This was a "live" simulcast from Rohan's, the hottest club in Vancouver in 1977. Broadcast by a local radio station, it exemplified a typical exciting night at this great club. "The blues is here to stay" is by Eddie Boyd, one of my favorite blues piano players, writers and vocalists, of the Chicago style. The RIDE band was an extremely diverse group from Eureka California and Vancouver, B.C. ( Drew Neville on keyboards, was from Vancouver). who toured extensively throughout Canada and the Pacific Northwest between 1975 and 1978. This was a time when the likes of Tom Lavin of (Powder Blues) and Jerry Doucette of (Doucette) would frequent the club and were no doubt influenced by RIDE, who also featured a three piece horn section and would blow tunes from Bobby Blands "That's the way love is" to New York's Fonia Allstar's "There it is", a strong latin dance piece.... and everything in between. Doucette, a year later (1978) would be a Juno award winner ( most promising group) and pen the Canadian rock national anthem "Mama let him play". Later he would ask me to join his band which I did, only to be billed with the Doobie Bros. national "Minute by Minute" tour, as well as the Beach Boys, Toto and the Atlantic Rhythm Section, just to name a few. And we did it all in 1979 and 80. Wow!!! The Powder Blues would play the clubs in Vancouver for a year or so and then release "Doin it right" in 1979, to become one of the most popular bands in Canada. Those were exciting days for all the acts in Vancouver,( to many to mention) and I still play tunes from Powder Blues and Doucette to this day, (my version of "What have I been drinkin' " by Dr. Ross and the Hellhounds is also on youtube......please check it out!). I hope you enjoy this "live" performance and the vociferous audience response by this great Vancouver crowd. This is truly a time capsule of Canadian/American music, performed in one of the seminal venues in Vancouver. This coalescence of Canadian/American musicians helped to formulate a genre which would have a strong influence on the future Canadian music scene. A big thank you to all my Canadian friends and fans, especially Fred Xavier who was the club owner.( those were the days!!) For more good music go to http://www.drrossrockin.com or http://www.myspace.com/drrossrockin The RIDE band line-up were as follows: guitar rhythm and vocal: Jim Alquist (nice stuff) bass: Jerry Reed (always solid) drums: Jon Chapman and Ernie Earnshaw (2 great drummers...cool ! ) lead guitar and vocals: Rich " Dr." Ross piano and organ: Drew Neville, a proud Canadian (who always inspired me to play better) special thanks to: Skip Parks for the slide show very special thanks to Dan Cowan who made it all happen for us. He was one of the main influences on the music scene in Vancouver at that time.

• published: 02 Apr 2010
• views: 1298