Hidden Track

For over 40 years, Canadian blues rock singer Colin James has cemented his double-platinum status with hits like "Five Long Years", "Voodoo Thing", and "Just Came Back". Now, the illustrious musician reflects on his journey with the debut of his book: Playing the Changes: A Musician's Memoir. In this episode of Hidden Track, Colin James delves into the inspiration and his process for bringing this memoir to life. He shares stories and gratitude for the mentors, heroes, and family who helped him along the way.

This episode wraps up our third annual collaboration with Music Yukon. This session of the Hidden Track podcast brings in two more artists from Canada's north. Ryan McNally and Claire Ness & The Rubies are the featured artists for this edition of the podcast.

First up is Ryan McNally. His distinctive brand of timeless roots-based music draws on his time growing up in a beautiful part of rural Southern Quebec.

Then it is Claire Ness, a multi-talented artist who describes her genre of music as "country meets jazz cabaret" and "playfully original folk-blues nostalgia from a wild Yukon wordsmith."

CREDITS

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette Senior Producer: Jasmine Vickaryous, Bronson Kashino Associate Producers: Scott Zielsdorf Host: Grant Stovel Music: Doug Hoyer Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's events and marketing teams!

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donour community. Thank you for your support!

This episode marks the start of our third annual collaboration with Music Yukon, where we feature the talented Northern artists they support in heading down to perform as part of the Edmonton International Fringe Festival. We're starting off strong with a two-part episode featuring two amazing Yukon-based acts!

Up first is John from Dawson, whose fun brand of boom-bap hip-hop has made him a CKUA and Music Yukon favourite. He is joined by DJ PJ, a new partnership that has added experimental electronic and drum'n'bass elements to his sound. The two are set to release an album together this year.

Major Funk is up next with a performance of "Starlight," featuring founding members Etienne Girard and Adrian Burrill alongside a talented group of musicians including new band members.

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette Senior Producer: Jasmine Vickaryous, Bronson Kashino Associate Producers: Scott Zielsdorf Host: Grant Stovel Music: Doug Hoyer Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams.

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donor community. Thank you for your support!

Valerie June's music is grounded in blues, country, Appalachian folk, gospel, and other veins of earthy roots music; but at the same time, it reaches for the heavens.

She's been deeply rooted in rural Tennessee her whole life, yet her music has also been informed by being based in Brooklyn for many years, and by travelling prolifically all across this world.

As Valerie chronicles in "My Life Is a Country Song," a track from her acclaimed latest album Owls, Omens, and Oracles, she faced great hardship personally and professionally early in her life.

Her latest record, her sixth, continues in what's now a long tradition of Valerie working with great producers, having M. Ward in the production chair, and calling in fabulous collaborators like her pal Norah Jones, and all-time gospel greats, The Blind Boys of Alabama.

CKUA's Grant Stovel caught up with Valerie as she was making her way towards Alberta for some summertime 2026 shows, including at the beloved Calgary Folk Music Festival.

CREDITS

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette Senior Producers: Jasmine Vickaryous, Bronson Kashino Associate Producer: Scott Zielsdorf Host: Grant Stovel Music: Doug Hoyer Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams.

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donor community. Thank you for your support!

How do you celebrate the 10th anniversary of an album that went gold, won a Juno Award, represents an artistic breakthrough, and seemingly foretold the deeply divided, disconnected world we inhabit today?

Well, if you're the band July Talk, you take those songs on a cross-country tour, you record the whole album again, ten years later...and you release the secret second entire album that you recorded a decade ago, but never put out.

Leah Fay Goldstein and Peter Dreimanis from July Talk join us for a very special Hidden Track Session, recorded live in CKUA's Studio A in Edmonton.

CREDITS

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette Senior Producer: Jasmine Vickaryous, Bronson Kashino Associate Producers: Scott Zielsdorf Host: Grant Stovel Music: Doug Hoyer Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams.

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donor community. Thank you for your support!

The band Broken Social Scene is a group that's all about creative friendships, inspiring and building upon each other's contributions, and collective joy through sharing music on as big a scale as possible.

Their greatly anticipated new album Remember the Humans is the first in more than 20 years to feature the production work of Dave Newfeld.

Broken Social Scene's Kevin Drew took some time backstage to chat with CKUA's Grant Stovel, in a tiny dressing room before soundcheck, to reflect on the past, present, and future of one Canada's most beloved, renowned, and influential rock groups.

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Credits:

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette Senior Producers: Jasmine Vickaryous, Bronson Kashino Associate Producer: Scott Zielsdorf Host: Grant Stovel Music: Doug Hoyer Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams.

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donor community. Thank you for your support!

Just like their music, a visit with East Pointers is always profound conversation — but feels just like a kitchen party!

There were, initially, three East Pointers when this band started a dozen years ago. Tim Chaisson, his cousin Koady Chaisson, and their great friend Jake Charron, were the key members of the band.

The band and their community suffered an unthinkable loss when Koady died unexpectedly and heartbreakingly in 2022.

Amazingly, Jake and Tim have carried on in Koady's memory, and with his presence still very much being felt in what they do, onstage and in the recording studio. Their beautiful 2026 album Schoonertown is both a very personal work and a slice-of-life story, reflecting experiences drawn from small-town life in Canada's East Coast.

The East Pointers stopped by CKUA's Edmonton studio for a laid-back and heartfelt conversation with CKUA's Grant Stovel.

Credits

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette

Senior Producers: Jasmine Vickaryous, Bronson Kashino

Associate Producer: Scott Zielsdorf

Host: Grant Stovel

Music: Doug Hoyer

Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams!

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donour community. Thank you for your support!

Cradled By the Waves is the title of Jenn Grant's wildly creative new stage show — a live multimedia expression of the music found on her latest album, Queen of the Strait. It's about family, life, death, art, relationships, nostalgia, home, love, heartbreak, and how, as she sings on the album's opening number called "Jim Cuddy Dress," "Nothing that's real ever fades." It's hard to decide whether Queen of the Strait is simply a brilliant album, or perhaps a musical version or a great short story collection, or an auditory interpretation of a visionary film. So it's appropriate that Jenn has — for the first time ever in her career — devised an ambitious, immersive production to convey the songs through dramatic storytelling, film projection, and elaborate stage craft. During a cross-Canadian tour, Jenn Grant and her brilliant band took some time to come visit us at CKUA, and we're so grateful for this candid, thought-provoking, yet fun and warm-hearted visit.

Credits

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette

Senior Producer: Jasmine Vickaryous

Associate Producers: Bronson Kashino, Scott Zielsdorf

Host: Grant Stovel

Music: Doug Hoyer

Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams.

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donour community. Thank you for your support!

While she's been releasing singles and EPs since the beginning of the 2020s, Katie Tupper has just released her debut record. She may be in her mid-20s, but Katie's been an artist to watch for many years already. This full-length album provides her with the space to stretch her musical boundaries, build on her very personal approach to songcraft, and venture into some new sonic and groove territory.

We caught up with this artist from Saskatoon just as her debut LP, Greyhound, is about to launch, and as she ramps up for a tour which will take her to the Broadway Theatre in her hometown and wrap up at the Winnipeg Folk Music Festival.

CREDITS

Executive Producer: Arianne Smith-Piquette

Senior Producer: Jasmine Vickaryous

Associate Producers: Bronson Kashino, Scott Zielsdorf

Host: Grant Stovel

Music: Doug Hoyer

Graphics: Tomas Spasiuk

Special thanks to CKUA's Events and Marketing teams.

The Hidden Track Podcast is a CKUA production, made possible by the generosity of our donor community. Thank you for your support!