Hold the Line
THINGS HAVE NEVER been better for Toto,” Steve Lukather told Guitar Player back in early 2018. “Everything we were told could never happen for us is now happening for us.”
At the time, Lukather seemed to be on top of the world. Toto had just released a career-spanning box set, 40 Trips Around the Sun, to coincide with their 40th anniversary (and, even more coincidentally, sales of 40 million albums worldwide), and the band was in the midst of an extensive and successful global tour. Over the next year and a half, the group would continue to sell out arenas around the world.
The sheer fact that Toto were performing at all seemed remarkable. The group had been through more than its share of travails, including the deaths of three key members. Lukather treated each show like a victory lap, one he intended to repeat for the foreseeable future.
Flash forward to October 20, 2019: The band’s performance that night at Philadelphia’s Metropolitan Opera House
