, the killing time song, I mean, that was a great interplay between the two voices. I mean, and unfortunately, we didn't see that too much on many other studio albums, so. Yeah, Rick was very good at, well, he was good at many things musically, but one of the things he was very good at, too, is this kind of orchestration of vocals and kind of juxtaposing, you know, harmonies, whether they were with instruments, guitars, voices, whatever, sort of, I guess, arranging generally. And that was all his work and design. And, you know, he helped me in the studio because a lot of times we'd work on songs where we were writing together. Even though I have a little bit of a background in piano, it wasn't substantial enough to really, you know, have a musical dialogue. So I would hum things to Rick, and then he would create the, he would create the melodies on guitar, and we'd make, you know, make suggestions and start working from that point. That's kind of how we collaborated. So yeah, that killing time, getting back to that was, that was quite an interesting piece. But that's really all Rick Emmett, his compositional skills. You know what's funny? Because Rick Emmett, we just spoke to Rick Emmett not too long ago. And he said, if it was up to Gilmore, we would be more of a hard rock. And he meant it in the nicest way. Don't get me wrong. He meant it in a nice way. He loves you guys, but don't get me wrong. But Gilmore wanted a heavy metal band. That's it. Is that true to that? Rick saw the name of our show, and I think he was aware of everything to come on. Yeah, I agree with Rick. It's funny when you look back, you know, like Mike, Mike Levine, he has a blues background. And I have a blues background, whereas Rick has a progressive background and classical. So if you look at the roots of blues and where it goes, into modern music, you're really looking at bands like Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones, and Deep Purple. You can really see the blues influence in those bands. The progressive side, and sometimes there was a mix. I'm looking at Richie Blackhorn, Deep Purple. He had a very new classical. Yeah, there you go. There you go. So with Triumph, yeah, I guess the blend of musicians was such that we had a guitarist who was from a different background than the bass player and the drummer. And maybe that's what worked. The fact that we had kind of a blues rhythm section with Rick's sort of more progressive approach or layer. But yeah, I guess Rick's point would be I was always trying to push the band in heavier directions. Yeah, that's absolutely true. And even to this day, I like all kinds of music, so don't get me wrong. But I love stuff that's incredibly heavy. Well, actually, I had one more question, Gil. And it goes to the hard rock aspect of stuff. The Us Festival. And you probably got asked this question so many times. How did you end up on the heavy metal day? I mean, yeah, Triumph is hard rock, for sure. But it's a stretch in a way, right? The heavy metal day in Triumph and the Us Festival. I think if you look at what's happened with metal. So when you got to the next generation of metal bands and bands like Metallica and Megadeth and so on, they were much heavier than what was considered metal, you know, in the 80s. So if you look at the Us Festival bill, and you say, were the Scorpions a heavy metal band? I mean, they were very melodic. Van Halen was doing songs that at times were pop, you know? So Joe Walsh was, you know, on that bill. Joe Walsh is a heavy metal. So who was really heavy metal? I'd say Judas Priest. I mean, I still remember them coming out in their leather. They went on right before us. Rob Halford comes up with all this black leather and studs and I went, those guys are going to melt. That's what Rick said the same thing the other day. Yeah, those guys are going to melt. But yeah, you look at the bands, I guess Motley Crue, they were on the bill, you know, they were maybe a little more, I'd say Priest and Priest and Motley Crue were probably the most metal. And then Van Halen and Scorpions and Triumph and Ozzy Osbourne were less so, you know? But I think all of us had, you know, metal attributes. I mean, if you look at Ozzy, his Sabbath stuff was much heavier than his solo stuff for a while when he was in Blizzard of Oz and so on. And then he kind of migrated almost back to the Sabbath sound, you know? It's amazing. It's amazing how it's evolved over the years. The sound, you know, and metal, what metal means today and back then too, right? Anybody that used the distortion pedal but it was lumped into heavy metal. I mean, it got Jethro Tull being nominated for a metal album, right? So I think everybody lost, I think maybe the businessman got involved and started trying to put everybody in those famous boxes and it was hard rock more times than not. Back to Gil's point. Yeah, I would agree with that. There was sort of this labeling that went on and, you know, over time you look back and you say, well, you know, the label got smeared this direction or that direction. And, you know, the people that live through the era, they kind of know what metal means but there are a lot of sub-genres, let's say. Yeah. All right. So let's just plug metalworks. Hey, if you're a band, I guess, looking to record somewhere, go to metalworks or if you want to learn how to become an engineer, producer, go to the Metalworks Institute. Gil, it's just, I guess the website is there for all the contact information, correct? It is, yeah. MetalworksStudios.com, MetalworksInstitute.com and our sound company is Metalworks Production Group.com. And Video Production too, right? Yes. We do it all. All right. And of course, the documentary, that's in the works. We'll talk more about that later on, I guess, do you know when it's coming out? It was slated to come out next month but I think what's happened is because of COVID it's been pushed back a bit. So I'm going to guess and it's going to be before Christmas but I'm not sure when. The film festival that they were shooting for, which was Toronto International Film Festival, when it went virtual or essentially all the film festivals have kind of melted during COVID. So there's really no date that they're shooting for. It's just kind of a no wine before it's time approach now. But they are getting closer to the final stage. I know they're at picture lock right now. So it's coming along great. I think it's going to be a really cool film, not just for Triumph fans but for anybody that's a music fan that wants to look back to that era. They'll get something out of it. Where is it going to be shown? Where is it going to be shown? Like is it Netflix or theaters? That hasn't been determined. I would think it'll have a theater run and I think Netflix is a likely location. I can tell you that in Canada, it will be on Crave. So Crave is a great, I guess Canada's Netflix, should say. And it'll be on Crave in Canada for sure because I know that that distribution deal has been made. But in America and Europe, the deals are still pending. So yeah, Netflix would be a good guess as a place to look for it. But it could end up elsewhere. And then the theater run, I would expect it will be different in Canada than it is in the United States. But there will be some sort of event in both countries. I would imagine we'll be with Cineplex up here. He was living for the weekend and he's had a hot time in the city tonight. He's got to get to the pharmacy. Never surrender. And I guess the good fight. And the last plug, is there any, I know there's vinyl releases for Triumph. Is there any music or unreleased music or anything like that happening with Triumph? Yeah, they just released not too long ago, the 120 gram vinyl version of Allied Forces. And next up is the tribute album that I mentioned with Mike Clink. And it's going to have some fantastic guest artists on it, including a return of Phil X. So yeah, so it's going to be a lot of fun. Mike was, I'm going to guess that that will be out in maybe the spring of 2021. Mike was starting to record it in Los Angeles anytime right now. He was supposed to start in July, but he was having trouble getting the studio availabilities that he wanted because of COVID. But he'll be starting up this month in August. So that'll probably be the next release. And on top of that, I know that there is a box set being put together by Round Hill that is going to be a blockbuster. Like there's never been a really, really big, thorough box set done on Triumph. And this one is going to be a five star version. So in that case, they're just working on curating the artwork to put it together. And I know they're going to be looking for unusual aspects in terms of recording. And it will definitely contain vinyl. How much vinyl? I don't know. But that'll be a package that'll be a real work of art when it's finished. From what I've seen so far. Will the band ever record again? I know you guys are touring is kind of on hiatus now or stopped, but will the band ever record? It's hard to say. I mean, there's nothing stopping us. Obviously, Metalworks is still there. We played three songs in the film. And they're recorded. So actually, that live performance is part of the documentary. And Mike and Rick and I have kicked around the idea of going back in the studio. You know, Mike and I recorded a little bit on Rick's last album. That was fun. So, you know, we're all quite busy. So it's, you know, finding the time to do it and the musical inspiration and so on. It could happen. We'll see. Good. Never say never. Never say never. Never surrender. Allied forces and thank you so much, my friend. Thank you so much for taking your time talking to us about Triumph and Metalworks and looking forward to a Metalworks tour for the Metalvoice fans to see what it's like on the inside. Hey, Jim, Jim, Rick and Gil in almost the same week. We hit the big time. We're missing Mike. We're missing Mike. Where's Mike? Thanks, Gil. I'll tell you where he's not. He's not in Jamaica. He's back in Toronto right now, but it was great. It was great chatting with you guys and definitely look forward to seeing you at Metalworks when the time permits and COVID lightens up a bit.