Put your hands on your hips, let your backbone slip. Aside from donating, this is the key message in the music of the upcoming Spring fundraising edition of Triple-R Radio. Things lift off with Roy’s original 1966 copy of Wilson Pickett’s “Land Of 1000 Dances” featuring all the snaps, crackles and pops of a well played 55-year-old 45. The merriment continues with some early Alberta rockabilly from Scotty Stevenson; 1960s dance-fad singles from Huey ‘Piano’ Smith & The Clowns, Dee Dee Sharp, Sam Cooke, and Miriam Makeba; country boogie from Moon Mullican; 1930s movers from Lil Armstrong and Duke Ellington; dining and dancing tips from Aretha Franklin, and more.
That’s Sunday, April 25, 1pm, Mountain. Tune in as World Spinning host Lark Clark, joins RRR host Roy Forbes, for a lively hour of 45s and 78s – it’s a Spring Fundraising Dance Date on Roooy’s Record Room, the show that continues to revolve.
If you want to donate, go to www.ckua.com for full details.
See you Sunday!
Roy returns to the ‘78s from the crates’ series this week with a stack of cool shellac from the Stan Getz Quintet, the Rhythm Pals, Claude King & His Hillbilly Ramblers, Ella Mae Morse, Camille Howard, Fats Waller and many more.
That’s Sunday, April 18,1 PM, Mountain, for a few 78s from the crates on Rooooy’s Record Room, the show that continues to revolve, and revolve, and revolve…
Now officially fifteen years and counting.
On April 10, 2006, a brand-new show hit the CKUA airwaves. Fifteen years and a day later, RRR host, Roy Forbes, celebrates a decade-and-a-half of Triple-R Radio with esteemed CKUA announcer Grant Stovel along for the ride.
Grant and Roy talk about Roy’s lifelong passion for vinyl and shellac, spinning sides about buttercups, psychotic reactions, Tennessee hustlers, electrocution, love drops and more.
You’ll hear a few of Roy’s record collecting stories, from a sock hop at Frank Ross Junior Secondary high school in Dawson Creek, BC, to a cluttered, unheated back room of a Peace River, AB, junk shop. The playlist is jam-packed with treasures from Count Five, the Birmingham Jubilee Singers, the Fort Worth Doughboys, the Esquires, Wanda Jackson, Jimmie Rodgers (with Louis & Lil Armstrong), Barry Allen, and more.
Join the festivities on Sunday, April 11, 1pm Mountain, as Grant Stovel and Roy Forbes celebrate fifteen years of Rooooy’s Record Room, the show that continues to revolve, and revolve, and revolve.
Listen here:ckua.com/listen-live
This week, Roy will be mining the RRR archives for a stack of shellac celebrating the early years of the revered Atlantic label. You’ll hear some tough R&B, doo-wop, blues, and early rock ‘n’ roll from 1947 to 1957 featuring the sounds of Big Joe Turner, Stick McGhee & His Spo-Dee-O-Dee Buddies, The Clovers, Ruth Brown, Clyde McPhatter & The Drifters, T-Bone Walker, LaVerne Baker and more.
That’s Sunday, April 4, 1 PM, Mountain, for Atlantic Records at 78 rpm on Rooooy’s Record Room, the show that is a week away from celebrating fifteen years on the CKUA Radio Network.
Listen to the show on-line HERE.
Read a recent article in the Vancouver Sun by Francois Marchand about Roy’s recent revelation HERE.
His first album of original material in two decades feels as natural as his first recording.
by Pat Langston
Edge of Blue, the new album by Roy Forbes, glances backward while simultaneously speaking to the present.
The record is a tasty blend of soul, old-school rock’n’roll and country, with Forbes’s high, quavering voice—a voice that, decades ago, gave us the definitive cover of Hank Williams’s I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry—positioned front and centre.
When he decided to make the album, the West Coast artist quite consciously dipped into the past.
“I wanted to get back to the spirit of Kid Full of Dreams,” he says, referring to his debut album, released in 1975 when he was performing under the name of Bim. Back then, “I dug my heels in and said, ‘I want to sing everything live (off the floor).’ That’s the way you want to get me.”
Over the years, he’s taken advantage of technology for some records but for Edge of Blue the basic vocal tracks are live. There was some overdubbing and a couple of fixes along the way but not the autotuning and other tricks that make some singers sound so perfect it’s almost scary.
Making the album was “like it used to be. For the most part, what you’re hearing is what I was feeling. The vocals aren’t perfect but they are heartfelt.”
Even his pre-studio technique has an element of times past. When he’s working on a new song, for instance, he often uses a cassette recorder. He says it sounds terrible but he likes the tactile quality of the recorder’s buttons.
And though no one would accuse Forbes of living in the past, he mentions that most of the music he listens to comes from an earlier time, when today’s multi-track recording technology wasn’t available. If you’ve ever listened to the collection of 78s, 45s, and LPs he plays on his Sunday afternoon CKUA show Roy’s Record Room you’ll know what he means. Add it all up and this album feels like a first album to him.
“I can’t explain it, but it does,” says the man who has recorded 14 of them, including a couple as a member of UHF with Shari Ulrich and Bill Henderson. “I’ve kind of come full circle.”Continue reading
Roy got an early Christmas present this year…a Canadian Folk Music Awards nomination for Producer of the Year for his new album ‘Edge of Blue’. Since 1985, Roy has produced or co-produced all of his own albums as well as records by other artists. He is tickled to get the nod for this area of his work from the CFMA ‘Producer of the Year’ jury.
The awards will be held virtually on April 9th and 10th, 2021. Find out more here: folkawards.ca